“Or a worse one. Like, so bad that there’s no way I’d make up something so bad. My boyfriend, Percival.”
“Hey! Percival is my grandpa’s name.”
I whirl to him, free hand over my mouth. “Oh my gosh, I’m so sorry! It was just—”
“Luce, I’m teasing you.” He’s grinning as I shove his shoulder, laughing. In an effort to keep me from pushing him away, he grabs my hand. “I’m sorry. Couldn’t help it. It’s cute how literal you are.”
It’s cute. Cute. Me. Okay.
His fingers, still laced through mine.
“So!” he says cheerfully. “Would it be okay for me to kiss you, then?”
I stop dead. Blink. My heartbeat is a throb, almost painful. “Now?”
That smile, smug and amused. Oh, save me. Literal Jesus in heaven, help me because I cannot withstand it, and I don’t even want to.
“Not necessarily,” he says. “I know you just broke up with someone. But, you know, sometime.”
“Yes,” I blurt out. “Sure. Great.”
Sure? I said SURE, GREAT?? God, I know You hear me! Bail a girl out!
“Okay, good.” His eyes sweep over mine.
He turns to go, even though our hands stay linked.
“Wait, I . . .” My mouth hangs open as I fail to finish that sentence—any sentence. He steps back to me anyway. He’s grinning until the split second before he presses his lips to mine.
What was your first kiss with Jones like? they’ll ask someday. Oh, come on, I’ll reply. I’m not going to talk about that.
Because how could I ever really explain his sure hands on my neck, tilting my face up to his? How a black ceiling of stars arched over us, pine branches bowing to cocoon us against the earth. How I clung to him because the ground flew out beneath us—or maybe we rocketed upward. How my heart beat so fast that I almost felt like laughing. Because it’s giddy to stumble into magic, to realize what this can feel like. Each kiss a phrase exchanged between us: There you are. There you are. I wasn’t even looking for him, so why do I feel found?
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
Is there any stretch of time longer than the space between a first and second kiss? As the girls zip around the cabin, getting ready for the day, I’m goofy-faced and dazed. I keep pressing my fingers to my lips, as if I can hold the feeling there.
“What is going on with you?” Keely asks as we herd our campers toward breakfast.
“Me? Nothing.? Just excited to have another night off.” It’s our one Saturday free, thanks to Henry’s brass band performance at the Fourth of July festival in town.
When I spot him walking toward the lodge, my heart takes a whole note rest between its beats of percussion. In a crisp white T-shirt, short sleeves neatly cuffed, he’s James Dean—but with a leather trumpet case slung across his chest like a weekend bag. Nobody has any business being this cool. Although . . . he did confess to me last week that those tortoiseshell sunglasses are prescription. So maybe not that cool.
“Ohhh,” Keely says, peeling away to give us space. “Gotcha.”
“Shut up,” I mumble.
“Hey,” he says. We stand there, exchanging the stupid, helpless smiles of having a really good secret.
“Hi.”
Gosh, we’re dummies.
“So, I’m off to the festival to help set up everything. But I’ll see you there later?”
“Yeah.”
He reaches for my hand, like instinct, before remembering there are campers all around. The backs of our knuckles brush. Even that tiny touch almost makes me feel fluttery.
The rest of the day drags like a middle-school band tempo, but we’re off duty once the girls go to dinner.
I emerge from the bunk bathroom, minimal makeup and hair falling loosely.
“Hmm,” Keely says, taking my outfit in. The sound is a pronouncement.
I’m wearing my favorite shorts: pale, cuffed denim. Well, they’re my favorite to look at anyway, but I’m always too self-conscious to wear them. This is probably my favorite shirt too. White linen and floaty, so wide-necked that I have to wear a tank top underneath. It slips off one shoulder sometimes, in a way that I think looks casual and soft. So if Keely hates this look, I really don’t have a better option. “What?”
She goes back to lacing her boots. “Nothing.”
“Oh, come on, Keels. Now I feel like I need to go change.”
“Don’t.” The word is sharp, commanding. “You look like you.”
“I look like me?”
“Yeah. This look seems really ‘Lucy’ to me.”
I’m stunned to silence, but luckily Keely doesn’t expect a response. She looks, of course, masterfully cool in an olive-green T-shirt dress and her combat boots. The only reason I had the nerve to wear these shorts is because I’ve been watching how she dresses. The fabric hugs all the round places of her body, and she wears everything like she has quiet knowledge of her beauty, her power. So here I am, exposing thighs that I’ve always wished were smaller.
Mohan shows up in a Springsteen shirt, Anna beside him in American flag shorts. It feels heady, the swell of excitement that will pop into fireworks.
It’s a solid twenty-minute walk into town, and Anna slows us down by picking roadside flowers. She calls them daisies, though I think they might be fancy weeds. My hair rises in the humidity, even curlier than usual, and I run my hands along the white picket fences, nearly skipping.
“Stand still a sec,” Anna says. She places the stems of a few flowers into my hair. “Your curls hold them so well!”
The park greets us with swarms of people in aggressively patriotic outfits. I breathe in sparkler smoke and bug spray and the aroma of spicy, food-truck meat. There’s a familiar scent on the breeze, floral but tangy. Petunia. They’re planted all over the edges of the park, red and white and purple against dark mulch.
My mom plants petunias every spring. In terra-cotta pots for our porch. Velvety petals. From the side, each bloom looks like a Victrola. The smell of soil, hose water in the metal watering can.
In this moment, my senses full of memory, I miss her so much that my chest aches. I briefly consider sprinting to Holyoke, throwing myself onto the couch beside her for a movie marathon. But no. This is what she wants for me, friendships and good summer memories. She made that clear enough.
The park fills the center of town, with a gazebo on the far end. That’s where the music is coming from, a spirited cover of “Brown-Eyed Girl.”
Anna stops at a free spot of grass on the lawn, one of the last where our blanket will fit. “This is good.”