“Sorry it’s so slow.”
He sighed again. “Me, too. But Ari, your mother . . .” He raised his eyes to me now and really looked at me, then out the door toward where all my temptations lay. Temptations he seemed jealous of. “You know something?” he said, his tone changing suddenly. “To hell with your mother. You’re seventeen and it’s summer and you have a boyfriend. Go to the goddamn lake.”
“Really?”
“Seriously.”
“I owe you one,” I said, when I really meant to say “thank you.” Because the truth was, I didn’t owe him one. I owed him zero.
“Don’t forget about Dani,” Richard said, trying to keep a stern voice, but he was already beaming. Probably because I was beaming.
I stepped out of the back room to find Camden waiting just outside. When I flashed him a thumbs-up, he threw his head back and laughed in that Peter Pan way of his. He wrapped his arms around me and lifted me off the ground.
I know he put me back a second later, but I never felt it.
I had to make a quick stop at my house so I could change into my bathing suit and grab a towel. Camden came with me, and Max left with Eliza. James was picking up Kendall, I’d been informed. It was all planned out, they said.
As I drove with Camden away from the store and Main Street, into the infinity of the day, Camden put his hand on my knee. I rolled down my window and let my left hand greet the rushing air, ribboning through my spread fingers. In this way, it was almost as if he was holding me down so I didn’t fly out of the car like a balloon. Because I felt that light, that capable of being carried away.
Camden waited in the car while I ran into my house, then back out again five minutes later. When we got to the lake, the early birds had just arrived to stake out their spots. Mabel was writing the day’s ice cream offerings on her whiteboard. The place had that Heart of Summer feel, another day where all kinds of life would happen here and it seemed impossible that in six months’ time, the lake would be frozen and abandoned, the beach lost in a foot of snow.
Kendall and James were already there when we arrived. In our old spot. I looked at it and Kendall saw me look at it, then smiled at me.
“Brings back memories,” she said.
“Shhh,” I whispered as I leaned in to hug her. “Thou shalt not talk about last summer.”
Kendall nodded and I spread my blanket out next to her. She watched James rather suspiciously as he went over to talk to Eliza and Max.
“What’s the matter?” I asked.
“I’m befuddled.”
“How was it when he picked you up?”
“Really boring,” she sighed. “He came in. He met my mom. We drove away.”
“Did he open the car door for you first, or did he get in on his side, then do a lean-and-unlock?”
Kendall’s shoulders slumped. “He leaned and unlocked.”
“I wish you’d relax and stop trying to figure him out. You like him, you’re spending time with him. At the lake, no less! That should be enough for now. That’s plenty.”
“That’s easy for you to say, newly crowned Queen of the Fangirls. You’ve got your king.”
“Jamie told you about AlternateArt?”
“Yes.” She snaked the sss.
I opened my mouth to say what was destined to be another platitude, something from the repertoire of supportive-sounding but clinically empty best-friend-isms. But then Camden sat down next to me and wriggled out of his shirt. It was almost alarming to see him in a bathing suit now, his chest with the beads of sweat trailing down, his waist with the hint of fuzz in the middle. He hadn’t been shirtless that whole night at the Barn, yet here he was in all his uncharted territory. There went my kneecaps again.
Then James and Eliza and Max joined us. A cooler bag was opened, tortilla chips and iced tea passed around. We talked about plans for the SuperCon: what costume tweaks had to happen, what panels we should attend, who was going to drive. Eliza told a hilarious story about a cat she’d been pet-sitting for.
“I thought he had a piece of pink ribbon stuck to his back legs. So I tried to pick it off, but then realized the ribbon was not stuck to his back legs. It was coming out of his butt.”
We offered a collective ew.
“Did you pull it out?” asked Camden.
“Uh-uh. You’re not supposed to ever do that. In case you pull its intestines out or something. No, I watched that litter box like a hawk for two days. Then . . . voilà. It was enough ribbon to wrap a present!”
We all cracked up.
“Please don’t ever give me that present,” said Max.
Eliza laughed, then eyed him sharply. “See, Max. I laughed. Evidence of a sense of humor.”