Girl Out of Water(71)

Everyone stares at me for a long, silent second—and then they break into laughter. Why does this keep happening to me? “This is like a regular occurrence,” Wendy says. “Since my parents work such weird hours, we try to do a giant breakfast at least once a month. You know. Bonding time and all.”

Lisa leans over and ruffles Wendy’s chopped hair. “Won’t be the same without you next year, sweetie,” she says.

“Next year?” I ask.

“Wendy’s going to school in Miami.”

“Whoa,” I say. “Isn’t that scary to go so far away?”

“Not really. I mean, it’s college, right? Isn’t moving away half the point?” Wendy forks a giant glob of eggs into her mouth.

No. “I guess…”

“You’re a senior this year, right? Where are you applying?” Wendy asks.

I shrug. “Probably just a safety school and USC—University of Santa Cruz. It’s a pretty good school and all.”

The conversation shifts, but despite my deflections, it keeps coming back to me. I know they’re trying to be nice, but it makes me uncomfortable to talk about myself.

“Will your mom be in Santa Cruz?” Sam asks after I tell him about Surf Break. “I know you mentioned your dad is still in Nebraska.”

I pause midbite. Lincoln takes my hand under the table and squeezes it once.

“I don’t know. It’s…complicated,” I say.

“You don’t know?” Lisa asks, concerned.

Lincoln cuts in, “Mr. Miller—Sam—you have to tell me what you put in these eggs. Take pity on me, please.”

Sam smiles and shakes his head. “That’s a trade secret,” he says but then proceeds to launch into a lengthy recipe anyway. I quietly zone out of the conversation. I know I should be better at answering questions about my mom by now, but it’s still so difficult. There’s no easy way to say my mom likes to run away for months, sometimes years at a time, without a word to anyone and then show up on our doorstep like everything is fine.

Once I told someone she was dead because it seemed easier.

Lincoln’s phone beeps. He pulls it out of his pocket. “Crap. That’s the alarm. We should get going soon if we want to make it to Santa Cruz at a decent hour.”

“It’s already six?” I ask.

We spent two hours eating and talking?

“We should get going too,” Lisa says. “We’re already more than an hour late, but you know, special occasion and all.”

Lincoln and I stand and start to clear the table, but Wendy shoos us away. “Guests don’t clean,” she says, “especially guests who are here for less than twelve hours.”

“Speaking of which, where’d you sleep last night?” Lincoln asks.

Wendy smiles covertly, shrugs her shoulders, and mumbles something about pranksters never sleep. I think her parents pretend not to hear her.

Lincoln and I hurry to get ready. There’s only one bathroom, so we skip showers and quickly brush our teeth and wash our faces. I pull out fresh clothes from my tote—athletic shorts, underwear, and a soft V-neck shirt—and put them on. Lincoln changes after me, and when he walks out of the bathroom, I can’t keep my mouth from gaping.

“Umm…no,” I say.

Lincoln grins widely. “Umm…yes.”

He’s wearing his Hawaiian print shirt.

“I’m just trying to get into the California spirit,” he says.

I shake my head, but don’t say anything else. There’s no way I’m going to let him wear that when he meets my friends.

“Man, I wish I could come with you guys,” Wendy says as we walk back outside, the early morning sun already heating the air. Even though I’ve known her less than twelve hours, I wish she could come too. I really like her. Plus, she’d give Lincoln company for part of the drive back to Nebraska.

“Umm…do you want to come?” I ask.

Lincoln and Wendy both look shocked by the invitation.

Maybe I need to make an effort to be nicer.

Okay, I definitely need to make an effort to be nicer.

“There’s plenty of room at my house. You’re totally welcome.”

Wendy lets out a big sigh, actually more of a grunt. “I totally wish that I could, but I’m leaving for Miami in T minus five days, and if you didn’t notice last night, I’m kind of the opposite of packed.” Wendy gives me a tight hug and then does the same to Lincoln, telling him, “You know, it wouldn’t be the worst thing ever if you came and visited me next year in Florida.”

Lincoln laughs. “Considering that drive is about twice as long as this one, I don’t know if that’s going to happen any time soon.”

“You could always fly.”

Lincoln shifts uncomfortably. I stare at him and then Wendy and then back to him. “Oh my god,” I say. “You’re scared of flying! Lincoln Puk is actually scared of something!”

“Okay, okay. So I’m scared of flying. What’s the big deal? Lots of people are scared of flying.”

“So you’ll fling yourself off of a ten-foot ramp, but you won’t get in an airplane?”

“An airplane goes a lot higher than ten feet.”