The Square Root of Summer(39)

“My maybe-best-friend’s a dick. And it’s uneven at the back.”

“Hey, Sof.” I nudge her. “Do you want to come over this Friday? You could help me even it up. And Thomas makes really good cake…”

There’s a pause, then she asks “Gluten-free?” and I know I have her.

“Certified fun-free, I promise.” I give it a second, then make my next offer. “Want to know a secret? Something Thomas doesn’t know.”

“Depends.” She takes off her sunglasses and squints at me. Fondness fills me up as I think: I’m not ready for this friendship to be over. “Is it a good secret?”

“I had sex with Jason.”

Ned should be here to photograph the look on her face.

This is how it would go if things were normal between us:

“Wooowww.” Sof would scramble upright and wolf-howl into the air.

She’d use up the world’s supply of vowels. I’d tell her about me and Jason, how he’d done it before and I, very obviously, hadn’t. But how quickly that turns out not to matter. We’d talk and eat licorice till our tongues turned black, go over every detail.

There would be a thousand questions. Is that why you were reading Forever? Are you on the pill? Did I need her to talk me through the options? And Jason? Did he strike a pose halfway through? Sof’s head would go Exorcist, and I’d love her for all the reasons I couldn’t last summer: her enthusiasm, her exuberance, her nosiness, her put-on air of worldly wisdom. She’d peer at me over her poseur sunglasses and explain that there was no such thing as virginity and have I read Naomi Wolf and penetration is just a myth anyway and I know that, right?

What actually happens: Sof picks her jaw off the floor and a piece of nail varnish from her toe before croaking, “When was this? He’s going out with Meg.”

“This was before that.”

I can’t tell her how long before. This is the trouble with secrets—you can’t just reveal them and hope for normality. Even when exposed, they leave ripples in the universe, like a stone skimmed on the canal.

“You know he and Meg are going to be at Ned’s party.”

Even though it’s happening at my house, there’s no question—it’s Ned’s party, not mine. Thirteen days and counting down.

“I’m sorry I didn’t tell you before,” I say. “About Jason.”

“Yeah, well.” Sof jams her sunglasses back on. “I don’t tell you all my secrets.”

“About Jason,” I say, not any lighter for telling her. “You’re the only one who knows…”

“And you want me not to tell Ned,” she says, standing up. Ever since the time capsule, Ned’s been popping up between me and Thomas like a jack-in-the-box. Lurking in front of the bathroom door and in the kitchen like a Roman centurion. Never leaving us alone. “Shall we swim?”

The ferns sway as we walk silently to the prow of the boat. At the edge, we stand side by side, together but not.

“Best summer ever?” I ask Sof. It’s so, so far from that, but that’s what I always used to say.

And she always used to say the same thing back: Nah—next year will be better.

This time, she doesn’t bother to answer. Instead, ahead of me in everything like always, she dive-bombs into the mirror-smooth canal, shattering all that blue into a thousand pieces.

Swimming with Sof—that was the plan. But by the time I jump in after her, the canal’s a wormhole.

I let myself sink into the cool, clear water.

*

After I come bursting up for air, I turn onto my back, and float. Earlier, when we were kissing, Jason persuaded me to take my hair out of its topknot. Now it’s drifting out around me in the water. I’m a mermaid.

I close my eyes as the sun washes over me, enjoying the contrast of warm on my stomach and cool underneath. When Jason calls my name, it sounds far away, as though we’re in two different places.

It’s only after he says “Margot” for the third or fourth (hundredth) time, I bother opening my eyes. He’s upside down above me, leaning over the prow of Sof’s boat. Her whole family’s on vacation, and I’m on plant-watering duty. The canal is the perfect Ned-free and everyone-free zone.

“Hi.” I crinkle my nose, wishing I could reach up and topple him into the water.

“Hi, daydreamer.” He smiles down at me, love and sunglasses. “Are you ever planning to get out?”

“Nope.” I splash with my hands a little, and he laughs. “You could get in…”

“I didn’t bring my bikini,” he jokes.

I close my eyes, because I don’t dare say this with them open: “So swim naked.”

Shortly afterwards, there’s a splash. I tip myself upright, treading water, and Jason’s beside me. Wet hair flopping into his eyes, bare chest, warm eyes inky blue. And as he looks at me, I suddenly get it. This isn’t the Big Bang. It’s just summer. But it’s still love. It’s still something.

“Now you,” he says, cocky. His arm slides around my waist, holding me steady, and we half swim to the side of the boat. Our gazes don’t break as I reach behind me to unhook my bikini top and fling it over the boat-rail, where it drips cool and steady into the canal next to us.