What I Thought Was True(30)

Nic’s face is stormy, almost threatening.

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“So what? You’ll get it, Nico. Cool down.”

“No, listen,” Nic continues, flexing his fingers. “Look . . . I feel weird telling you this, but . . . I get to the next table and it’s Spence Channing, buddy-buddy with Alex Robinson. Talking about you.

Alex says you were ‘a fun time.’ A fun time? That assclown. Spence just laughs and says you’re a swim team tradition. He’s on my f*cking team and he’s disrespecting my cousin. I mean, I’m on the bus, I hear how they talk about girls—all ‘I’d tap that’ and ‘she’s hot, but-her face’—but this is you, Gwen. Who the hell does he think he is? Who the hell does he think you are?”

I swallow. My face heats, freezes, then gets hot again. Spence knows who I am. Better than I’d like.

“Then I have to refill his goddamn water glass, not punch his face in . . .” Nic’s hand curls into a fist and he glares across the room, then looks back at me. “Aw, cuz. I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have said anything. I wasn’t thinking, too pissed off, I—”

“No big deal, Nico. I have a ways to go before I become a tradition. Plus, I’m going to have a hard time with Hank Klein, unless he breaks up with Scott Varga. But, you know me, I thrive on a challenge.”

“Don’t, Gwen,” Nic says quietly. “Not with me.”

I’m silent as we push through the half-plastic, half-cloth curtain that shields the main tent from the makeshift kitchen/

prep area.

“About time, Guinevere!” Al says, thrusting another tray of shrimp and cocktail sauce at me. I take it, pull back the curtain and scan the tent, searching for the navy stripes of Alex’s seersucker jacket.

It’s sort of like Where’s Waldo . . . there are a lot of blue-and-102

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white striped jackets. Finally I locate him, still sitting next to Spence. But now he’s talking to some redheaded chick on his left and Spence has on his half-amused, half-bored face. Which is his go-to expression, the world-weary aristocrat. He only looks happy when he’s swimming, training, or hanging out with Cass and the rest of his crew.

He perks up when I appear at his elbow. “Castle! Am I glad to see you. A favor? The bartender’s a little elusive. Snag a bottle of champagne for us here?”

Brushing a piece of his shiny, very straight dark hair out of his eyes, he gives me his practiced slow smile, the trademark once-over. Spence is good-looking, no lie. But there’s something too sharp. Like you could paper-cut yourself on him without him even noticing.

I take a deep breath, tightening my grip on the tray. “Not my job, Channing. I just do the setup and pass the food. Plus, you’re underage.”

“It’s a wedding rehearsal dinner. All rules are suspended. All of them. I just walked by my uncle Red in the backseat of his car with one of the bridesmaids.” He lowers his voice to a loud whisper. “Don’t tell Aunt Claire.”

Since I have no idea who Aunt Claire or Uncle Red are, this is unlikely. But it throws me off for a second before I say, “I’m not here to wait on you. I’m here to tell you you’ve got the wrong word.”

An emotion—in this case, puzzlement—actually crosses his face. “Come again?”

“If I were a swim team ‘tradition,’ Spencer, I would be something that happened repeatedly.”

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Another emotion, a brief flash of embarrassment. “I didn’t mean for you to hear about that.”

“Maybe next time you should pay more attention to who’s pouring your ice water. Did you really think Nic wouldn’t pass that one on? He may be your teammate, but he’s my cousin.

Blood trumps chlorine.”

Alex has picked up on my raised voice and peeks over, takes in the situation, turns away, clearly distancing himself from any potential “scene.” He hated scenes, probably why he broke up with me by text.

“I think the word you were going for is mascot. You should work on your vocab, or your SATs are going to tank.”

I walk away to the sound of Spence’s startled laughter.

When Vivie and Nic drop me outside our house, I hold my hand up in farewell, climb two steps, and plunk down wearily on the porch. The back of one of my shoes is jabbing into my heel like a blade saw.

The sky is hazy summer-night beautiful, with the moon cutting sharp into the dark, but the stars are nothing but pin-pricks. The night breeze is shifting, stirring through the woods, over the water, bringing in the silty, sandy smell of low-tide.

I look down the High Road. The quartz embedded in the tar glitters in the moonlight. Seashell has no streetlamps. This late at night, barely any windows are still lit in the long line of houses along the road. The Field House is five down from ours.

I wonder if Cass stayed late at the party. I didn’t see him as we packed up the van to leave. Partly because I tried really hard 104

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not to look. Will he spend the night in town in his sailing-ship house, or here on Seashell? I rub my hands up and down my arms, abruptly chilly in the night breeze, and wonder why I’m suddenly thinking about Cass Somers so much. Gah. Part of the whole point of this summer was to forget him.