Where the Stars Still Shine(27)

“I’ll be right back.” I hop down from the tailgate, go inside the store, and buy a Drumstick. I throw the ice-cream sandwich away.

Alex doesn’t comment on my weird ice-cream-buying habit as I hoist myself onto the tailgate. “Ready for your sponge identification lesson?”

“Really?”

He leans back and slides a blue milk crate toward us. Inside are sponges.

“This one is the easiest,” he says, pulling out one with a stem and about a dozen long knobby-knuckled fingers. “It’s the finger sponge. It’s not used for anything except decoration, and tourists love it.”

The next one resembles a bowl, with a hollowed-out center and a flat bottom.

“Grass sponge,” he says. “The small sizes are used for painting and, I guess, for putting on makeup, but the pot-shaped ones are really popular in the store. People put plants in them.”

He drops it into the crate and draws out another. “Wire sponges are mostly used for insulation, so you don’t really have to think about this one because we sell these to industrial customers.”

He tosses that one over his shoulder and brings out two more that look similar to each other.

“Wool and yellow sponges are fairly interchangeable, but the wool is softer. Wool sponges are for personal stuff, like taking a bath or shower, and yellow sponges are the household ones for washing dishes or whatever. You can use grass sponges for all that stuff, too, but tourists want to think they’re getting something special so we make the distinction.”

“Finger, wool, grass, wire, and yellow,” I repeat.

“Yep.” Alex pops the last bit of Drumstick in his mouth and brushes his fingers on his jeans. “And if you forget, wing it. Tourists are going to believe anything you say because you’re beautiful and you’re Greek. So you can tell them a grass sponge is a wool sponge and they won’t know the difference.”

He hands me the wool sponge. “For you.”

“I’ve smelled these things on your boat.” I crinkle my nose and hand it back. “I’m not sure I want that thing touching me in the shower.”

Alex laughs and swaps it for the finger sponge. He presents it to me like a bouquet of flowers, pulling it out from behind his back with a flourish. “Sponges are better than flowers,” he says, as if he’s read my mind, “because they’ll never die. They’re already dead.”

I take the sponge. It’s quite pretty, really—like a winter tree bowing to the breeze—and it’s the closest thing I’ve ever come to getting flowers from a boy. Or any gift at all. Still, I laugh it away, so he can’t see that it means something. “Thanks.”

“There’s more where that came from.” He gives me an exaggerated wink. “Of course, I’d have to dive down and harvest them, so—just hang on to that one, okay?”

“Is sponging really that bad?”

“Not really.” He leans on his hands and looks up at the sky. It’s kind of hard to see with the lights of the gas station, but the moon has expanded since the last time I paid attention to it and it’s peeking around the edge of the Sparta sign. “I’ve always loved it. I mean, being underwater is—I don’t think I can even explain it in a way that will make sense. I’m a lot more comfortable in the water than I am on dry land. But my crewmate Jeff doesn’t dive. He handles everything on deck, which is cool, but I never have the option of not going down. I can’t be tired. I can’t be sick.”

“What if you are sick?”

“No sponges, no money,” he says, glancing at his watch, a wide brown strap lashed around his wrist. “So unless I can’t breathe, I go. And speaking of going … we should probably head home.”

I don’t want to go yet, but we’re well into tomorrow and I start work in only a handful of hours. “Yeah.”

Alex parks the truck down the street from Greg’s house and lets me out on the driver’s side so he won’t have to slam the passenger door. “I’d walk you home.” He keeps his voice low. “But under the circumstances—”

“It’s okay.” I nod. “Thanks for—”

He cuts me off with a kiss that makes my toes curl under and my heart feel as if it’s going to climb right out of my chest and throw itself at his feet. It’s an entirely new feeling.

“I, um—” he says, getting back into the truck. “See you later.”

I stand there for—I don’t know—maybe a minute, wondering what is happening between Alex Kosta and me. Just when it feels as if this might be something more than nothing, he pulls away. He doesn’t make me feel as if I’m just another piece of ass, but maybe he’s just better at this game than Danny or Matt or—Adam. I remember now that the first guy’s name was Adam and he played guitar in a park, busking for change. He charmed me with a little song he made up on the spot with my name in it, and at thirteen I lost my virginity to him in his van.

It’s a distinct possibility that I am a terrible judge of character.

I sneak over the fence, being careful not to trample the flowers, and press myself into the shadows until I’m inside the Airstream. I place the finger sponge on the little shelf above my bed and crawl in, not bothering to even take off my clothes. Alex’s scent lingers on my pillow, and I fall asleep with the ghost of his fingers moving through my hair.