What Happens Now(61)

“I’m not sure Eliza is capable of doing anything that’s not for the benefit of others to enjoy,” said Max, who was wandering down the greeting card aisle.

“Excuse me?” she snapped at him.

“What? You live to entertain. You know that already.”

“Why would you say it like that?”

“Like how?”

“Like a dickhead?”

“I was kidding,” said Max. “Christ. What happened to your sense of humor?”

Eliza gave him what I would classify as the most withering look I’ve ever seen, then hopped off the counter and put away her phone.

Camden motioned for me to lean in close to him. I did. His breath was warm as he whispered, “We’re here to steal you.”

“What?”

“To the lake. It’s a gorgeous day.”

I drew back. “You can’t steal me.”

“Uh, stealing doesn’t really operate that way. You don’t need the stealee’s permission. You simply do it.”

“I’m at work.”

“Can’t you ask Richard for the rest of the day off?”

“I’m not really supposed to . . .”

“He’s your stepdad, for God’s sake,” said Eliza. “He’s not going to fire you. The worst that’ll happen is that he says no.”

“My mom will kill me.” As soon as I said it, I wasn’t really sure it was true. Would she? Would she care that I wavered from the schedule, on her first day at her new job to boot? And would I care that she cared?

“Nobody will kill you, Ari,” said Camden calmly.

My eyes found his and I felt something that might have been a hunger pang, if I hadn’t just eaten breakfast.

“You are absolutely right.”

I went to the back room, where Richard was standing on the stepladder, reaching to put something on a shelf. His shirt hiked up and I could see how white the skin on his back was. Poor guy. Had he been outside in the sunlight at all this summer?

“Hi,” I said softly, worried that if I startled him, he’d fall.

“What’s up?” he asked, distracted. He hadn’t been his usual Mr. Sunny Sunshine all morning. Starting when, you know, my mom left the house at 7:00 a.m. in a supernova of jitters, snapping at each of us and cursing her way out the door.

“Camden’s here. He wants to say hello.” That was good.

“Oh, okay. I’ll be out in a bit.”

“His friends Eliza and Max are here, too. You can meet them.”

Richard nodded. I turned away and started back into the store, my courage deflating now. It really was a bad day to do this. Even if there wasn’t a single customer in the next few hours, he seemed so down and . . . lonely.

But there was Camden, leaning against the counter with his hair falling across his face, and I didn’t know which I wanted to touch more—the hair or the face. We hadn’t been truly alone since the morning after the fair, and my fingers itched for him.

There, too, was the blue sky through the store window, and the promise of cool water and the sand between my toes and basically everything else in the world.

“Actually,” I said slowly, as if this were a brainstorm coming to me now. “I’m wondering if you need me here today. They’re all going to the lake and I really want to go with them. I’d leave in time to get Dani from camp.”

Now Richard turned all the way around and sat down on the top of the ladder.

“You’re wondering if I need you here today . . . ,” he repeated.

“Well, maybe I’m a little more than wondering.”

Richard sighed. “No,” he said with a shrug. “I don’t need you here.”

“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.