Chapter Four

The drive to Captain's Lake, North Carolina, takes three hours. It's a winding, uncomfortable drive through the mountains, triggering my car sickness. Leaves fly through my headlights in the dark, and I stop for a Coke and some mints.

A three-and-a-half-hour drive.

Before I get to the house, I stop at The Square Meal, the little market in Loxley, the nearest town to Captain's Lake. David's family lives in this town, and he, his parents and his two younger sisters made little dent in the population of year-round residents.

Giant, expensive vacation homes line the mountainous region around the lake, and Loxley takes this into consideration, which is why the brick-paved downtown streets are decorated with Christmas decorations already: icy blue banners, lights swinging from lamp post to lamp post, an undecorated tree waiting in the square. A few mums remain on storefront stoops. Signs are taped to the doors with Thanksgiving day hours.

I walk inside the market, collecting a wicker basket at the entrance and waving to the man at the small deli.

It's as warm as I remember. Tiled floors, shiplap walls, fresh flowers, and wooden shelves with essentials. I walk down the aisles, smiling at the assortment of organic, locally sourced honey and off-brand Doritos.

During the summer, David worked here on and off, and we would ride our bikes up to see him before he and Francesca started dating at sixteen. They'd flirt at the register, and I'd pick up baking supplies, like I'm doing now.

Flour, sugar, baking powder, baking soda, chocolate, nuts. I also grab some oil, butter, milk, and eggs because the house's pantry staples might still be edible, but I don't want to take any chances.

I turn the corner and catch my breath as the song playing overhead changes. If Heddy thinks the Universe is doing this, then he/she and I need to have a little chat.

I squint, trying to block out the sound of Adam's voice because when I hear his voice, I see his face, which isn't hard to do in this building.

The first time I met him was for five minutes in the backyard. The second time was in the breakfast items aisle.

Swinging his basket and singing to himself, he had stopped short when he saw me, recognition pouring over his face.

He wore dark blue shorts with holes in the pockets and duct tape patching tears in the hem. His loose striped shirt hadn't been buttoned properly, leaving the right side of his chest exposed to a silver chain and tan, freckled skin. His boat shoes were scuffed, and his fingertips and nails were dirty.

With such an appearance, it'd be easy not to think much of him. However, when my eyes finally passed the disheveled clothing, he made my heart stop.

It wasn't just the smooth squareness of his clean-shaven blemish-free jaw, the dark brown eyes lined with black lashes, or the thick, furrowed eyebrows. More than anything, I was attracted to the rumpled chocolate-brown hair and hodgepodge outfit he wore so casually, as if it didn't matter that he hadn't brushed his hair or picked clothes that matched.

I didn't put a ton of effort into my summer lake attire, either, but I lacked Adam's natural charisma.

If a stranger looked at my appearance the way I judged him then, I would have passed over my basket, slunk into the smallest possible form, and crawled away, expecting to be booed and sprayed with salt.

Not Adam. That day, he shifted his weight, the chain sliding over a wide collarbone, his mouth half raising to a smile.

"You're my neighbor," he said.

"Yes," I replied, barely able to look at him.

My nervousness didn't have anything to do with being eighteen and finding him attractive – I'd long gotten over that dry-mouthed, half-blacking out in front of a boy phase – but rather because of my sister's stern warning.

Even though I merely said ‘hello' to him the day before, Francesca had dragged me into the kitchen immediately and just said, "No. Just no. Don't even think about it."

Don't even think about dating our hot new neighbor on the last summer of our sisterhood. This summer is about you and me, Vienna. No distractions.

Adam peered his eyes into my basket and asked me, "What are you buying?"

I decided not to be weird, since I promised my sister I wasn't interested and would not go out with him, were such a fine specimen of man interested in my mystery thigh bruises and cropped Care Bears shirt.

"Um, stuff for chocolate chip cookies," I answered.

Adam nodded, his mouth on the verge of saying something.

I jutted my chin to the items behind him. "I also need to get some coffee."

"Sure." He slid out of the way.

I looked up at the top shelf, then glanced at my new neighbor who waited for me to get the bag of Heddy's favorite organic coffee beans.

"I'm about to do something that I'm not proud of," I said, placing my basket on the ground.

He tilted his head. "Are you going to steal some coffee?"

"No."

I settled my foot on the second to the bottom shelf and climbed up to the top. If it had been on the edge of the shelf, I could have jumped and swiped it, but Heddy told people about this brand, and it grew in popularity. She brewed it in the sister location of Magic and Minerals, which happened to be next door.

As I climbed down from the shelf, something warm touched my skin. My feet on the ground, I discovered Adam touching me, his palm pressed into the visible part of my back.

"I didn't want you to fall," he said, looking down at my eyes.

"I'm fine, I do that all the time," I said, stepping away and pulling the edge of my shirt down.

He spread his fingers wide and stuck them in his back pocket, shaking his head, cheeks pink. "Sorry, I didn't mean to touch you like that. I don't know why I did."

My jaw dropped a little.

I'd never seen anything like it.

I wish I'd had a camera or a film crew making a documentary about the wild because Adam did something I didn't know was possible: act genuinely remorseful for touching my exposed, baby flesh. I only knew handsome boys to be cocky about it, too familiar with their hands, always looking for an opportunity to touch a girl and call it heroism. They weren't embarrassed afterward. They wanted a special kind of thank you.

Adam cast his eyes down and visually rebuked himself.

At that moment, I liked him. I had quickly put him in a box that he proved not to belong in, from what I could see in that moment, anyway. He surprised me.

I loved surprises.

"Do you want some cookies, later?" I asked him.

Adam looked up and smiled. "With coffee?"

" Well ." I held up the bag. "This is my godmother's expensive, organic Hawaiian coffee that I had to scale a wall to get, so not this particular brew. I'm gonna go with Folgers."

Adam blinked slowly, assessing my body.

"Not like a date or anything," I blurted out. Then, I shut my eyes and stopped myself before the facepalm inevitably followed.

"It's not a date if there's not organic Hawaiian coffee involved," he said.

I opened my eyes. Adam had a gentle smile on his face. Something in his energy made me calm, like rolling atop a warm, easy wave in the ocean. He didn't make me feel embarrassed. He did, however, make me feel tingly and hot.

I needed to shoot down the idea of a date because of the look forming on his face. It wasn't smarmy or predatory, but definitely interested, like he was touching me with his eyes.

The Care Bears shirt did it for him.

"I'll bring the cookies over later," I said, tucking my hair behind my ears. People passed. We were in the way. They grumbled and eyeballed us, but I didn't care.

Adam said, "No need, I'm coming over to go on the boat with your sister and her boyfriend."

"Oh," I said, unaware of the plan.

Francesca always told me when she and David were going to take out his dad's boat. They must have planned it without me, knowing I was going to bake cookies, because she didn't want me to join them.

She was keeping me at bay and keeping secrets, for some reason, despite wanting claiming to want a special sister summer and guaranteeing that David would be working at the market. She forbade me from going on a date with Adam because of it.

I also missed my damn cruise.

However, like always, I swallowed the hurt and didn't blame her. Francesca, with the blue teary eyes, never saw my anger. I rarely let my hurt grow big enough to become that feeling, so I said to Adam, "Okay, I'll have some out for when you guys get back."

Adam rubbed the back of his neck. "You're not coming with us?"

I watched the lean muscle of his bicep and looked away quickly.

" No ," I answered. "I'm not a big fan of boats."

Lie.

"That's a shame," Adam said. "You're missing out."

Protecting my sister meant protecting me. I pretended that I didn't let her walk all over me, that she wasn't leaving me out.

"Yeah, well, that's just how it goes," I replied. I gave him a halfhearted smile and held my basket up as a goodbye. "I'll see ya later."

"Bye." He watched me walk down the aisle.

But, as is the way with grocery stores, unless you're walking out at the same time or someone leaves the store first, you're bound to bump into them again.

The first time we saw each other again, I smiled politely, and he gave me that look , complete with his own kind of smile.

The next time, I said, "Howdy," tipping my imaginary hat in the freezer aisle.

"Good day to you, ma'am," he followed when we met again beside loaves of bread.

He appeared beside me suddenly, both of us staring at fresh fish we didn't intend to buy. I offered, "It's the chicken of the sea."

With all seriousness, he replied, "You can tuna guitar, but you can't tuna fish." He shook his head with embarrassment, and I bit back a smile.

Then, I picked up a cartoon of eggs, and Adam muttered in my ear, "Don't put all your eggs in one basket."

"That's egg-ellent advice," I responded, biting back a smile.

I saw him looking at dry beans. I needed nothing down this aisle, but I wanted to be around him some more. I wanted to know what he would say next.

As I walked behind him, he winked and said, "It's raining cats and dogs." He shrugged, and I snorted a laugh.

"You got it, dude," I said with a thumbs up, nearly bumping into a confused woman clutching a box of pasta.

"They killed Kenny!" Adam yelled back, holding up an orange bag of Cheetos.

We managed to check out at the same time. I picked up a bottle of chocolate milk from a cooler and gave it a shake. Standing in opposite lines, I called to him, "My sources say no."

He picked up a can of soda, shook it, and immediately grimaced. "Outlook not so good."

I covered a laugh when he attempted to put it back in the minifridge, catching the angry look of the cashier. Adam held his hands up in defeat and set the soda on the conveyer belt.

As we checked out, I looked back, and Adam was staring right at me. I viewed the contents being placed into paper bags. We easily spent fifteen minutes in the store, walking around, but he only bought a few things, a similar number of items he had when we first saw each other.

We walked into the sunny parking lot at the same time, his shoulder bumping up against mine until I stopped at my bike and asked him, "What did you buy?"

He ran his hands through his hair and closed the bag suspiciously. "Nothing."

" Tell me ," I insisted.

"Porno magazine," he blurted out.

My cheeks went warm, he never stopped looking at me, but I managed to reply, "Not here at this store, you didn't."

Adam had this smile. His cheeks would bunch up and his mouth tightened, but every other muscle in his face relaxed, his eyes strong and focused. I could always see the energy of that smile, billowing under his heaving chest, even if he didn't let it alter his face.

He finally opened his paper bag, and I checked its contents.

Glass jar of olive oil, a box of Band-Aids, Pillsbury pull-apart chocolate chip cookies, and a brick of Folgers coffee.

My mouth curved into a smile.

He lifted his shoulder. "It felt like a cookies and coffee kind of day to me too." Then he said, "Do I still get to come over?"

I bit my lip, realizing that I wasn't over the black-out nervousness in front of a boy phase. I just hadn't met this boy yet.

All I could do in that moment, flush with infatuation for someone I'd just met, was nod.

"Let me give you a lift." He gestured to an old, red truck. "We can put your bike in the back."

Fran wouldn't like it.

"No, I'm fine, thanks," I said, my voice unstable. "I-I like to ride."

Adam wavered. I knew he wanted to ask again, so I jumped in with, "I'll see you when you guys get back."

From the boating trip I wasn't invited on.

He tipped his chin. "I will see you. Right?"

The confirmation, the question, and the desire in his tone released a flurry of butterflies in the pit of my stomach.

"Yeah," I answered, clipping my pink bike helmet under my chin.

I'm cold.

It's dark out now and that spot where I would once lock my bike is empty. I hug the paper bag of groceries to my chest and walk across the quiet, spare parking lot.

I could make chocolate chip cookies when I get home, but the sting of standing in our kitchen remembering Adam, with his damp hair and bare chest, putting that cookie in his mouth while staring at me, cannot be ignored.

I forgot a piece of that memory. The bit about Francesca not inviting me on the boat.

When I had returned to the house, she had her bathing suit on, and she claimed to be going swimming in David's neighborhood pool. I had already begun stirring my batter at that point. When the three of them came into the house later, the boys mentioned being on the boat and Francesca never said a word, and I never confronted her about it.

That night, she climbed into bed with me and started to cry.

"I wish Mom was at our graduations," she whimpered. "I wish she saw how pretty you looked in your white dress."

At eighteen, brushed my twenty-two-year-old sister's hair and calmed her the way I'd done for ten years.

"I'm glad you're here, Vee," she said. "This summer is going to be special for us."

That night might have been the last time Francesca spoke about our mother, but it wasn't the last time I had been expected to be everywhere and anywhere she needed me. After the silence of an empty home, it felt good to be needed.

I turn my car down the dark gravel driveway through the woods to the house and park facing the lake, watching moonlight sway on gentle waves. Outside, it's silent, like I'd hoped. I grab my suitcase and bag of groceries, Heddy's house key in hand.

The porch stairs creak. The screen door sticks for a second when I pull it back. I put the key in the lock and glance over my right shoulder. Through the thinning woods, I view the outline of the house next door, seeing lights glow from inside the windows, a silhouette moving past. Suddenly, there's sound. Someone's listening to acoustic guitar music, of course. His parents must still live there.

I pry my eyes away and enter the dark house.

I'm not here to relive swoony nights over a boy. I'm here for my sister, the way she wanted me that summer.

The lights flip on, and warmth covers my soul.

I'm home.