chapter 25

The sound ofBryant’s bullhorn fought its way through the wind.

“Back to the buses. There’s a storm coming.”

Izzy didn’t move. Lillian was mesmerizing, staring up at the kite with a delighted smile.

“I get why people do this,” she said. “You’d think, What’s fun about getting a piece of nylon up in the sky on the end of a string? But it’s… it’s like part of us is up there.” She looked over, her eyes full of amazement.

What would it be like if Lillian said us and didn’t just mean us flying a kite?

“The buses!” Bryant managed to convey irritation through the bullhorn.

Around them contestants were wrestling kites back into bags, an almost impossible feat with the wind blowing. The schedule for the day said they’d be staying at some place called the Kite Sand Resort, a minor sponsor who wouldn’t make it onto the show but might get some play in The Great American Talent Show socials.

“When we get back to the hotel, do you want to go for a walk on the beach?” Izzy asked.

“Isn’t there a storm?”

“Exactly.”

On the horizon, streaks of gold and pink light cut through the black clouds. The wind whipped up the surf.

“You’ll love it,” Izzy said. “We’ll ditch the cameras and everyone and get out in the storm. It’ll call to your soul!” She flung her arms wide to make the statement melodramatic, not dreadfully earnest. On an afternoon like this, with the clouds gathering, you could stand on the beach and not see one other person. It was just you and the vastness of the ocean. Something about Lillian was vast and beautiful and strong and fierce like that.

“What about the puffer fish? They’re dangerous this time of year.” Lillian handed the spool back to Izzy. Izzy cupped Lillian’s hands as she took it, and Lillian let her fingertips trace Izzy’s palm. She held Izzy’s eyes as she did, and just as the string held the kite to the spool, Lillian’s gaze held them together.

“It’s the sirens you have to look out for.” Izzy couldn’t look away from Lillian’s golden-brown eyes. Had the waves stopped breaking? Had the wind stilled? Were they the only people who’d ever stood on this beach?

Lillian broke the moment with a little laugh. “I’ll come find you when we get to the hotel.” With that, Lillian followed her dancers. Looking over her shoulder, she shot Izzy an ostentatious wink.

“Hey, that’s my trick,” Izzy called, surprised that she could still form words.

Lillian winked again. “It works on women, doesn’t it?”

Yes. Yes, it did.

“And by the way, if anyone can rock Lie in Wait, it’s you,” Lillian added, turning to walk backward, her arms spread wide.

Izzy thought she might never stop grinning.

Sarah and the rest of Velveteen Crush caught Izzy up in their midst as they hurried toward the buses.

“I like her,” Arabella said. “She’s strong. She could take a man down in a fight.”

“Lillian could not—” Izzy began. Actually, Lillian could probably take a man down in a fight.

“She seems sweet,” Axel said.

Sarah fell into stride beside Izzy.

“I know. I know,” Izzy said. “Tell me she’s going to break my heart.”

Sarah shook her head and, proving that her amateur therapist skills needed some work, said, “Maybe it won’t be a train wreck this time.”

The buses deposited them at the Kite Sand Resort, a midcentury-modern hotel set on a bluff. Lillian caught up with Izzy as runners handed out keys to the contestants.

“Meet me behind the hotel in ten?”

Lillian said, “In ten,” and a little golden windstorm kicked up in Izzy’s heart.

Izzy ran her bag up to her room faster than running onstage, but she paused when she came back down. Lillian was waiting for her on a patch of sandy grass behind the hotel, gazing at the ocean, her white coat flying out behind her, like a heroine on the cover of a novel. Izzy approached her slowly, taking in every detail. Lillian’s turtleneck sweater and, surely a concession to the coast, her sneakers. When Lillian turned, her smile warmed the cold wind.

“I won’t take you out far,” Izzy said. “We’ll be back before it starts to rain.”

On the beach, the receding tide had revealed a field of craggy, black boulders. Pushed by the wind, a piece of kelp flopped along the beach. Izzy’s hair blew in her eyes and caught in the corners of her mouth. Lillian, with her short platinum hair, looked as composed as always.

“You said this would speak to my soul?” Lillian looked pensive.

“We can go back in.”

“I don’t want to go back in.” Lillian stepped close enough that anyone who had seen their silhouettes from the hotel would think they were kissing.

Izzy’s body thrummed with her nearness. Lillian tucked a length of Izzy’s hair behind her ear, and the touch of her cool fingers made Izzy’s knees weak.

“I want to go out in it,” Lillian said. “It does speak to me. And even if it didn’t, if you want to show it to me, I want to see it.”

Izzy’s hair escaped again, and her heart escaped her chest and went dancing along the beach.

“So how do you know how to fly kites when the rest of us almost put an eye out?” Lillian asked, beginning to walk down the beach.

“I started coming here in college. It was my place to go when I’d gotten dumped by some heartless girl,” Izzy said ruefully.

“Dumb girl.” Lillian looped her arm through Izzy’s as they began to walk.

“I was a lost cause in college. I wanted to date every girl who’d leave because they were passionate about something that wasn’t me. I had a crush on this girl who was a legit model. I didn’t care that she was beautiful. She was just so intense about what she did. She was premed. She’d study all morning, exercise, then fly to New York for photo shoots. And she liked rugby players, so I joined the team.”

“Rugby? I bet you were hot. Did you have a striped shirt?”

“All of it, but I was terrified. I lied to the coach, said I’d played in high school. I watched a bunch of YouTube videos about rugby. And despite what people think, the College of YouTube cannot teach you everything you need to know.”

“I could see how that could go wrong,” Lillian said sympathetically.

“I ran away from the ball because I knew if I caught it, a dozen women would pile on top of me, which wouldn’t be a bad thing except they were all covered in mud and trying to break me in half.”

Lillian laughed, but it seemed like she was laughing at life, not at Izzy’s young self.

“Finally, I smoked pot in the locker room so I’d get kicked off the team.”

“Why not just quit?”

“I wanted the girl to think I was a badass.”

“Did she?”

“For a few nights. For a few nights, I thought we were in love. Then she started dating a daughter of a senator, and it broke my heart. Then there was a soccer player from the Seattle Reign. Rachel from the WNBA.”

“You like athletes?”

“I liked their intensity.”

“I met Rachel when she’d torn her ACL. She broke up with me the day she got cleared to play again. And the opera singer. God, I was so bad at it all.” But Izzy didn’t feel sad. It was kind of funny how over-the-top she’d been with her dating choices.

“You didn’t always want shooting stars?” Lillian asked.

“I was a twentysomething lesbian whose mother left her to fend for herself at eighteen. Of course I wanted someone to love me.”

“Your mom wasn’t there for you?”

“Nah.”

“Is it something you talk about?”

“You don’t want to hear my poor sad child story.”

“I do, if you want to tell it.” Lillian still had her arm looped through Izzy’s, and she pulled Izzy closer.

And Izzy did want to tell her.

“Well,” Izzy began. “Megan—my mom—got pregnant really young, but she was already a great singer. She opened for some artists up in Portland. She could have been on The Great American Talent Show. I thought she was so amazing. Beautiful. Funny.

“When I was with Megan… my mom, it felt like magic. Like we were fairy princesses. She’d take me to the Dollar Tree, and we’d spend hours looking at whatever little vases or glass beads they had. She’d start singing, and everyone would stop and listen.”

Strange, the memory was still sweet even though Izzy knew what came next.

“And my mom wanted that but in a bigger way.”

“Did she go on to sing?”

“She performed a lot, so I was alone a lot.”

“Like as a teenager?”

Despite their heavy coats, Izzy could feel the warmth of Lillian’s body beside her.

“Like seven or eight. She’d leave for a weekend. She made sure there was food and TV for me.”

“She left a seven-year-old alone for weekends?”

“Yeah.”

All those dark nights in the trailer listening to every sound.

“That’s child neglect!”

A reflexive protectiveness flared in Izzy’s heart. Megan wasn’t a bad mom. Izzy had been mature. She didn’t need a babysitter. The flame died as quickly as it rose. Megan was a bad mom. Not the worst by a long shot, but she wasn’t winning any PTA awards.

“I survived. I got all into school stuff. Plays. Choir. Dance team. We didn’t have great extracurriculars in Broken Bush, but there was always someone like my mom who’d never gotten to live their dreams, so they helped teens do bad versions of Brigadoon, and in the land of bad Brigadoon, I was a star.”

“And then?”

“She met a man, Rick. He’s a good guy. They planned to have a baby. Painted a room. Had a baby shower. Then when I turned eighteen, they left. Like I was a foster kid, and I’d aged out. Rick got a transfer to California. We still owned a trailer. Megan said I could live there. She gave me a hundred dollars cash and told me to call anytime. But what was I supposed to call about?”

“Their baby was Bella, the one who’s getting married?”

“Yeah. The other day Megan called me saying how proud she was that I made it on the show.” Too little, too late. “She says she has a ticket to the studio audience to an upcoming show.”

“Are you… happy about that?”

“She probably just wants to be on TV, but if she came just to see me…” Izzy had barely admitted it to herself. “I did a lot of school plays, and she never came. Sarah says my inner child wants her to show up.”

Megan was coming to Portland to see her. Coming to one show didn’t make up for leaving her in so many different ways, but it was everything her teenage self had wanted. To see Megan in the audience as she took the stage on opening night of the school play. To run into Megan’s arms backstage as all the parents crowded around to hug their kids. To go out to dinner at Applebee’s afterward. It’d be a little taste of that life. Maybe Megan would get her a bouquet of flowers. Maybe Izzy would dry them. Maybe a little taste was enough.

“When she comes to the show… then when I go to Bella’s wedding, maybe I’ll feel like part of their family. I don’t know. Probably not.”

The wind kicked up, but not so much that it blew sand in their eyes. The clouds were heavy but not raining.

“Maybe that’s why I bought the theater. It’s a place for my found family to be safe. At least for now.”

“For now?”

“If the bank doesn’t take it. That thing is a money pit.”

“Is that why you need the prize money?”

“No.” Yes. “It’d help but…” To win, they had to beat Reed-Whitmer. She didn’t want to think about that now. She wanted to enjoy this moment. “I want to make it beautiful so I can bring gorgeous women there and seduce them.”

Izzy flashed Blue’s smile. Lillian shook her head with what looked like indulgent affection. Then Lillian stopped, turned toward Izzy, and wrapped her arms around her, deflating the puffer fish coat and holding her close. The hug was so unexpected, Izzy stiffened for a second, but Lillian didn’t let go, and Izzy melted. Lillian nestled Izzy’s head against her shoulder, stroking Izzy’s tangled hair.

“I really am fine,” Izzy murmured. Lillian’s coat smelled of her sunlight-warm perfume. Memories of Broken Bush whisked away on the wind.

“I know,” Lillian said. “But that doesn’t make it easy.”

Izzy could have stood there through the storm and never gotten cold.

When Izzy finally broke their embrace because they really couldn’t stand there forever even though she longed to, Lillian took her by the shoulders, studying her, her gaze indescribably tender. Lillian adjusted the collar of Izzy’s puffer coat and patted the shoulders to fluff it up.

“You,” Lillian said slowly, “really are the only person who can make this stuff look good.”

Izzy felt as light as her kite as they began walking again.

“What about you? What were you like in high school?” Izzy asked after a little while.

Lillian pressed her hand to Izzy’s back for a moment, then began with a caution Izzy recognized. Which piece of the story should I tell?

“The family is me, my parents, Kia, and her dad, my uncle Carl. My parents live in this house that looks like a Jane Austen mansion, except it’s new construction, and I’m sure that has something to do with their inner children. And Uncle Carl lives on a yacht and owns a million spaniels.” Lillian launched into a story about her uncle taking her sailing. It sounded like Lillian lived in a fairy tale. But Lillian left things out. Izzy heard it in her pauses. Izzy wanted to ask, but she didn’t know how to stop Lillian and say, You can tell me the rest of it if you want.

The sky spit a few drops of rain. They kept walking. The story about the yacht led into a list of strange recipes Kia had cooked in her food truck. Izzy laughed and launched into stories of failed performances. Izzy could walk forever talking to Lillian. But a few drops would be a downpour in twenty minutes.

“We should go back,” Izzy said reluctantly. “I want you to love it out here, not get hypothermia.”

“Can we go a little farther?” Lillian turned to the ocean and the black sky slashed with gold. “How did you know I would love it out here?”

“It’s you. Intense. Beautiful.” That sounded too romantic. “I mean dangerous. Siren-ous. You’ll lure me to my ruin.”

As if to illustrate her words, the rain let loose.

“You’re the siren,” Lillian called over the sound of the wind.

“Sirens are just misunderstood mermaids.”

“Come on, mermaid. We should go back.”

They turned. The shoreline of tall, sandy bluffs disappeared into the fog and the gathering darkness with no hotel in sight. How had they walked so far? It had felt like mere minutes. A walk back in this rain? They really would get hypothermia. And what if the tide was coming in? Izzy assessed the water. It looked closer than it had before. This was king tide season when waves crashed over Highway 101 in Depoe Bay, the ocean nipped kayaks out of people’s backyards, and at least one beachfront property slid into the water. If they walked back, they’d have to scramble over rocks, the waves lapping their heels. They’d make it, but it’d be scary. What if Lillian slipped? Cut her hands? Twisted an ankle? The walk would certainly wreck her coat. And she’d be scared. Izzy couldn’t let anything happen to her.

A cluster of lights shone on top of a nearby bluff.

“There’s something up there,” Izzy said. “Maybe we can dry off and call someone to get us.”