Chapter 23 | Zoey

Chapter 23

Zoey

T welve hours. Twelve blissful hours. Two in the car on the drive down to Wildwood, Wilderness Weekend blasting, our favorite road snacks between us. It felt like old times. The second we crossed town lines, Andrew’s shoulders relaxed, his hand found mine, and he smiled—the first real and easy smile I’d seen from him in months. At the beach house, we fell into bed. We’ve hardly left it since. Beach? What beach? This is our love shack.

All the worry about my brash decision to go away with Andrew after leaving Claire flummoxed in Lola’s bathroom was pointless. This lazy, slow, and emotionally charged lovemaking is exactly what Andrew promised. And everything I’ve been missing. When he said the words outside the high school that day, I didn’t believe him, but it’s clear that we’ve made it back. To each other, to love, to what could be. Everything I know of the past few months, of his infidelity, doesn’t matter. Whatever Claire was, Andrew and I are together and in sync and perfect. Again. Finally. Maybe he needed to lose me to realize what we had couldn’t be replicated. Isn’t that the saying? Isn’t that Liz and Julian’s whole story, ignoring this current part.

“You were right,” I say, rolling onto my side, Andrew’s T-shirt hugging my curves. Andrew’s still naked, the sheet pulled up only as high as his hips. Our entwined legs stick out of the bottom of the tangled sheets, mine tan from days on the track, his from days on the beach. My body trills at the sight, and my heart patters its normal, happy beat. I feel truly calm for the first time since April.

“About what?” he drawls sleepily. His eyes scan my partially clothed body with a frown.

“We needed this.” I kiss him, letting our lips and tongues play. “I forgot what we can be when we’re us. Being here, spending this time with you...” I put my hand over his heart. Warmth radiates through me, and I’m so giddy I have to suppress a rising giggle. “I’m glad we found our way back.”

“Zoey.”

“It’s not going to be easy.” I continue as if he hasn’t spoken. I have to get this out. This is my chance, and if I don’t take it, then what the hell have I been doing all summer? “Honestly, it’s going to be messy, and no one is going to like it, but I love—”

“Stop.” The word is forceful and filled with a mix of panic and aggression. My heart, which has been doing this fluttery prance in my chest, loses the beat. “Don’t tell me you love me. That’s not what this is. You knew that from the start.”

“Whatever we agreed upon...” I start, trying and failing to keep the tremble out of my voice. He doesn’t mean it. He can’t mean it. “It didn’t include weekends away and sex so intense that I felt everything we feel for each other deep in my soul. I felt it, Andrew.” I take his hand in mine. “I feel it. I didn’t believe you when you said we could find this feeling again, but we did.”

“No, we didn’t.” He sits up and yanks his hand out of mine. “Is it too much to ask for one weekend? One lousy weekend where we could have fun, casual sex without slinking off to a shore motel or fitting it in while my mom’s at book club?”

The hope from minutes ago, along with the bravado at asking for what I want, evaporates at his words. I knew. Of course I knew. But for that moment, I let myself believe that this could be real.

“And what if I want more than that?” What if I deserve more than that?

“There isn’t more than that,” he practically growls. He reaches for his boxer briefs. “There hasn’t been more than that for a long time.”

“Then why? Why would you seek me out? Keep coming back? Invite me here?” Here where we lost our virginities and cemented ourselves in each other’s histories for all time.

He stares at the ceiling and pulls at his hair. His body pulses with agitation. “Because it was easier than having to court some townie for a few months. And you were so easy. I mean, that kiss by the pool was a moment of weakness. I did miss you. But then you liked it. You suggested we go someplace more private. I barely had to try. One look at Claire, and you practically mounted me in public.”

That’s a harsh-but-true retelling of the events of that night. If I’m honest, I didn’t think Andrew was insightful enough to know why I decided to sleep with him for half the summer. But if I didn’t kiss him back that night, if I let the moment pass, would we be strangers now? But I did kiss him. Because it felt like I would never know anything but heartache again, and that moment undid me. And I wanted to win. I wanted desperately to know that I was better— am better—than Claire in every single way.

Andrew walks to his open suitcase and pulls a new shirt over his head. “You can’t fuck me into loving you again. You couldn’t do it when I actually still loved you, and you definitely can’t now.”

The room narrows down to Andrew’s dark and cruel eyes. Eyes that were once familiar but now feel like staring into the unknown depths of an abyss. Who is this boy?

I blink back tears. “You can stop, Andrew. I get the point.”

“Do you?” He thrusts his legs into pants. “Because I thought I made it clear by sleeping with your best friend. I mean, how could we ever go back after that? What self-respecting person forgives her boyfriend for fucking her best friend? And yet, here we are.”

His words hit like bricks. He picked Claire. Intentionally. Tears spill over, streaming down my face. I don’t even try to stop the flow. My body shakes. My mind rejects this latest truth, one worse than all the others. Claire wasn’t some organic and horrible mistake. It was calculated and planned. And by the person I loved most in the world. How did I misread the situation? How did I ever love him? Why does some sick part of me love him still?

“I’m going down to the beach,” he says, not looking at me.

“The beach?” My voice is hoarse and raspy from the crying. It sounds like some other girl’s voice.

“Yeah. There’s a party.” He pauses, nearly out of the room. “And Zoey, I would suggest not being here when I get back.”

The front door slams a few seconds later, but I can’t move. I can’t breathe. My mind races through everything I thought I knew about the events of the last few months. All this time, I blamed Claire. Claire must have come on to Andrew. I blamed my best friend for the ultimate betrayal. How that betrayal came to pass, I didn’t know. I didn’t want to know and would hear no explanations. I knew there was something more to the situation, something that I steadfastly ignored all summer, but I couldn’t have imagined this. That Andrew handpicked the one person who could irrevocably tear us apart.

My hands shake, and my legs barely support my weight as I fumble in my bag for my phone. I stare at it, nothing but a blur through my endless tears. Too many emotions pile onto my already broken heart. My mind can’t process them all, and my body can’t take this shock. My fingers tremble as I scroll through my contacts. Too many secrets leave me few options. No Becca, no track family, no Dad—definitely not Dad. Haley, the person I could call, is halfway across the country. I scroll past the H’s, thinking of the one local person who might understand.