“No—”
I stand up. “Wait,” I call out. Godfuckingdamnit.
I start moving, ignoring May’s protests.
“Nico,” I huff out, panting at the effort it takes to run over a few feet of sand. Damn, how do volleyball players do it? “Nico,” I try one more time, louder, and he takes me by surprise when he whirls around.
“No, Annie Li,” he tells me, pushing his stupid sunglasses up into his hair, which is frankly extremely overwhelming, because the now two times in fourteen years I’ve seen Nico’s eyes have been in the dark or behind sunglasses, and here, now, in the bright of the sun? They areintense. A clear, rich brown, steady and bright throughout, with only a darker rim tracing the outer edge. No flecks of gold or hazel, not a lighter brown in the middle, nothing. The same pure brown all over. Warm and sure. A pool of melted chocolate. Ready to sweep me away to an unfortunate end. Like one of those kids inWilly Wonka.
“Please, Nico,” I manage.
“Annie, I just fuckin’ got here and feel an overwhelming urge to get away from you. And you know how fuckin’ long it takes the A train to get down here?! I’d rather sit on that train for four hours than spend thirty minutes on the beach with you, on this gorgeous freakin’ day,” he rages. “Not to mention, in the two times we’ve seen each other infourteen years, we’ve set abaron fireand scared away all the seagulls on the beach with our screaming. How the hell could we ever manage three thousand miles inside the three cubic meters of a car?”
“Well, technically, the fire was your fault—I mean, it wasyourcigarette, and Itoldyou that smoking was disgusting, and seagulls are totally just beach rats, anyway?—”
“Goodbye,” he says, turning on his heel and walking away.
I gnash my teeth together. Is this even worth it? This cannot, by any means, be worth it. I look back towards May, who’s curled into a tight ball and looking down at the sand while Tom rages, gesticulating wildly.
Damnit. “Nico!” I run after him and grab his arm (which has the audacity to be harder than it looks) and swing him back around. I have to tear the next few words from my throat. “I’m sorry. I’m really sorry. Maybe we can spend the trip learning not to kill each other at their wedding?” I offer weakly.
“The wedding won’t matter, Annie, because we’ll kill each other before we even get there!”
“Not if we’re learning not to kill each other!”
He opens his mouth to say something else, but I cut him off.
“I’ll be good. I promise. Please, Nico. Please.”
His eyes flick to me on the second “please.” He chews on his lip, then sighs, looking past me towards the ocean.
“What are you thinking? Tell me,” I demand.
Nico cuts his eyes back to me. “I’m calculating a physics problem.”
“Huh?”
“Velocity.”
I rack my brain for high school level physics. “Velocity equals distance over time?”
He nods, only somewhat impressed.
“Velocity for…”
“The velocity I’d have when I launch myself into the ocean.”
“Ha.”
“Distance from here to the ocean?” he continues. “Maybe ninety meters.”
I smirk despite myself. “Time?”
“Dunno,” he shrugs. “ASAP.”
That gets him a smile—a real one, and I receive a look of surprise in response.
Nico shakes his head, blinking. “I really do have to work,” he says. His eyes dart all over my face in confusion. “The road trip is for work.”
