Alice shook her head. ‘I wasn’t smarter. I just studied more.’
‘No, you definitely were.’ Harper hummed thoughtfully. ‘It used to really piss me off. I’d get a 96 on a test and you’d get a 98. It was like no matter how good I was, you were always better.’
Alice shrugged, not sure what to say to that. ‘Sometimes I felt like it was the only thing I had going for me,’ she admitted. ‘You were popular. I wasn’t.’
‘Are you being nice to me now?’ Harper asked, feigning shock.
‘Only for now. You haven’t said why you know where the tea is, so I’m still suspicious.’
‘I’ve come in here a few times when I couldn’t sleep,’ Harper said, staring down at her mug.
‘Something wrong?’ Alice asked.
‘No,’ Harper said quickly. Then, looking at Alice’s face, she added, ‘Weddings are messy. Anyway, why areyouawake?’
‘I called my dad.’ Alice couldn’t explain it further.
Harper considered her for a moment. ‘He’s a dick, right? Left your mom?’
‘You remember that?’
‘Know thy enemy,’ Harper said.
‘Yeah, he cheated on her,’ Alice said. She thought back on how harsh she’d been with him, but no longer felt bad about it. ‘I asked him to apologize.’
Harper nodded. ‘I get it. I’ve tried to get my parents to apologize for a lot of things.’ She grimaced. ‘It never goes well.’
‘They’re still together?’ Alice asked.
‘Unfortunately,’ Harper replied, running her finger over the lip of her mug. ‘I think they thought staying together would be better for me. But it was a lot of pressure. Like I needed to succeed to make it worth it for them.’
Alice wondered if her parents would be happy now if they’d stayed together. She couldn’t picture it.
Harper sighed. ‘It was better when I went to college. No, actually, it was way worse, but then it got better. Having Briar and Noah was good for me.’
‘Yeah,’ Alice said. She knew what it felt like to be surrounded by people who cared about her. It was something she’d spent the last decade of her life convincing herself she no longer needed.
‘They remind me that I didn’t have to be anything more than myself,’ Harper said. ‘Is that corny?’
Alice smiled. ‘Only a little.’
Harper shrugged. ‘Whatever. They’re my best friends. I can be corny for them.’
Alice’s chest ached at the declaration. It was a glimpse into what her life could’ve been if she’d never left; it was another reminder that no matter what happened this summer, she would leave again. She reached over and squeezed Harper’s hand. ‘I’m really glad that Briar has you.’
Chapter 25
Alice
Alice had devised a schedule for fixing up the house, breaking down every task to match each person’s capabilities until all the projects were scheduled to be completed exactly on time. She had also created cover stories for the majority of the excursions, although for some of them Freddie and Sierra were just supposed to keep Briar too distracted to notice the missing staff.
Physical labor was a great distraction from her now hard-to-ignore feelings. And Noah proved to be an invaluable asset, both in his strength and his high spirits. When Alice’s energy flagged, when she just wanted to give up, go back to camp, and wrap her arms around Briar, he was quick to remind her that it would all be worth it when they got to see Briar’s face at the party.
By the third day, they’d fallen into an easy familiarity with each other, joking around as they worked to reattach the closet door, with Noah holding it while Alice tackled the screws.
‘Are you sure you know how to use a screwdriver?’ Noah asked, his arms shaking from the weight.
‘Yes, I’m sure,’ Alice said, blowing a strand of hair out of her face. ‘Would you like to try?’
