I remember Estelle loaning me a pretty bright blue bikini once—Étienne had been trying to get me to go in the river and I finally gave in to pressure, but I hadn’t brought a costume with me. Estelle’s fit like a dream.
I chance a glance at Étienne and see that he’s having an animated conversation with the girl at the end of the table. I deliberately refocus my attention on Jackson.
“And then along came Chloe in her red bikini,” I say significantly. “Your eyes were out on stalks.” I grab my cider and swallow down the nausea I still feel when I think of them together.
“Teenage hormones,” Jackson mutters. “They’ve got a lot to answer for.”
“Do you ever wonder what would have happened if she hadn’t come that summer?”
My question surprises us both. Jackson and I have always danced around the topic of our feelings for each other.
“Yes,” he admits, staring at me.
“The summer before that, when we were sixteen…”
“And you were going out with Sam.”
“You remember his name?”
“Of course I do,” he replies. “I was jealous as hell. I was jealous of Nick too.”
His candid confession thrills me.
“You’ve always wanted what you couldn’t have,” I point out.
He snorts. “Yeah, that’s my problem,” he agrees. “I’ve learned my lesson now though.”
“Have you?”
“The headfuck of a roller coaster I went on with Chloe? She loves me, she loves me not…Always chasing after her, trying to please her, having her come around and then push me away. I’m too old for that. The next time I settle down, it will be with a nice girl who doesn’t play games, and hopefully it’ll be for life.”
Oh, Jackson, I think as he drains his beer,I’m not sure you know yourself very well.
Because all my instincts tell me that his head will still only beturned by what he can’t have. He was like that with Chloe—she treated him mean and it kept him keen—and he was like that with me too.
Suddenly I feel exhausted.
“You want another drink?” he asks. “Same again?”
“Yes, please.”
He gets up from the table. I glance down toward Étienne and catch his eye. He pauses mid-sentence and lifts his chin. It feels like a very small and insignificant acknowledgment, but it causes the beautiful brunette he’s with to look over her shoulder at me.
I avert my gaze and, for want of something better to do, decide to go and use the bathroom. There’s a second room beyond this one and it’s just as crowded. I wind my way between tables and chairs to a door in the far corner.
Why did he bring us all the way here if he was just going to chat up another girl?I think with irritation as I reapply my lipstick.
On my way back through the opening dividing the two rooms, Étienne intercepts me.
“Ça va?” he asks as he comes to a stop right in front of me, hands oh-so-casually tucked into the pockets of his jeans.
I shrug, unsmiling, as my heart skips and skitters at his close proximity. I’m assuming he’s on his way to the bathroom so I sidestep him. But then he sidesteps right in front of me.
There’s a glint in his eyes, a tilt to his lips. This is the Étienne who wants to play. This is not the same Étienne who took me to his house and Chauvet 2.
I sidestep again and he mirrors me, his smile widening.
“So what were you thinking?” he asks.
