"That's not what I expected you to say."
"What did you expect?"
"Something lighter, maybe. Party stories. Beach stuff."
"I like beach stuff." He grinned. "I just like knowing it'll still be here in fifty years."
The fire popped. A scatter of sparks rose into the air and vanished.
"What about you?" Ryan asked. "What do you want?"
"I'm not sure yet." She picked at the edge of the blanket. "I'm supposed to be figuring out my major, my career, my life. Everyone acts like I should have a plan by now."
"I probably made it sound like I have mine together." He looked out at the water. "I don't. I just found one thing I care about. Everything else is still a question mark."
"That's more than I have."
"It's one thing, Brittany. One." He turned back to her. "I don't know where I'll get in, or if I can afford it, or if I'll be any good at it. I just know I want to try."
She didn't say anything for a moment. The honesty surprised her.
"That helps, actually," she said. "Everyone else makes it sound like they've got the whole map."
"Nobody has the map. Some people are just better at pretending."
"That sounds like something from a self-help book."
"My mom reads a lot of self-help books. Apparently some of it stuck."
She laughed. The tension she'd been carrying all day, the cabana, the talking-to, felt further away now.
Someone called Ryan's name from the other side of the fire. He ignored it.
"We should probably rejoin the group," Brittany said.
"Probably."
They stayed where they were.
The fire crackled. The waves kept rolling in. Somewhere down the beach, someone laughed loud enough to carry over the water.
"Tonight was better with you here," Ryan said, his voice lower now.
"Yeah." She smiled. "It was."
A pause.
Then Dana's voice cut through—"Ryan, get over here, we need you for this debate"—and the moment slipped past.
He got to his feet, brushing sand from his shorts. Offered her a hand up. She took it, and for a second their fingers stayed laced together.
"Coming?"
"Yeah.”
They walked back toward the group, and the conversation folded around them. Laughter and stories and the easy banter of people who'd known each other for years.
By the time the fire started dying down and people began drifting away, she'd lost track of time. One by one, the blankets emptied. The cooler got packed up. Someone doused what was left of the flames with seawater.
