“I know,” he answers flatly.
I think I’ve struck a sore spot. The heavy air around us is cut by my sister’s voice. “Ramona, get your ass in here! And who’s this—”
Freddie stands to greet her and he flips on that charm like a light switch. I can’t believe the transformation. “Hey, Hattie.” He grins.
She makes a show of squinting. “Well, shit,” she says. “Little Freddie Floaties?”
He rolls his eyes. “Nice to see you, too, Hattie. And I can swim in the deep end now, just so you know.”
She skips forward and gives him a wet kiss on the cheek. “Puberty was kind to you.” Hattie turns to me. “I’m totally introducing him to Alma, that new waitress. Howcutewould they be?”
I shrug, but there’s a warmth in my chest that I can’t quite process. “Pretty cute, I guess?”
Freddie chuckles nervously. “I sort of—”
Heavy footsteps smack against the patio. “Babe!” Tyler slurs. “Where’d you go? Don’t I get some birthday kisses?”
She smiles at us both, like it’s so obvious how irresistibleTyler is, as she grabs each of us by the hand. “Cake time!”
Inside, Freddie follows me to the kitchen while Hattie corrals everyone into a circle. I dig around for the birthday candles we use for customers, and Freddie helps me light each of the twenty candles until the cake is glowing. It’s beautiful, and I only hate that it’s for Tyler.
Freddie watches me from the other side of the cake through the tiny flames. “Let’s blow them out,” he says.
“What?”
“Do you like your sister’s boyfriend?”
I wait too long to answer, which is more than I need to say.
“Steal his wish,” Freddie says. “You deserve it.”
A smile tugs at my lips. Freddie was always such a Robin Hood. He shared everything right down to the shells we’d spend all day collecting, and he expected others to do the same. “Okay.” I close my eyes, and my head is filled with too many requests, like when you’re a kid and you want to wish for infinite wishes. I think I want more from life than my cup can hold.
Inhaling deeply, I open my eyes and blow out each candle.
Freddie grins. “I feel good about it. Some good mojo in this room.”
He relights the candles and we take the cake out to the dining room and no one suspects a thing. After everyone sings “Happy Birthday,” Freddie turns to me. “You wanna go for a walk or something?”
We take what’s left of the whiskey with us and walkdown to the other edge of the boardwalk past all the nighttime fishermen and their coolers of bait and beer. Alongside the beach, overnight drivers pass us by on Highway 90. The streetlights are concentrated on the road, leaving the sand cool and dark between our toes.
“I don’t know when I’m going to get used to you living here,” I tell Freddie. “Doesn’t it kind of suck that you’re starting over for senior year?”
He shrugs and takes the bottle from where it dangles from my fingertips. “It really does. Or did at first, I guess. I fought with my gram, begging her to wait a year or let me stay with friends, but—” He stops abruptly.
“But what?”
He looks at me. “I decided it was finally her turn. She raised my mom and then me. I’ll be gone in a year anyway. And I’ve got you, right? So I guess I’m not really starting over.”
Ruth and I aren’t like this with each other. Our friendship is much too utilitarian for that, so it’s hard not to melt a little when he says things like that. “You’ll make friends at school,” I tell him. “You’re just that kind of guy people want to be friends with.”
In my pocket, my phone vibrates and I pull it out to check my messages. I don’t even realize I’m holding my breath until I exhale, but it’s only my sister.
HATTIE: heading home soon. your bike is still here. are you okay? ARE YOU DEAD? DID FREDDIE FLOATIES KILL YOU?
on the beach with Freddie, I type back.see you at home.
“Not who you expected?” asks Freddie.
