“Hungry.” I raised my loaded plate. “An older gentleman told me the potato salad wasto die for.”
Meredith smiled knowingly, and others at the table laughed before settling into easy conversation. “Connor, hey!” Wit called later, and I followed his gaze to the make-your-own ice cream sandwich station. Connor was helping Teddy scoop ice cream onto a palm-sized chocolate chip cookie. His obnoxious sunglasses still reigned supreme.
He gave us a goofy salute.
“That kid,” Wit said, “is a literal golden retriever.”
Austin chuckled. “His parents raised him well.”
Right, I thought.Austin is Mads’s brother.
“No, I’m serious,” Wit said. “Have you ever met someone thathappy?”
“Oh, I don’t know,” Katie said lightly. “How aboutyou?”
“Funny.” Wit smirked. “But you know that even I have my moments.”
Meredith coughed. “Moods.”
Austin shrugged after the table laughed. “He’s always been a glass-half-full guy. My sister says he even takes heartbreak well.”
“Maybe he hasn’t ever truly had his heart broken,” I piped up without really thinking about it. Connor caught feelings easily, but he was proving to be an enigma. Had he actuallyfallenin love with his ex-girlfriends? Or were there so many because he justlovedlove?
Or the idea of love.
Why can’t I be like that?I thought.Why don’t I want that?
My friends always supported me when I told them I wasn’t hanging out with Rob or CJ or Luca or Trevor anymore, but the way Erica sometimes looked at me once I casually mentioned it to her and my dad…
There was that knot again.
“It’s a fair point, Austin,” Katie said. “Even after that one girl—”
“Okay,Entertainment Tonight.” Meredith winked. “Leave him alone.”
Her friends chuckled before Nick asked about some renovation happening on the Farm, but someone stole my attention.Connor, in the corner of my eye, alone and solemnly gazing out over Oyster Pond.
My heart stirred in my chest; I wasn’t used to his face without a smile.
What is he thinking about?I wondered, and wondered again later, while my dad and I made our own ice cream sandwiches. The sun was slipping in the sky, which meant we couldn’t be too far off from the fireworks.
“This is a mistake,” I told him as he scooped Mad Martha’s peppermint ice cream onto a peanut butter cookie. “Of epic proportions.”
“We’ll see…” he mused, then nodded at my dessert. A hefty scoop of sea salt caramel between two snickerdoodles. “You’re playing it safe.”
“Safe can still meandelicious.”
“Touché.” He smiled. “My mother would go for the white chocolate macadamia nut.” He gestured to the far platter of cookies.
“Oh, definitely,” I said through a bite of bliss. “With raspberry sorbet.”
Annie had never met a sorbet she didn’t like.
“Have you spoken to her?” my dad asked, a little tentatively. “Recently?”
I nodded. “She was watching HGTV this afternoon.”
“Love It or List It?”
