Roo noticed. It was clear in the way his eyes narrowed on our now-joined hands, quickly processing what this meant. Then, the beers in his arms, he turned back to Hannah. “Let’s go,” he said. “It’s this way.”
They started down a wooden staircase that led off the cul-de-sac, with Rachel right behind them. Down below, I could see people were crowded on the small porch, the steps, and the dock, their voices rising up to us. I suddenly remembered Blake was holding my hand.
“What are you doing?” I asked, finally coming to my senses and pulling it back. “This is an apology. Not a date.”
“Oh, come on,” he said. I just looked at him. “Fine. Kill me for trying. I had a chance, I took it.”
“Well, we’re not like that anymore,” I told him. “Understood?”
“Yeah, sure. You just wanted a ride. I get it.”
“That’s what you offered!”
“Because I was trying to get back with you!”
I stopped walking, halfway down the stairs. Roo, Rachel, and Hannah had already gotten to the porch, their arrival (or that of the beer) celebrated with a burst of applause. “Why?”
He just looked at me. “What do you mean?”
“Why?” I repeated. Like his “nope” earlier, I wasn’t backing down. “Whydo you want to be with me?”
“I don’t know,” he replied, frustrated. “Why wouldn’t I want to be with you?”
“You can’t answer my question with a question. Try again.”
He sighed, leaning back against the rail behind him. “What do you want me to say?”
“I want you to explain why you want to hold my hand. Why you want to date me. Why this”—here, I ran a hand through the air between us, to him, me, then back to him again—“is appealing to you.”
“Well, right now, it’s not,” he said. I made a face. “What? Look, I’m an assertive person, okay? I go with the flow. And the flow treats me well. So what’s not to like?”
I could not even begin to understand this. Yes, I’d been a person who’d benefited also from the actions of others: because of my dad and his hard work, I lived in a nice house and basically wanted for nothing. But people weren’t things you just came across. They had to mean more.
“Colin liked Bailey. Bailey brought me along. And you dated me because I was there,” I said to Blake. “This isn’t a relationship, it’s a coincidence.”
“Who wants a relationship?” he asked.
Me, I thought, surprising myself. But not with someone who’s been given everything. How could you value something if you never fought for it?
But what hadIfought for, before this summer? All thethings I didn’t want to do, a battle of prevention: driving, thinking too much about my mom, keeping the world as I knew it small, safe, and organized. Then I’d come here, where I was thrown in with little notice and no manual, forced to figure it out on my own. North Lake had changed me. And I wasn’t sure I wanted to change back.
And then, of course, there was Roo. Who’d recognized me when I felt surrounded by strangers that first day. Who’d picked a dress that made me feel beautiful, made me laugh and think and, most of all, remember. He was right there in that house below us, nearby once again, and I should have been able to make this my moment to return the favor, find him and say everything I hadn’t that night of Club Prom.Shoulda done it, Bailey had said. And for every moment since, I’d known she was right.
“I don’t want to be part of your flow,” I said to Blake now. When he opened his mouth to reply, I continued, “And you shouldn’t want that either. Life is big and huge and scary. But you have to go and take your part of it. There’s a reason the saying is ‘Seize the day,’ not ‘Wait for it to come along at some point.’”
“Hold on, so you want me to seize you? I just did! I took your hand.”
“But I’m not the one for you!” I said, exasperated. “I’m just the one who’s right here.”
He was quiet for a second. “So... are you saying you don’t even want to walk in with me? You want, you know, me to wait out here until you go in?”
“No,” I said. “We walk in together, as friends. Because we are. Right?”
“I hope so,” he said quietly, and I could tell he meant it. Then he gestured for me to go ahead on the stairs, and I did, hearing him follow in the next beat behind me.
April’s house was right on the water, with a great view of the lake. As we approached, I could see her through the window, adjusting some twinkling lights in the kitchen. The party planner at work.
“It’s my BIRTHDAY!” Taylor, who was sitting on a cooler by the house’s front door, wearing a light-up crown with feathers that said PRINCESS—slightly crooked—and only one shoe, said when she saw us.
