“I guessI’m just confused about the kiddie pools.”
The sand is still warm beneath my bare feet, wind whipping my hair as I toss it up into a bun and watch Dahlia and Darby lay out two small heart-shaped inflatable pools on the beach. Darby pulls a bicycle pump out of the wagon she brought down, sticking it into the inflation valve.
“Here, let me do that for you.” I step up beside her and pull the pump from her grasp, standing on either side of it and beginning to move the handle up and down, slowly inflating the pool. “If you pump too hard you might give birth.”
“Honestly…” She sighs, rubbing her belly. “At this point, you’re probably not wrong.”
“We blow them up and then sit inside them with blankets and watch the sunset.” Dahlia grabs a cooler from the wagon. “It’s more comfortable than sitting on the ground itself, and we don’t get sand in every conceivable crevice.”
My eyes flit to Darby. “Don’t you fuck on the beach like…all the time?”
“Not all the time,” she grumbles, then references her belly. “Especially not since this happened.”
“Speaking of fucking…” Dahlia laughs, laying out blankets in the pool I just finished inflating while I start on the other. “Can I ask you a question, sister-to-sister?”
There’s a long pause before I finally glance up, realizing that she was talking to me.
“Sure?”
“Is August’s dick as big as I think it is?”
I bite back the smile begging to tease my lips. “Probably bigger.”
Darby blows out a slow puff of air before asking, “Pierced?”
“Yep,” I reply, putting the air pump back in the wagon after I finish inflating the second pool.
“And…?” Dahlia asks.
“Yes,” I respond, understanding exactly what she’s asking.
“His tongue is pierced too,” Darby adds.
I grin, dropping a pile of blankets into the second pool. “It very much is.”
Both of their brows shoot up, and they toss each other contemplative looks before going back to setting things up.
A few minutes later, the two pink pools sit side-by-side, filled with blankets and pillows. A cooler sits between them that has water, soda, and snacks.
“We used to do wine, but obviously…” Dahlia motions to Darby, who sits beside her in one pool, while I get comfortable in the other. “Plus, you haven’t been drinking, right?”
“Nope. Not since January,” I say. It’s not something I’ve brought up on my own before, but I suppose I shouldn’t be surprised that they know. I’m sure that my drinking was of major concern to my brothers, and I can’t be upset that they needed to talk about it with their significant others. “I don’t know that I’d call myself an alcoholic or anything…I don’t think? It’s odd. I never felt like drinking was a problem in my teens or early twenties. It was always social, never an emotional crutch. I don’t know when that changed, or what label it puts on me now, but…I just feel better without it. I don’t think a glass of wine is going to make me spiral, but I suppose I just don’t see the point anymore.”
“I think that’s great,” Darby says. “You don’t have to explain yourself to anyone. People choose to stop drinking alcohol for a slew of reasons, and all of them are valid.”
I smile. “Thanks.”
A moment later, the heavy pounding of rapid footsteps sounds from behind us, and I turn around to see Lou barreling through the sand in our direction. She’s still wearing her soccer uniform, sans shin pads and shoes, with my mom trailing behind her. Two pigtail braids bounce at her shoulders as she runs, stopping in front of her mom and aunt.
“Hi,” she says breathlessly, bending down to hug Dahlia before placing a hand on Darby’s stomach. “Hi to you too, baby.”
“Hi, bug. How was practi?—”
“Elena, I’m so glad you’re here.” Lou cuts off her mom as she beelines to the pool I’m in.
“You are?” I ask.
She nods rapidly. “I finishedThe Lightning Thief.”
