“Well, no. But you can park your bike and hop in. We could get an ice cream or something.”
Sam softens a bit at that—but just a bit. She does love ice cream, and she recognizes the peace offering. But she doesnotwant to talk about what happened in New York, not with her mother, not with anybody. She shakes her head and purses her lips and says, “I don’t want to talk about it. I just want to go to the beach and fall asleep for like a year and a half.”
“Okay,” says her mom. She puts the Wagoneer in gear, checks her mirrors. “Okay. But wear sunscreen, okay?”
Sam rolls her eyes again, harder this time. But she says, “Okay.” Cece did a lot of skin-care videos; Sam actually learned a lot about good sunscreen from her.
Once her mom is gone Sam pedals that last hundred meters to the parking lot, parks and locks her bike, and walks through the pavilion and onto the beach. She surveys the beach—it’s crowded, but not awfully so—and picks an empty spot in the sand to lay out her towel. She stretches out on the towel, then, remembering her mother’s advice and Cece’s videos, sits up and reaches into her backpack for a bottle of sunscreen. She’s looking down, squeezing out the sunscreen, when two feet with darkly painted toenails appear in her line of vision. She looks up, shielding her eyes from the sun with her hand. It’s Maggie, from Joy Bombs. A distraction from her own thoughts—hooray!
“Hi. Sorry to bother you. Am I bothering you? I just wanted to say hi.” Maggie shifts her feet on the hot sand. She’s wearing a bikini top and tiny shorts. Sunglasses. Messy bun.
“You’re not bothering me. And hi back.” Sam gestures to the end of her towel. “Sit, if you want. Don’t burn your feet. Are you by yourself? Not working at the café today?”
Maggie sits carefully on the edge of the towel as though worried about taking up too much of it. She crosses her feet underneath her. “My mom gave me today off.”
“Nice.”
“Sort of. But she has an ulterior motive.” Maggie stretches out her legs and flexes her toes. “Her boyfriend’s son is coming for two weeks on Friday, and they’ll want me to babysit. Max. He’s six.”
“Is it a good or bad thing that the boyfriend’s son is coming?”
“A little bit of both, I guess. He’s cute. But it gets crowded. I mean, it already got a little crowded, when Anthony moved in with us. Sometimes I miss when it was just me and my mom. I want her to be happy, of course I do, and she loves Anthony, but sometimes I miss us, the way we used to be, when it was just herand me and that’s it.” Maggie makes a little embarrassed face and shrugs. “That probably sounds weird.”
“Not at all,” says Sam. “I think it makes sense.” She watches a boogie boarder ride a wave. “Moms,” she says. “Even the good ones are complicated.”
Maggie snort-laughs and says, “Yeah.”
“I was just really grumpy with my own mom.”
“Why?”
“No reason. Just in a bad mood.”
“I don’t think of someone famous like you having a mom. Or like bad moods.”
Sam laughs. “Are you kidding me? I have both. The whole month of May was an endless bad mood for me. Endless. I feel like I just pulled myself out of it.”
Maggie nods. “Because of Evil Alice. Sure. I get that. It’s just that even with all of that, I don’t know anyone who wouldn’t trade places with you in a second.”
“I’dtrade withyou, Maggie.”
“Shut up. Don’t tease me.”
It’s true, though. Maggie is so young and unspoiled by the world, so full of optimism and goodwill. “I’m not teasing. I mean it. You’ve got killer hair. You live on this gorgeous island, you probably don’t have people constantly saying awful stuff about you online, you work at an iconic café—”
“I don’t have achoiceabout where I work,” says Maggie, stopping short of petulant, but not that short. “And I’m not sure it’s iconic.”
“Trust me. It’s iconic. Also, you’re cooler than everyone around you, and you don’t know it yet. Believe me, Maggie. I know what I’m talking about.”
Maggie twists her mouth and says, “Thanks. Even if you’re just saying that to be nice.”
“I’m not. I’m not that nice actually.”
Now Maggie laughs and says, “Yes, you are.” She turns away from the water and waves at a figure moving down the sand. “There’s Riley,” she says. Then, “Ugh. She brought Jacob.”
“Boyfriend?”
“Yup.”
