“You’re supposed to say something horny! Like never have I ever had sex in a pool, or never have I ever hit on my teacher —”
“Sex in a pool doesn’t work —” Cole interjects.
“— You’re not supposed to make us all cry,” Bree finishes, but they’re both laughing.
“Okay,okay—” Seth tosses the pillow to the side and wraps his arms around her, giving her a bear hug. “Never have I ever had sex in public.”
All three of us down our bottles, and the game continues on, long into the night.
Thirteen
We Could Have Just Told Them
August 2025
“YOU KNOW, LITTLE BRO,I’m not sure we fit in on this beach,” Seth chuckles.
I look over at my brother, and even the motion of turning my head makes me feel like the world is spinning. Like me, Seth is wearing a long-sleeved navy blue rash guard, knee-length swim trunks and a sun hat pulled low over his eyes. We’re in Provincetown, at Herring Cove Beach, probably the gayest beach in Massachusetts, and pretty much every other guy as far as the eye can see is in a tiny swimsuit. Everywhere I look, I see skin, and Cole is no exception. He’s in acheeky lime green suit today, all golden skin and wind-tossed hair as he stands in the surf with Bree. They were swimming a little while ago, but now they look like they’re in a serious discussion, their heads tilted together as they stare out into the waves. Finally, Cole holds out his arms, and Bree hugs him. And then he’s trotting over the sand towards me, shielding his eyes from the sun, a thousand-watt grin on his face.
“Are you going to lie there all day?” he calls as he gets closer.
“I’m so fucking hung over,” I groan back. “I don’t even want to move my eyes.”
“Come on, the water’s freezing. It’ll do you good,” he laughs, holding out a hand to pull me up. “You’ll feel better once you’re out there.”
“I don’t believe you,” I grumble, but I let him pull me up. Of course I fucking do.
Once I’m on my feet, he drops my hand and slings an arm around my shoulders to lead me to the water line. You know, like bros. As we walk, he looks at me out of the corner of his eye.
“I don’t know if you were worried about Bree and the jealousy thing, by the way,” he says. “She just gets — I dunno, protective of me sometimes. Because she’s seen me at some pretty low points. But she really likes you.”
“That’s good, since she’s going to be my sister.” I glance back over our shoulders, watching as Breecoaxes Seth off the blanket and towards the ocean. “I get why she’d think it was weird, especially since she doesn’t know the whole story.”
“Hell, I don’t know ifweknow the whole story,” Cole declares, and I’m about to ask him what he means when the surf washes over my feet.
“Fuck!You weren’t kidding — JesusChrist, that’s cold —”
“Not in Jersey anymore, are you? Welcome to New England, baby —” Cole cackles, and he dives directly into the waves.
“Fuck fuck fuck fuck—”
I’m usually the kind of guy who can take twenty minutes or more to ease myself into open water, especially when it’sthisfrigid. But Cole is already slicing through the surf, long and lean and fuckingmouthwatering, and so I splash my way in, chattering and cursing the whole way, until we’re both bobbing in the waves. Once I’m all the way in, he swims toward me, wrapping his arms around my neck, and I pull him close, my toes buried in the sand beneath us.
Our faces are nearly touching, and there’s ocean water in his lashes, his wet hair much darker than usual, the tip of his nose a little pink from the sun.
“I can’t fucking begin to tell you how much I want to kiss you right now,” I groan, my fingers possessive around his hip.
Cole glances over my shoulder. “They are totallymaking out and they’re pretty far away, so if you make it quick —”
I don’t wait for him to finish his sentence before I crush our mouths together. He tastes of saltwater and sunshine, and he sighs against my mouth, one hand cradling the back of my head and the other on the side of my face. When we break apart, he moans in frustration, then pulls back just a little, his eyes glowing.
“It’s crazy that we’ve never done this before,” he muses. “You know, we lived next to the ocean for almost a year and we never swam together.”
I thought this over.“I guess it was winter for most of it. And the beaches were a mess because of Sandy. And then —”
“And then I left before it really got warm enough to swim —” His voice is a little hollow, and I hold my breath, because it’s the closest either of us has come to saying anything about that night —
But then he’s off again, splashing me with water and diving underneath the surface, daring me to catch him. And the rest of the morning is just like this, the four of us frolicking in the waves.
