Leaving Joe’s bed, his house, and his embrace only makes me crave to shed the girl who is afraid to love and be left behind. Instead, I am gnawed by a growing anxiety from the intensity of my feelings for him.
I tried to shake the remnants of my conditioning in learning to survive on my own by walking my dogs. It was supposed to break the isolation I've used to survive for years, the habit of suffering silently, but the worry followed me through every single step. It wasn’t until I finally kicked off my shoes and felt the hot beach sand under my feet that I felt a bit better.
Looking up, the sight of my girlfriends, Artemis and Mimi, at the Casa Sun beachwherewe agreed to meet for brunch makes me smile. I missed them. It’s already boiling hotfor June, and Artemis thankfully claimed the onlybrunchtable in the shade, right under the white and yellow striped umbrella. The sea is turquoise and calm, with a soft breeze that reminds us we grew up in this paradise.
Artemis stirs ice into a glass of rosé, her hazel eyes lock with mine, and her smile in instant.
“You made it,” Artemis says, scooting over to make room.
“Barely.” I drop onto the bench next to her.
Her nails, painted a lethal shade of coral, click against the glass. Her very long, light brown hair brushing in the wind, her tiny bikini and her tall legs resting against her chair. Mimi is next to her, strands of black haircatching in the wind and sticking to her glossy, luscious lips. She is slouched over her phone, her entire existence and big blue eyesdistilled intothe tiny screen.
“Hi babe!” Mimi beams at me, and her smile drops as quickly as if she’s wounded.
I feel a stab of guilt. I haven’t been hanging out much with them, and even now, I’m rehearsing apologies that don’t taste like lies.
Artemis waves to the server. “You look like you haven’t slept in a week. A rosé for the lady, please.” We’ve grown up too fast in a village made for adults, where regrets of having a glass of wine for brunch are delusional. Luckily, we were able to drink at eighteen, which none of us waited on either.
I wave it off. “I haven’t.”
Our shady corner in the warm sand lets filter sunlight in a way that makes me want to close my eyes and disappear. I imagine falling asleep right here, letting the conversation swirl around me like soft waves.
Artemis snaps her fingers and makes me flinch back to my existential unease. “So? you’re just going to sit there and not spill it?”
“Sorry. Long night,” I say, sitting up straight.
She raises an eyebrow, “With Joe?” Her voice drops to a conspiratorial whisper.
Mimi glances up. “God, say it already.”
I blush, which is exactly what they want. “Nothing happened.”
Artemis leans in, elbows on my knees, prowling like a feline sniffing her prey, grabs my jaw closer to inspect me and with a voice honey-sweet and dangerous as her vanilla perfume invades my senses. “You’re such a liar. If he looked at me the way he looks at you, I’d be having trouble walking.”
I roll my eyes.I wish I had trouble walking.
“I’m still a virgin if that’s what you really want to know.” I give her a look.
“And you're upset about it!” Mimi exclaims as if she cured Ebola.
“Just shut up, both of you.” I chuckle, pulling my sunglassesout of my purse and sliding them onto my facelike a shield.
Artemis is still staring at me. “You know what you should do?” She lets her tongue out resting on her tooth. “Don’t text him for a day. Let him wonder.”
“Let him suffer,” Mimi says, not looking up from her phone.
I snort. “That’s not my style.”
“It should be.” Artemis stirs her drink with extra violence. “Men are like dogs. If you don’t train them early, they ruin the carpet.”
I laugh, but it comes out weirdly high. “He’s not a dog.”
Mimi puts her phone down. “No, but he’s a man. It’s like, genetic.”
I want to argue, but I’m tired and outnumbered and they’re both older than me by a year but in these girls’ world it’s a lifetime and so far, I’ve been the “good girl” of the group, dare I say the introvert. I settle for biting into the croissantthat seems to stare back at me.
Artemis’s tone softens. “Seriously, though. Don’t get so wrapped up in him that you forget about the rest of us.”
