Original Edition: Chapter Twenty-Three

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Alissa Hasting's obscenely large white Range Rover pulled to a stop in front of Blake and me. One of his hands was still resting on my hip, his index finger pressed against the tiny sliver of skin bared between the waistband of my shorts and the hem of my sweatshirt. His sweatshirt, I reminded myself with a great deal of chagrin. As if our little parking lot escapade could look any worse.

"On a scale of paraplegic turtle to Usain Bolt, how fast are you?" I demanded out of the corner of my mouth.

"What?" Blake hissed back.

"Here's the game plan. On the count of three, we turn and go for the car. You do one of those cool over-the-hood slides and get in on the driver's side, and I'll—"

"We're not running away," Blake whisper-shouted.

I shifted my weight between my feet, trying to shake off Blake's hand so I could give into my instinct and run the complete opposite direction of the ex-girlfriend of the boy I'd just kissed. But his fingers just tightened resolutely around me, as if to say we're definitely about to die, but dammit, we're gonna die together.

The tinted passenger-side window of Alissa's car started to roll down at an excruciatingly slow pace. I squeezed my eyes shut and held my breath, not ready to face Blake's ex-girlfriend like this.

"Dude, you pick the weirdest places to hang out."

Funny. Alissa sounded a lot like a teenage boy.

I peeled open one of my eyes. Jesse Fletcher's sunburnt face grinned back at me from the passenger's seat of the Range Rover, his golden curls pinned back by a hot pink elastic headband. Behind him, Alissa sat upright in the driver's seat, her face hidden by a pair of oversized sunglasses.

"Where's Lena?" I asked, frowning.

At this inquiry, the rear passenger's side window started to roll down. Lena was slouched, her bun of wild golden curls perched on the top of her head like a strange hat, with her arms folded across her chest and her eyes narrowed at the back of the seat in front of her.

I turned to Jesse, confused.

"Don't mind Lena. She's just bitter I got shotgun," he explained, his grin smug with triumph.

"Only because you cheated," Lena snapped, extending a tanned leg to kick the back of her brother's seat.

Jesse lurched forward from the force of her kick. He let out a cry of outrage and twisted in his seat, jabbing himself in the face with his own seatbelt before he managed to get a clear view of his twin.

"I did not!"

"Yeah, you did. You broke shotgun rules. You called shotgun before the car was in sight. Everyone knows that's a violation."

"Your mom's a violation."

"We have the same mom, idiot."

I shot a wary glance towards Alissa, wondering if she'd seen more than the incredibly oblivious Fletcher twins had. But her face was impossible to read behind those stupid hotel-heiress-slash-part-time-model sunglasses, and since she wasn't getting out of the Range Rover and demanding for someone to hold her earrings while she punched me out, I was starting to think maybe none of them had seen Blake and me kissing just a minute ago.

Blake seemed to realize this at the same moment I did. His hand dropped from my side, and he cleared his throat.

"So, um, what's the plan?" he asked.

Jesse abandoned his attempts at defending himself to turn to us.

"We have work, dude," he said. "Lissa was going to drive Lena and Waverly home and you can take us to—"

Lena's hand shot out. Her fingers hooked underneath the hot pink elastic headband Jesse was wearing and pulled it half a foot from his face. I winced, already knowing what was coming.

The sound of elastic smacking skin was audible.

"Lena!" Jesse roared, cradling his forehead as he spun back around in his seat. "I'm gonna rip all the posters off your bedroom walls, and I'm gonna eat all your favorite flavors of those stupid protein bars mom keeps buying, and I'm gonna cancel all your recordings on our TV, and I'm—"

But Lena was laughing too hard to hear his threats.

I glanced over at Blake.

For a solid three seconds, the two of us just stared at each other. Then the relief set in. Blake was the first to crack a smile and release a breathy chuckle.

"You have work?" I asked.

Blake nodded.

"Lifeguarding," he said.

"Oh," I managed, dumbly. "Uh, have fun."

"I'll try."

"Don't drown or anything."

Blake rolled his eyes. "Thanks."

"I mean it," I insisted, and I might have sounded a bit too serious, because suddenly Blake's smile was sympathetic. His arm jerked up, as if he were going to reach for my hand. But the Fletcher twins were still tossing insults at each other not even ten feet from us, and Alissa Hastings could have been watching us from behind those enormous sunglasses of hers—although we'd never know, since her shades were about as tinted as the windows on a presidential limousine. In any case, it definitely wasn't the time for Blake and me to act like anything other than platonic friends.

"So, uh," Blake began, then cleared his throat, "I'll see you at the Fletchers' house. For the barbecue?"

Jesse's head poked out of the front window.

His hot pink headband was around his neck, like a noose.

"Next Saturday," he coughed, "nine o'clock. Parents and step-parents and guardians of the aunt persuasion are welcome. But you're gonna have to bring your own ketchup."

"Our own ketchup?" I echoed.

I'd never been to a barbecue before, so I didn't know what was customary.

Lena's head appeared out of the back window.

"Dad's allergic to tomatoes," she explained, "so we don't keep any tomato products in the house."

Jesse took advantage of Lena's momentary slip in focus to pop open the door of Alissa's Range Rover and tumble out into the hospital parking lot, a mess of spindly limbs and khaki shorts and golden curls.

"And he sticks the landing," Blake muttered in a huff.

Jesse, who'd managed to pick himself up and was dusting grains of asphalt off his shorts, shot Blake a scowl.

"Just for that," he said, stabbing a boney finger into the air as he started towards his Jeep, "I'm not letting you sit shotgun."

"Fine," Blake shrugged. "You can be my chauffeur."

I watched dumb and dumber bicker all the way to Jesse's Jeep, where—after a moment of debate—Blake yanked open the passenger side door and stepped up onto the ledge over the wheel. He paused for a moment, sending another glance in my direction, and only ducked into the car once I'd given him a reassuring nod.

"Hey," Alissa called from behind me.

I turned over my shoulder and, stupidly enough, was surprised to find she'd spoken to me. Her sunglasses were pushed up onto the top of her head and her eyes were trained on me.

Naturally, her winged eyeliner was on point.

"I'm driving you home," she said.

But what I heard was, I'm gonna pretend to drive you home but actually throw your dead body into the ocean, you ex-boyfriend stealer.

"Okay," I swallowed. "Sure. Great. Thanks."

I stood there for a second, debating whether to run around the Range Rover and hop into the back seat next to Lena or risk my life and sit shotgun. But then Alissa leaned over and popped open the passenger side door, and the choice was made for me.

The leather seats of the car were smooth and cool against my bare thighs, but I couldn't help but feel like I'd just slid into the fiery depths of purgatory. Dante hadn't accounted for the tenth circle of hell—sitting in an intimidating girl's car five minutes after messing around with her ex-boyfriend in a parking lot.

"God, I'm exhausted," Lena groaned from the back seat.

I heard the shuffle of limbs as she squirmed into a more comfortable position and was struck by the sudden realization that, if Lena were to fall asleep, she wouldn't be able to witness whatever wrath Alissa unleashed on me.

Do not fall asleep, I willed Lena in my mind. Don't you dare

Not ten seconds later, Lena let out a massive snort that most accurately resembled the anguished cry of a dying whale. There was an awkward pause, and then the sound came again. And again. My impromptu bodyguard was snoring.

I sunk into my seat, my chest tightening with dread.

For one long, drawn-out minute, the inside of the car was totally silent except for Lena's rhythmic, lawn-mower-esque snores. Alissa sat ramrod straight in her seat, but her hands were resting lazily on the steering wheel, her wrists slack. She glanced at the dashboard, and for a moment I thought she was going to turn on the radio. Instead, she opened her mouth.

"I know you're a thing," Alissa said. "You and Blake."

Well. There it was. The elephant in the Range Rover.

It felt like every blood cell in my body was migrating to my face. I sunk a fraction lower in my seat, my mouth opening and closing several times as I dug through my scattered brain for something to say.

"I'm not mad, Waverly."

And just like that, the excuse I'd started to word in my head collapsed.

"You—huh?" I asked, fumbling my words. "You? Aren't—are not—mad? At me? Mad at me? You're not... what?"

Alissa let out a little sigh and executed an impeccable left-hand turn.

"He and I broke up," she said simply. "We're over. He should move on."

She must've seen the way my eyebrows furrowed in suspicion, because she pushed on, her cheeks flushing the slightest bit pink.

"Blake is important to me, obviously. I mean, we dated for a year and a half. But," she trailed off. When we pulled up to a stop sign, she finally took a moment to turn in her seat and face me. "We, like, grew up, I guess."

"I thought you wanted him back," I said. "You seemed so upset when you guys broke up, I just assumed you were still..."

"In love with him?" Alissa finished for me, falling back into her seat.

"Well, yeah."

Alissa took a deep breath and adjusted her grip on the steering wheel.

"I don't know if I loved him," she admitted. "I mean, I guess I loved him in a way. But I wasn't in love with him, you know? He was, like, my first real boyfriend. And it was a good relationship while it lasted, but—"

Alissa's face screwed up, her mouth twisting to one side.

"But what?" I prompted.

Alissa glanced over at me again, then up into the rearview mirror. When she saw Lena was still asleep, sprawled across the back seat, she let out a gushing breath.

"His mom was dead and mine was in Milan boozing it up on a yacht with some guy twice my dad's age," she said, shrugging. "Our relationship was built on talking shit."

I didn't reply for a long time.

The girl sitting next to me in the plush leather driver's seat of a car that must've cost a year's worth of college tuition was a picture of perfection. Her hair was pin-straight, though dented where her sunglasses hit it when she wore them on top of her head, and dark against flawless olive skin. She was gorgeous, and wealthy, and terribly, horribly unhappy.

Something heavy settled in my stomach. Guilt.

I hadn't known a thing about her, and I'd gone and painted her a villain in my head, all because she'd been pretty and wealthy and carried herself like someone with half a brain and was dating the boy I had a crush on.

"How did you and Blake start dating, anyway?" I asked suddenly.

Alissa's hands twitched on the wheel, then went for the air-conditioning dial.

"We had class together second semester sophomore year. Precalc. Someone said his new stepmom was hot, and he punched the kid in the face. The principal suspended him for, like, a week, and I offered him my notes when he got back," she said, then shrugged. "It was good, for a while. We needed each other. But I think we both grew out of it, all the venting and complaining. It's hard to stay angry. It just makes me so tired."

I peered out through the car window to watch the roll and crash of the waves down in Marlin Bay, one guard rail and rocky cliff's drop away from us.

"Why Ethan?" I blurted.

I mean, why had she chosen to mess around with Ethan, of all people? Alissa clearly had enough horrible people in her life. Why would she go looking to add another to the mix? I mean, who had ever looked at the cast of people they knew and gone, you know, I could really use an egotistical jerk with the fashion sense of someone in an early-two-thousands music video in my life. And I should also date him.

To her credit, Alissa didn't even wince.

"Because the first time we hung out, my mom shouted at me. Screamed at me, actually. She didn't trust him at all. She didn't want me hanging around him."

"So it was a teen rebellion thing?" I asked, smiling a little.

Alissa swallowed, ducking to peer into her side-view mirror despite the lack of traffic on either side of the winding road.

"It was the first time my mom had talked to me in four months."

My smile dropped.

I decided it was time to stop prying.

Alissa slipped her sunglasses back down over her eyes, and I couldn't help but worry that she was tearing up behind her shades. I was relieved when she reached forward and turned on the radio, settling on a country music station. I hadn't pegged her as the type, but soon enough I caught her tapping the steering wheel and mouthing the words to a couple of songs.

Who would've guessed Alissa had a thing for Tim McGraw?

While acoustic strumming and banjo plucking drifted through the car, I kept glancing into the back seat to check on Lena, whose face was plastered against the car window. At some point during the ride, Alissa pushed her sunglasses back on top of her head, and I pretended I didn't notice the way her winged eyeliner had smudged at the corners.

"Is she drooling yet?" Alissa asked as we drove past a sign alerting us that Holden was less than ten miles away.

I craned my neck.

"Uh-huh."

Alissa handed me her phone, the corner of her lips curling up mischievously.

"I need a new screensaver."

I smiled back.

When Alissa finally pulled her car to a stop against the curb outside Aunt Rachel's pale orange house, I was stiff and sore from two forty-minute drives, one attempt at risking my life to sit on a board out in the ocean, an impromptu lunch date, and a kiss (a kiss). I still had sand and salt tangled in my hair, but at least Blake's too-large sweatshirt was clean and soft. Alissa tucked her phone into her pocket, promising me she'd forward all the photos I'd snapped.

"Thanks for the ride, by the way," I told her as I hopped out of her Range Rover.

It was just as windy as it'd been that morning, but I figured I already looked homeless, so what was a little hair in my face?

"It's no problem," Alissa told me, smiling sheepishly. "I'm sorry if I scared you, earlier. I—look, I'm really happy for you and Blake. And I know I can't say that without sounding like I'm totally lying, but I mean it. I'm not mad at you guys for getting together. Like, at all. I promise."

"Thank you," I told her. It was all I could think to say. I had no idea how to articulate my relief without coming across as an imbecile.

Alissa glanced into her lap, hesitant, and then sent me a nervous smile.

"To be honest, I'm sort of relieved you're with him," she told me, her cheeks flushing pink again. "For a while there, I sort of thought you and Jesse were, like, a thing."

God, what was with everyone thinking he and I were more than friends?

The little burst of annoyance I felt was immediately trampled by the realization that Alissa was relieved to find out that Jesse and I weren't together. I thought of them again at Marlin Cove, sitting out on the water together, their surfboards tethered by Jesse's grip on hers.

Jesse, you suave son of a bitch.

"We're not a thing," I told Alissa with a shake of my head.

"Oh?" She bit down on her lower lip.

I turned towards Rachel's house so she wouldn't see the amused grin spreading across my face. "Trust me," I called over my shoulder as I started up the front walk, "he likes girls who can actually surf!"


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