Page 95 of The Summer List

“THREE! TWO! ONE! GO!”

I leap off the edge, Naomi’s hand still clutching mine as we soar through the air before crashing through the surface of the water.

Everything turns muffled and slow. Bubbles swarm past my ears as I let myself sink down to the very bottom of the pool.

The world is quiet down here. With nothing but the echoes from the roiling surface and the thump of my heartbeat to fill my ears, I can imagine there’s no party to deal with at all. There’s no mom or dad to deal with either. There are no questions to ask or plans for the future to figure out.

For a moment, it all hovers above me, a weight I know will crash down on me as soon as I come up for air.

But I need to breathe, and Naomi’s hand is tugging me up to join her.

I kick off the floor of the pool and shoot up to breach the surface, sucking in a deep breath the second I do. I blink my eyes open to find Naomi’s face just inches away from mine.

I stare at the water droplets clinging to her eyelashes, at the strands of blonde hair plastered to the sides of her face, at the blue of her eyes reflecting the shimmering ripples and waves in the pool, and I decide ‘weird’ was an understatement.

This has been the most unexpected and utterly chaotic summer of my life, but I wouldn’t change a single second of it because somehow, this summer led me to her.

CHAPTER 24

Andrea

She’s wearing the blue dress again.

She told me there were no guarantees when I asked if she would, but she steps out of the house in the dress I’ll probably be picturing her wearing until the day I die. She’s paired it with white sneakers and a cute little white headband this time. The colour scheme makes her cheeks look extra pink when she catches me staring at her from where I’ve been sitting out on the front steps.

“What?” she asks as she pats her hair down.

“You know what,” I tell her, giving myself a few more seconds to stare before I get to my feet.

She gives my outfit a once-over and nods her approval once her eyes reach my face.

“You look so pretty,” she says, stepping close enough to run a finger under the simple gold pendant I’m wearing to go with my purple skater skirt and white crop top.

“Is this good enough for our mystery venue?” I ask to distract myself from how good it feels to have her fingertip brushing my collarbones.

She lets go of my necklace and takes a step back before nodding. “It’s perfect.”

She insisted on taking care of all the planning after we decided the best way to celebrate my official decision to move to Ottawa was to go on our second date. It’s been a few days since what we’re now referring to as the Hardcore Pool Party Incident, and we’ve settled into the final stretch of our stay at the house together.

I lead the way down the path to the driveway. My heart skips a beat when Naomi reaches for my hand.

“Can you believe this?” I say once we’re standing out on the curb waiting for our ride, her fingers still twined with mine. “We went from you thinking I was a burglar breaking into the house to murder you to holding hands while we go on our second date.”

She laughs and shakes her head. “Yeah, even if I’d had a thousand tries to guess how this summer would end, I wouldn’t have guessed this.”

I watch the fading yellow rays of the sunset catch in her hair and make her skin glow gold. She smells like flowery shampoo and long afternoons spent lying in the grass, the scent of her mixing with the baked asphalt and sweet clover of another hot August day fading into night.

There’s a breeze in the air that hints at the start of September. My dad and Sandy will be back from Italy next week. Naomi will go back to her parents’ place, and I’ll stay with my dad until I find some roommates to move in with.

“Good thing that data entry job pays so well,” Naomi says, sliding her hand out of my grip so she can check our driver’s progress on her phone. “We have to savor this ride, because I’m really going to need to ration my savings once I start school.”

I trail my fingertips down her arm to let her know I want to hold her hand again, and she lets out an adorable giggle before wrapping her palm around mine.

I brush my thumb over her knuckles and ask, “How are you feeling about school, by the way?”

She sighs and stares down the wide, tree-lined street. “I’m not going to lie. It still terrifies me. So much is going to change in ways I can’t even anticipate, but…well, it’s not like I could have anticipated this.”

She bumps our joined hands against my leg, which makes it very hard not to pull her to my chest and kiss her in the middle of the sidewalk.

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