Page 5 of The Best Friend Power Play

Evie, who's sitting next to me, offers me a smile. "Are you okay? You seem a little…flat. Here. Want some?" She tips her cup my way.

"I'm okay. But thank you. I know how much it took for you to offer me that."

She smiles. "You're worth depriving myself of a little caffeine."

I smile back. "The truest sign of friendship."

We stare out at the sleepy town of Comfort Bay.

I've lived here all my life, and I love it. But lately, I've been starting to feel a little restless.

When I was a little girl, the thing I wanted to do most was travel. I got a globe for Christmas one year, and I remember spending hours and hours outlining national borders with my tiny fingers, saying the names of cities aloud, wondering what those places were like.

Then I turned thirteen and life happened. I stopped dreaming.

And now I'm on the verge of another major life change.

"What's on your mind?" Evie asks as the sky transforms in front of us, getting lighter by the second.

"Summer." Summer stops talking with Amiel and Beth and spins around. "The season, not the person," I clarify.

Evie takes a second. "Oh, right. Of course. The twins."

"Yeah." I take a sip from my water bottle. "The twins."

The twins are Katie and Chester, my younger sister and brother. Except they feel more like my kids than my siblings.

When we lost Mom, they had just turned seven. Dad fell apart. Grandma moved in. And I went from being their big sister who did jigsaw puzzles with Chester and read and reread Charlotte's Web to Katie every night, to taking on a much more active role in raising them.

Dad was and still is a software engineer, so after Mom died, he upskilled and got a high-paying job for an IT company. The only drawback was the job's location in San Francisco.

He lived and worked there during the week, and until I graduated from high school, he'd do the three-hour drive to Comfort Bay every weekend.

These days, he visits about once a month.

His absence was tough, but it was the best way for him to take care of us financially. It couldn't have been easy for him, either. He and Mom were so happy together. It took him over a decade to start dating again, and even though he occasionally sees someone, he hasn't found what he had with Mom. Whenever I ask him about his love life, he says he'll tell me when he meets someone special.

I insisted Grandma move out once I turned eighteen. She'd put her own life on hold for long enough. I wanted her to enjoy her golden years. She moved to a retirement community on the other side of town—which in Comfort Bay means a fifteen-minute walk away—and I took over running Mom's flower shop.

My life became carpools and homework, extracurricular activities and household chores. It was challenging and stressful and sometimes lonely, and I will always have the deepest respect for single parents. It's tough and often thankless work.

Luckily for me, I had family, great friends, and a wonderful and supportive community.

And Culver.

I can tell him things I can't tell anyone else because he knows what it's like to lose someone you love. He lost his twin brother at the exact same age I was when Mom passed. It's a tragic way to be connected to someone, but it's given us a strong, unshakable bond.

A bond I am never going to destroy.

"What are the twins' summer plans?" Summer asks.

"Katie is going to Wyoming to spend the summer with Dean and his family."

"High school sweethearts are the sweetest," Amiel coos.

"They are. He's the best first boyfriend I could have hoped for for her. And Chester's been working at the grocery store to save up and go to Europe with friends."

"To party?" Beth asks.

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