Page 68 of Beached Wedding

“I was,” I admitted, nodding as I recalled the excitement that had hit when I was getting on the plane. “No one warned me about the freaking spiders, though.” Or snakes or jellyfish or crocs.

A smile of morbid curiosity spread across her face. “Auntie Ashley said some of them are really big. She showed me a photo of one she saw at a campsite that was as big as her hand.” She splayed her fingers wide.

“That was only a teenager. I’ve seen bigger.” I set my hands in the air as though framing a dinner plate.

“For real?” She hung her tongue out. “Barf. I’m never going there.”

It was a throwaway remark, but knocked me onto my proverbial ass. It was one more reminder that her aunt wouldn’t be there as a reason for Fliss to come visit.

She sipped her coffee. “Do you like your stepfather?”

“Mitchell is okay.” I tried not to rehash the past since there was no changing it and I’d mostly made peace with it. “We never fought or anything. I did all my chores and got good grades. Spent a lot of time at Shane’s so I wasn’t in the way too much. He still calls me his wife’s foster son, though. Even though his kids look like they could be my biological siblings. It’s always made me feel like he wants people to know I’m not his, you know?”

“He sounds like a dick. What was your stepmom like?”

“Stephanie calls me her stepson and treats me more like a member of their family, but she’s hard to be around. Really high strung. She’s a doctor and they have three kids plus they breed standard poodles. She keeps a lot of balls in the air and runs everything like a military operation.” I chopped my hand against my palm. “Are you coming for Christmas? What time do you arrive? How long are you staying? Can you watch the kids on Tuesday so we can go to a holiday party? That was a conversation I had with her last week.”

“It’sMarch.”

“That’s Stephanie.” I sipped my shake and found it empty so I rattled it, hoping for a final taste. “As a kid, it was really hard to relax around her because I felt like I was one more thing she had to manage. I kind of preferred Mitchell’s indifferent attitude. He didn’t make me feel super welcome, but he didn’t act like I was a huge burden, either. I was just a fact of life he couldn’t avoid, like paying taxes or sweeping the garage. And I had Shane next door so I was glad to stay in Oz.”

“And Eddie and Sandy were nice to you?”

“Very nice,” I assured her, privately smiling at the anxious look she was giving me.Somuch like Ashley. “They invited me to come along all the time. Eddie calls all of Shane’s mates ‘son’ and means it. Like they’ve adopted all of us. It means a lot.”

It was why I couldn’t bear to further damage my relationship with them by taking up with the woman they had thought would be their daughter-in-law.

“Are you saying I should make friends with Josh who lives next door to Oliver?” She made a face of revulsion.

“What’s wrong with him? Is he one of the potheads who hangs around behind the gas station?”

“Jock,” she said pithily. “Doesn’t even know I’m alive. Not that I care.” She tried to sound dismissive, but I read confused speculation in her disgruntled expression.

You poor, poor kid. I wouldn’t go back to middle-school insecurities for all the money in the world. But where was I right now? If not co-starring in a high school love triangle? God knew I didn’t have the lead.

“Tell him you learned to surf over spring break. That’ll get his attention.”

“Are you referring to my failed attempts to drown myself?”

“You’ll get better.”

“When?” she scoffed.

“What are you doing right now?”

“Really? You want to go surfing? With me? Right now?”

“Why not?” I could use the distraction as much as she could. I wasn’t in a hurry to face Ashley again, especially if she was talking to her sister and Izzy about me.

“I already have my suit.” She plucked the string that was tied around her neck beneath the collar of her striped T-shirt.

“Text your mom so she knows where you are and let’s go.”

ASHLEY

Drinking while depressed only made you more depressed. That was the great epiphany I was experiencing. I was being careful not to fall past the tipping point, where I would start to confess stupid things to Izzy and Whit, but I had consumed enough that I felt both drunk and hungover which only compounded my misery.

Izzy and Whitney insisted the best way to combat my blues was dancing at the bar.

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