Page 68 of On the Beat

“No, of course not.” I straighten. “Listen. Lately, I haven’t been interested in relationships. I don’t have time for them. They’re boring and exhausting and messy.”

“And does she know that?” Paulo steps on the brake so hard that my seatbelt tries to choke me.

“I… I don’t know,” I admit. Have I told her that? Have I told her any of it? Because she needs to hear it.

“Well, you should tell her—What is that?”

We pull up in front of his mother’s house. Catering staff circulate the large yard and filter in and out of the house. Both of our eyes are drawn to the giant pyramid of limes in the front yard, Paulo’s favourite fruit. Which, when you think of it, is pretty weird. Who has a favourite fruit, and whylimes? They’re basically a smaller, greener lemon, and no one’s favourite fruit is alemon.

“Uh… the crazy party you didn’t want me to plan?” I offer.

Paulo parks the car in the driveway and storms out of the driver’s seat before muttering, “I’m going to kill you, Ryder.”

“You can try!” I scramble out of the car after him.

He stalks over to the giant lime pyramid on the round table. Isla rushes out of the house, as though she doesn’t want to miss a single moment of her cousin witnessing his birthday party.

“Surprise!” She yells, blowing a noisemaker.

Paulo grabs a lime from the middle of the pyramid, causing the rest to roll down like a giant green, spherical game of Jenga collapsing. Limes roll onto the grass, one nearly hitting the sidewalk. I stop it with my shoe as five more roll under the car. Then he chucks the lime at me.

“Well,” Isla huffs, putting down the noisemaker. “Gloria and I only spent five hours putting that together.”

The lime hits me in the chest, and it’s already been cut, so it bursts open, spraying citric acid into my face. I have the wherewithal to shut my eyes, so that the lime juice just covers mostly my mouth and chin. Licking it off, I cringe at the sour taste, dabbing at my face with the hem of my t-shirt. I squint at him through the blinding sun and the juice of the lime, which is now splattered on the floor. “Paulo, why did you saylimesare your favourite fruit, again?”

Between my cracked-open eyelids, I see him juggling five limes at once, having picked them up from the grass. “They’re the easiest to throw.”

I touch my face, picking a seed off of my cheek. “You are a danger to everyone around you, and yourself.”

“Tell that to my patients, why don’t you?”

“I will!” I yell at his retreating form as he goes into the house, leaving me and Isla alone in the yard.

“You have a lime seed on your eyebrow,” she declares, walking over with a laugh. “Poor Paulo.”

“He threw a lime in my face, but you’ve only got sympathy for him?” I grab a napkin off the table, and dab at my face. When I pull it away, I realize it’s also lime-green. “Wow. You guys really went all-out for the party decorations.”

“Didn’t even get a picture of the lime tower before he demolished it.” Isla shakes her head, pressing a hand to her chest. “All my work, destroyed!”

“It’s okay,Iappreciated it.”

I bend down, crouching over to pick up all the dropped limes. Isla runs back into the house and returns with a wicker basket, holding it out to me as I dump the limes in it unceremoniously.

“I’m more objecting to the fact that you are doused in lime juice.” She grabs more limes from the broken pyramid—there had to be at least fifty that fell off, and two hundred on the table still—and dumps them into the basket.

The screen door bangs open before shutting again in the stiff breeze, startling both of us before we laugh.

“That was my indirect way of telling you to take a shower.”

“You should just stick to being direct. You’re terrible at being subtle.” My own words to her remind me of my conversation with Paulo in the car. “I’m going to shower, but first, I want to tell you something.”

“Okay, but stand at least six feet away from me while you say it,” she says, a grin spreading across her face. Neither of us makes a move to pull away. “What’s up?”

“I-I…” I clear my throat. “This thing between us… What are we?”

“There isn’t anything, last time I checked.” She cocks her head to one side, examining me like I’m her patient with head trauma. “You don’t want it to be anything serious. I don’t want it to be serious. I mean, it’s not evenreal, right?”

God.

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