Page 48 of Only Mostly Devastated

He popped back above the surface and shook his head to dry himself off.

“You drenched me,” I complained. Not to mention the rest of my ice cream, which was half lake water now.

“Well, you’re wet now,” he said. “You might as well get in.”

Something about the thought of stripping down to my shorts and jumping into the lake with this guy I barely knew seemed illicit and thrilling to me. Even though I knew it was stupid, and he would probably freak out if he knew I was thinking about him like that. Chances were pretty strong that this was completely innocent. Still, it was fun to pretend. And with a guy this hot, who could blame me for fantasizing a little?

But then, when my head emerged from taking my shirt off, IsworeI saw Will stare at me. Only for a second, though.

I jumped in.

“You know, a lot of people back home can’t swim,” Will said, his head bobbing up and down. “I asked my friend Matt to come up with us but he bailed because of that.”

“I don’t think I’ve ever met someone who can’t swim,” I said. “What if your plane crashed into the ocean?”

Will burst out laughing. “That’syour main concern?”

“Well, it’s true! I mean, I guess you could just float.”

He shook his head. “No way, floating’s way harder than swimming. I can’t do it at all.”

“Seriously?”

“Yeah. I never learned how.”

“It’s easy. You just kind of…” I launched myself onto my back to demonstrate.

He tried to mimic me, and ended up flopping backward into the water like a finless whale. “I told you!” he said, snorting water out his nose.

“No, just try and… yeah, a bit more arched, though—no,more arched, Wi—here.” I put my hands at the top and bottom of his back and moved him into position. “Like that.”

His skin was warm to the touch. “Oh,” he whispered, before swallowing. “Like that.”

Then he rolled over to return to a paddling position. Which brought him about three inches away from my face.

He didn’t move back, though.

Our legs collided a few times underwater. My hands were still burning from where they had touched his skin. He looked at me with an intensity that took me by surprise.

All at once, I realized hehadbeen staring at me before.

With exactly this expression on his face.

I was just starting to hope when one of his hands found my waist, and he kissed me.

Another Thursday, another band practice.

This one was running particularly late, too. The band had a new set of songs Izzy wanted us to learn as soon as possible, and we couldn’t get Sayid and Emerson to agree on anything, from the tempo to the harmonies to the lyrics.

It didn’t matter too much to me if we went overtime, though. The girls were at a basketball game. I would’ve totally gone, but the thing is, I’d rather floss with barbed wire than watch a live sports match, so I declined with regrets. Besides, I’d had to skip the last band practice to play emergency babysitter when Aunt Linda developed a sudden pain in her side. It didn’t turn out to be anything major—thank God—but I couldn’t guarantee it wouldn’t happen again, so I couldn’t afford to play hooky from practice on top of that.

We’d been practicing for about an hour when Sayid and Emerson called a time-out to argue over a line in the song—Sayid thought the original “you throw your armsaround me, while all the lights surround me” was better, while Emerson was pushing for the obviously superior, “when darkness seeks to blind us, a fire ignites inside us.” Izzy, who thought lyrics were only there to complement an epic drum track, decided to mostly ignore them while she experimented with different beats, humming the chorus to herself. I wasn’t able to focus—I’d been a ditzy, gooey mess since Thanksgiving—so I perched myself on a stool and watched the others with a vague smile. So vague, even, I didn’t notice Izzy had stopped drumming. Until she threw a Skittle at my head.

“What are you all smiley about?” she asked. “You look like a Disney princess; stop it.”

I hunted for the Skittle on the carpet then popped it in my mouth.

“Ew, Itouchedthat,” Izzy said. “My hands are all sweaty.”

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