Page 98 of Sacrifice
I glanceat my phone again. I’m worried Olivia will call or text and I won’t hear it. I thought Crew was going to have to pick me up and carry me out the door. It feels so unfair, so hedonistic, to leave Ever when she’s sick, even though she told me to leave so she could play Candy Land with Olivia.
Crew’s hand grabs my thigh and gives it a shake. “She’s fine. She’s having fun.”
“I know,” I say through gritted teeth. “I just feel bad . . .”
“For what? Recharging your battery for an hour? You feel bad about that?”
“Yeah.” I rest my head against the back of the seat and let the early evening sun warm my face.
He turns the radio down. “You’re dumb.”
“Thanks.”
“No, I mean it this time.” He laughs. “You can’t feel bad about leaving Ever with the only person besides the two of us she loves. She’s going to have a good game of Candy Land while we go out and get an ice cream.”
I look at him and he grins. “We’re going for ice cream?”
He nods and pulls into Castle Island. “I thought it would be a nice thing to do. Grab a cone, sit by the water, have a few minutes together. Just the two of us.”
My heart fills. This is exactly what I need.
He parks his truck, we climb out, and then he meets me at the front and grabs my hand immediately, like it’s the way we always do. I like it. I like all of it. As we walk through the entrance and over to the ice cream stand, I like every bit of this evening.
Our hands, clasped together, swing gently between us. His thumb strokes my knuckles and each swipe sends a warm sensation through me. I love the way I feel safe. I adore the way I feel important to him. I love looking up at him and seeing him looking at me out of the corner of his eye, and I love the grin that tickles the corner of his mouth.
“What?” I ask, a grin tugging at my lips, too.
“Just wondering how I’ve stooped so low to be seen with a girl wearing a Red Sox shirt.”
I bump him with my shoulder and he feigns like it hurt. He covers his shoulder with his other hand and sours his face. “Ouch. I was kidding.”
I shake my head. The ice cream stand is in front of us, the menu hanging off the front just like I remembered.
“What do you want?” he asks. “You still like the coconut flavor?”
“I haven’t had the coconut ice cream here since the summer you left.”
A look flitters across his face. “Really?”
“Gage and I never came here. Not for ice cream.”
He nods and looks away. “What do you want then?”
“Coconut.”
He orders me a cone and himself a chocolate one while I do a quick check of my phone. I’m relieved to see the screen blank. He hands me my cone and we walk away, licking our treats. “Want to go sit by the water?”
“Yeah. Let’s do that.”
His hand finds mine again and our fingers interlock. We walk leisurely down to the beach and sit close together on the sand. It’s warmer than it has been, but the breeze still makes it a little chilly. The waves roll in easily, lapping against the shore.
“I think the first time I ever saw you, you were right over there,” he says, pointing to an area near an outcropping of rocks. “You were with your friends and laughing. You looked so beautiful, like you didn’t have a care in the world. There were guys walking past you, checking you out, and you seemed oblivious.”
“I was,” I said, thinking back to that day.
“You know, if I could go back to that day, I’d change everything.”
He holds his cone in both of his hands in front of him, his elbows resting against his knees.
