Page 22 of The Words We Lost

But as soon as she reached the open library doors, her heart stuttered to a stop, and she quickly slid into the shadowed alcove to the left of the room, where she gawked at the nightmare playing out in real time.

Joel was inside!And worse, he had Cecelia’s backpack slung over his shoulders. Why was he always the one to ruin her best plans?

Yet her frustration quickly gave way to curiosity as she studied the rare look of amusement on his face. She followed his line of sight to where Ingrid stood, both hands raised in the air as if Joel was about to quote the Miranda rights to her. But from the looks of it, the only thing he was doing was leaning against the doorjamb with his own hands casually stuffed in his pockets.

“I—I swear, I wasn’t stealing anything,” Ingrid uttered.

“That paperback in your back pocket might suggest otherwise,” Joel said with a suave-sounding voice that made Cecelia roll her eyes to the ceiling.

Ingrid pawed for the tattered novel sticking out of the back pocket of her denim cutoffs. “Oh no, this isn’t ... this one is mine.”

“You carry books on your person often then?”

“Yes.”

Joel raised his eyebrows at this, then smiled in full.

“I swear, Cece was right here with me a minute ago. She can tell you.” She rose on her tiptoes and appeared to be searching the space. “I’m just not sure where she went.”

“Cece, huh?” He laughed as he spoke the nickname. “I’m not sure I’ve ever heard anyone else refer to her as that before. Maybe if there’s two of us, her campaign to change her name might actually stick. Still”—he lowered his voice a smidge—“you should probably know that Cece has a bad habit of wandering off at inopportune moments.”

If Cecelia wasn’t actively trying to hide from her cousin, she’d tackle him. How long was he going to hold that particular grudge? It wasn’t as if she’d planned to walk away with their only flashlight that night. Sure, Joel had been waist-deep in dark waters at the time, and sure, he had asked her to light his way back to shore after he retrieved the runaway crab pot, but she would have lost the rare Moon Snail shell to the tide if she’d waited even a few more seconds. But the way Joel told the story, she all but planted that fish hook on the sand for him to step on.

Joel pushed off the doorjamb and held out his hand for Ingrid’s book. “Mind if I take a look at that?”

Seconds passed before Ingrid handed her book over to him, and Cecelia wondered if her new friend was even breathing while Joel examined it. “I read this one in fifth grade,” he finally said. “I enjoyed it. Especially the protagonist’s relationship with the dog. Probably because I’ve never had a dog of my own.”

And much like the way Ingrid’s eyes lit up on the dock, they did once again, turning a shade of melted gold.

“I never have, either,” Ingrid said. “But I love Rontu. I’m trying to get my dad to name our next boat after him, but he said dog names don’t make good boat names and that if I want to use it, I’ll need to either buy my own boat or save it for a dog.”

Joel turned the book over with care before handing it back to her. “Which confirms you are indeed Ingrid Erikson.”

Ingrid took a step back. “How do you know that?”

“My dad just called me from the marina—said I should keep an eye outfor you seeing as he just hired your father to be the hotel’s charter boat captain this summer. I’m Joel.” He smiled, and Cecelia noticed it wasn’t his usual smile. While it had taken her some time to get used to the baritone of her cousin’s post-puberty voice—and to the way he’d practically bulked up overnight—she’d rarely seen him interact with peers their age. And certainly not with exotic, sea-bound, book-loving newcomers who’d just been granted a reason to stick around town for an entire summer. Cecelia bit her bottom lip and studied the second hand of the clock in the grand hallway across from the lobby.Two minutes.She had two minutes to make a decision she might regret forever. “I’d planned to introduce you to my cousin,” Joel continued. “But it sounds like she got to you before I could.”

“That’s right, Joel. I did.” Cecelia practically leaped out of her hiding place. “Which means as of right now, you are officially the third wheel.”

He shook his head and laughed while Ingrid looked between the cousins curiously.

Joel slid the backpack strap from his shoulder, allowing it to dangle in the space between them. “I found this on the patio. Seems to be packed pretty full for a casual day at the beach.” Suspicion gleamed in his eyes. “Care to explain?”

Cecelia’s cheeks flamed in their silent standoff. “How about if Idon’texplain and instead we take our new friend for a blackberry lemonade slush and show her around town before our shift starts tonight?”

He narrowed his eyes and Cecelia held her breath. “You buying?”

She grinned and nodded. The tradeoff was very much in her favor. She swiped her backpack off his shoulder with a hard yank. “I just need to run upstairs and grab something really quick.” Like the good-bye letter she left for her mom. Perhaps she’d store it away for another time, when things in this town returned to their typical, mind-numbingly boring existence.

But something told her that if she left on that ferryboat today, she might just miss the most epic adventure to ever happen to this town ... and to her.

9

As Joel concludes reading Cece’s first chapter aloud and lowers the stack of printed pages to his lap, I’m thinking how strange it is to have known a person so well and still be a stranger to their inner thoughts. While her written narrative brought an instant recall to the dramatic inflection of her voice and to her unique way of stretching every detail to the fullest, it wasn’t without surprise. Although, Joel seems to be focused on something else entirely: a cautionary tale I’ve heard a hundred times.

“She really did make a horrible lookout,” he reports with feigned indignation. “I still have that scar on my foot from when she abandoned me on the beach without our one and only flashlight.” He shakes his head. “If that fish hook had been—”

“Even a centimeter off you would have needed surgery, which would have resulted in more than the five stitches you needed,” I conclude for him.

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