Summer of Seventeen Read online

  “What … what did she want?”

  My voice sounded high pitched and strangled, as if someone had squeezed my balls hard.

  Yansi shrugged. “To apologize.”

  “Really?” I croaked. “Wow.”

  “Yeah, wow. She told me everything that happened at the party, that it was her fault, and that you … you were drunk and … you thought she was me?”

  Her voice turned a corner at the end, becoming a question by accident.

  “Is that true?”

  I nodded slowly, my cheeks reddening with shame as the memory flooded behind my eyes.

  “I was dreaming about you,” I whispered, my voice hoarse. “I said your name, but then I realized it wasn’t you and … it was too late,” I finished lamely.

  Yansi frowned, and two parallel lines appeared between her eyebrows. “That’s what Erin said.”

  “God, I’m so sorry, Yans. I’ve missed you so much.”

  “I’ve missed you, too,” she said sadly. “I asked Papi how you were, but he wouldn’t tell me anything.”

  “I guess he doesn’t know why we split up then,” I said quietly.

  Yansi shook her head. “No.”

  Well, that was something.

  “Your mom?”

  “Yeah, she knows.”

  Crap.

  “She was there when Erin came over, so I had to explain. I didn’t tell her everything, but I think she probably guessed the rest…”

  “So she hates me, too,” I sighed, wearily.

  “I don’t hate you.”

  Yansi’s voice was quiet, but I felt a flutter of hope as I looked up into her beautiful dark eyes.

  “You don’t?”

  “I wanted to,” she admitted. “I tried to, but I just couldn’t.”

  My mouth was dry as I tried to swallow.

  “God, if I could take it back, I would. I wish I’d never gone to that stupid party. I was just so angry after what Julia said and…”

  Yansi’s head snapped up. “What did Julia say?”

  “Oh. Well, nothing really.”

  I didn’t like remembering that night.

  “It can’t be nothing!” Yansi insisted.

  I sighed again and lowered my eyes to the table, mindlessly peeling the label from a bottle of ketchup.

  “The usual, you know. Going on about me being a fuckin’ waste of space. I guess she was right.”

  Yansi shook her head briskly.

  “That’s not true. You can be a real idiot sometimes…”

  “I’m sorry.”

  I didn’t know how many times I could keep on saying that. Maybe as many as it took for Yansi to forgive me?

  She sighed and stared out of the window.

  “You know that me and Erin…” I took a deep breath. “You know that I don’t like her that way?”

  Yansi pulled a face and looked down at the glass of water.

  “Yeah, I guess. She told me what you said to her.”

  I winced. “I was angry.”

  Yansi smiled, a sad lopsided smile. “Yeah, she said that, too.”

  “Um, I don’t really get why she came to see you. You said she wanted to … apologize?”

  Yansi frowned. “She really cares about you.”

  I shook my head. “I don’t care about her.”

  “She’s not all bad.”

  “Why are you defending her, Yans? She got what she wanted,” I said bitterly.

  “No, she didn’t,” Yansi said briskly. “She thought … she thought that if you had sex with her you’d want to start dating her. I think she was pretty shocked when you blew her off. She said you’d always been nice to her, so she … she blamed me for taking you away from her, I guess.”

  “She didn’t take me away from you,” I said impatiently. “I never wanted her. We went out one lousy time, and that was only because you weren’t allowed to date until you were 17. I couldn’t wait to get rid of her.”

  “She was really upset.”

  “I don’t care!” I shouted, and Yansi flinched. “She fucked things up for us. What she did, it wasn’t an accident! I want you, and now it’s all ruined.”

  I swept my hand across the table, sending the pile of papers flying. Yansi stared at me, shocked. I didn’t usually lose my temper around her, but I was having a really bad day.

  “Sorry,” I mumbled after a moment, then knelt down to start picking up the papers.

  Yansi was quiet, and then she bent down beside me and began shuffling everything into a neat pile.

  “What is all this?” she asked.

  “Mom’s stuff.”

  “Oh,” she said quietly, stacking it back onto the table in a neat pile.

  Then she pulled out a photo of me as a kid, flattening it on the table because it was curled with age.

  “Aw, look at you. You’re so cute.”

  I glanced across.

  “That was my first boogie board. I was maybe five or six.”

  She smiled, then carefully pushed the photo back into the pile.

  “I found my birth certificate,” I said.

  She paused, looking at me intently, but I couldn’t hold her gaze. She saw too much—she always had.

  “Did it tell you … anything?”

  “Yeah, it did.” I took a deep breath. “My dad is some guy named ‘Robert Alan Croften’. It’s weird, seeing it written down like that. Makes it real, you know?”

  “Are you going to try and find him?”

  “I don’t know. I haven’t really thought about it. I mean, what’s the point? His name is on the birth certificate so I guess that means he knows I exist, but the dude hasn’t wanted anything to do with me in 17 years—why would he change now? Anyway, I don’t think Mom wanted me to know him, or she would have said something, wouldn’t she?”

  Yansi looked doubtful. “Maybe. She obviously had her issues with him…”

  I started shoving the papers back in the box, feeling confused and miserable.

  “Why are you here, Yans?” I muttered without looking up.

  “I want us to try again.”

  My hands stilled and the flare of hope was painful. When I dared to meet her eyes, she was watching me, a tiny smile on her face.

  “Really?”

  “Yes. Really.”

  I stared at her stunned. “You mean it?”

  “Yes, you idiot!” she half laughed, half shouted.

  She launched herself at me, and I could have cried with relief at the way her soft body molded against mine. I wrapped my arms around her, burying my face in her hair, breathing in the scent of warmth and spice.

  “Don’t ever do that to me again,” she whispered.

  “I won’t. I promise,” my voice stuttered. “Oh God, I promise.”

  “No more getting wasted at parties?” she asked carefully.

  I hesitated, not wanting to lie to her. “I promise I’ll try.”

  She sighed and shook her head slightly. “Good enough, I guess. At least you’re honest.”

  “I’d never lie to you, Yans.”

  She frowned. “No, you’d rather not tell me the truth.”

  I felt ashamed, because she was right.

  “I’d rather know,” she said softly. “I’d rather hear it from you. It hurt so badly when Megan told me. I didn’t want to believe her.”

  “I’m sorry,” I said again. “I’m so fucking sorry.”

  “Me, too. I’m sorry I didn’t give you a chance to explain. Although I’m not sure I would have listened there and then.”

  I winced at the memory. “Probably not.”

  “But I missed you so much. When Erin came around, I was desperate to hear what she had to say. She felt bad for what happened, especially when she saw that you were never going to go out with her and that you were really miserable.”

  “I don’t want to talk about Erin ever again,” I said coldly.

  Yansi paused. “Okay. We won’t. Well, just one thing: at least now I know what I can’t li
ve without,” and she pressed her soft lips against mine.

  My girl always had to have the last word.

  My girl.

  The next few days were strange. Awkward. But it was getting easier.

  Yansi was grounded. It was obvious that she got into a shit load of trouble for coming to see me when she did. She’d never had much freedom, but now her parents wouldn’t let her leave the house unless one of them was with her, although she wouldn’t tell me what they’d said when she went back home that day. I tried to ask her, but she just said it wasn’t important. I wasn’t sure how that squared with her insistence on complete honesty—from me—but I didn’t want to push her either.

  It was getting good again, and I wasn’t going to risk that.

  Mr. Alfaro wasn’t happy. Not that he ever looked anything other than a Hispanic grim reaper—or maybe he was just constipated. Either way, the sight of me made him pissed, and I kept expecting to be fired, but he never did.

  Although I wasn’t allowed to sit in the truck’s cab anymore, but I was used to that by now.

  Yansi sent me at least a dozen text messages each day. Every time Mr. Alfaro saw me checking my phone, this weird vein throbbed in the side of his head. On the third day after we got back together, he made me leave my phone in the truck while we were working. But then I spent my whole lunchtime texting, just to piss him off some more. Well, that was part of it, but I really wanted to hear from her. Whatever, I think it worked. Not that I was trying to give my girlfriend’s dad a coronary, but he was being a complete douche canoe about it.

  I changed the password on my phone, because if any of my friends saw the messages I sent her, they’d take away my man-card; probably tear it up and burn it, too. But knowing that she was thinking about me and wanted to be with me … it felt damn fine. A lonely corner of my mind wondered if maybe Yansi was right: the time we’d been apart had shown us both how much we had to lose. Well, I’d already known that, but I was glad that Yansi did now. I hated that I’d put her through so much shit, but we’d gotten better at talking to each other—the important stuff.

  I thought Sean was going to be a dick about it when I told him that me and Yansi were back together, but he wasn’t.

  “No, I get it,” he said. “I don’t get her, but what you guys have—that’s real.”

  I had to let that register in my brain, and then check that the words really had come from Sean.

  He gave me an irritated look and then shrugged.

  “I can think deep shit just as much as you can, bro. You were turning into a cock-sucking emo bitch without the ole ball an’ chain around.” Then his voice turned serious. “If she’s what you want, hang onto that. Because if there’s nothing you want, life is shit.”

  I tried to ask him what he meant. He blew me off, making a joke of it. But I didn’t forget what he’d said.

  I was keeping my promise to Yansi, too. When I hung out with Sean or Rob and the guys, I kept the drinking to a couple of beers—enough to get a buzz, but not enough to be tanked. I still took a few hits if a blunt was doing the rounds, but I passed on it more times than I inhaled.

  Sean was still partying hard, but it didn’t seem to make him happy. In fact, the more he drank and smoked, the more miserable he seemed. I thought about what he said, about not wanting anything. The only thing that he seemed to care about was surfing, but even then he’d been too hung-over to make it to some of the dawn surfaris we planned.

  He was hanging with Marcus and his crew a lot more, too. I’d been kind of avoiding Marcus since the thing with Julia. I saw him at the Sandbar when I was working, and sometimes we passed each other in the kitchen or on the way to the shower; but he was out a lot, and I didn’t go down to the pier as much as I used to.

  The worst thing about Yansi being grounded was that she was going to miss the Fourth of July. That seemed unconstitutional to me, but her parents weren’t letting her off.

  Panama’s Independence Day was November 28th. Yansi said that she hoped she wouldn’t still be grounded by then. I think that was a joke. Whatever. It meant that all the things we’d planned to do weren’t going to happen. There was a free concert in Riverfront Park in Cocoa Village a couple of miles away on the other side of the causeway, then we were coming back to the beach to see the firework display, which was always awesome.

  Now she was going be at some family bonfire and cookout instead. So, I took the lunchtime shift at the Sandbar, just to keep myself busy more than anything else. And I promised to hang with Sean and Rob, so I came down to the pier after work. Plus, I’d have felt like a loser staying at home on the Fourth. Yeah, and Sean would have given me shit.

  At least I knew Yansi would rather be with me. That was something. She was finding it harder to put up with her parents’ rules. I can’t really say I knew what that was like. Mom had always been cool about stuff. As long as I wasn’t hung-over on a school day, I could pretty much do what I wanted. But Yansi was on a short leash. I wanted to tell her that having her parents care so much was better than having ones who didn’t care at all. But I wasn’t good with words, so I didn’t say anything.

  I was running late because the Sandbar had been slammed and Steve had wanted me to stay on. I did an extra hour, but that was all. Then I went home and took the time to eat something before heading out again. The food choices were pretty limited, but partying and drinking on an empty stomach—well, I wasn’t going to make that mistake again.

  It was hotter than balls, and all week the sweat had been running into my eyes, making them sting. My body was losing so much moisture, I was drinking a bottle of water every half hour. One day I used the garden hose where we were working to cool myself down for a few minutes. Today the air was thick and heavy, and the palm trees looked like they were drooping. I’d taken a shower when I got in from the Sandbar, but it hadn’t made a whole lot of difference—I was sweating again and my t-shirt clung to my back.

  The ocean was a steely gray, flat and lifeless, just like it had been for days, and all of us surfers were grouchy with the lack of wave action. Paddleboards just didn’t cut it when what you really wanted was to work some bitchin’ waves, catch air, or ride some tubes.

  I weaved through the evening crowds of vacationers on my skateboard, watching families enjoying the holiday vibe: Cocoa Beach was doing what it was born to do.

  Mom loved the big holidays. I tried not to think about it too much because it hurt so bad. But Julia was the same, ignoring what we couldn’t change. She was hanging out with Ben and some of his work friends, so she must have been pretty desperate to have something, anything to distract her. I wished I did, too.

  A few people were jogging on the wide, flat beach, and in the distance I could see a sailboat moving sluggishly across the horizon.

  The pier was crowded, people already jostling for the best position to see the fireworks, but the usual suspects were hanging out below.

  Sean was trashed already. I wondered where he was getting the money to buy booze so often. But then again, money had never been a problem for him.

  He saw me and grinned, his lips slack like a punctured tire.

  “Hey, bro! We’ve gotta add Cloud Nine on Siargo Island to the list. Marcus says it’s got an awesome reef break that’s just itchin’ for us to shred. Total death rides, man! One slip and the coral will shred your skin.” His eyes were glassy as he turned to Marcus and tried to coordinate a high-five. “The guy rocks! He’s a legend!”

  I noticed that Camille was sitting on the sand next to Marcus. She was studying Sean carefully and didn’t crack a smile when Marcus laughed and returned the hand slap.

  She was still watching him, a small frown wrinkling her forehead, when Sean lurched to his feet.

  “Back in a minute: I gotta piss so bad, my eyeballs are floatin’.”

  I watched him stagger off to use the gross public bathrooms up on the boardwalk. At least, I hoped that was where he was going, because if he went and pissed behind a dune in daylig
ht where families were walking on the beach with their kids, he was going to end up getting arrested for public indecency. And, without passing judgment, the guy liked to wave his dick around if he thought girls would see him.

  He’d been doing that since fourth grade so I didn’t think he was going to stop now.

  I’d seen Sean’s dick more times than his doctor. That sounds bad, but the guy was obsessed, whipping it out at every opportunity—the back row of the lecture hall, in classrooms, behind the bleachers, at the football field, but especially the locker room.

  Believe me, there’s an etiquette when you’re in the locker room. Sean’s brother Aidan said it’s like the New York subway after night; it should be safe, but you never know when someone’s going to pull out a dick.

  When you’re 13, there’s a lot of towel snapping, wedgies, and comparing of various body parts. There just is.

  The length of your johnson becomes common knowledge: hung like a horse versus has a weenie.

  But by tenth grade, the rules change, and they’re pretty simple:

  Keep your eyes to yourself. (Although there’s a school of thought that says you should keep your eyes on the floor, I think that makes you look like a weirdo loser. No, look at eye-level or above.)

  Don’t get in the personal space of the guy next to you. And never, ever bend down to pick something up if you’re close to someone’s personal space. Leave that fucker on the floor, or you’ll be leaving with a split lip.

  Keep your towel nearby and don’t spend any more time naked than you really have to.

  Get in. Get out. It’s not the time to check your phone for messages. Creepy. And don’t start a conversation with naked people. Not cool.

  Sean could never seem to remember that. You’d think he had a dick like a donkey the way he went on, but I’d checked, and it looked pretty average to me.

  Rob passed me a beer and told me about some girl he’d met at a party and how she said she was going to hang with us tonight. Maybe she would, but Rob had been so stoned all summer, he admitted he couldn’t really remember what she looked like.

  Typical Rob. Guy was such an asshole sometimes.

  Sean was back a few minutes later. I guess he’d used a dune after all.