We'll Always Have Summer

“Wedding stuff,” Jeremiah said vaguely.

“Wedding stuff,” Conrad repeated. “So you guys are really doing it?”

“Hell yeah we are.” Jeremiah pulled me back onto his lap. “Right, wifey?”

“Don’t call me wifey,” I said, wrinkling my nose.

“Gross.”

Conrad ignored me. “Does that mean Laurel’s changed her mind?” he asked Jere.

“Not yet, but she will,” Jeremiah said, and I didn’t correct him.

I sat perched there for about twenty more seconds before I twisted out of his arms and stood up again.

“I’m starving,” I said, leaning down and poking around Conrad’s grocery bag. “Did you buy anything good?”

Conrad gave me his bemused half smile. “No Cheetos or frozen pizza for you in here. Sorry. I got stuff for di

He got up, took the grocery bag, and went into the house.

For di

With a mouth full of chicken, Jeremiah said, “Wow, I’m impressed. Since when do you cook?”

“Since I’ve been living on my own. This is pretty much all I eat. Chicken. Every day.” Conrad pushed the salad we’ll always have summer · 139

bowl toward me, not looking up. “Did you get enough?”

“Yeah. Thanks, Conrad. This is all really good.”

“Really good,” Jeremiah echoed.

Conrad only shrugged, but the tips of his ears turned pink, and I knew he was pleased.

I poked Jeremiah in the arm with my fork. “You could learn a thing or two.”

He poked me back. “So could you.” He took a big bite of salad before a

I could tell Conrad was surprised, because he didn’t answer right away.

“I won’t be in your way,” I told him. “I’ll just be doing wedding stuff.”

“It’s fine. I don’t care,” he said.

I looked down at my plate. “Thanks,” I said. So I’d been worried about nothing. Conrad didn’t care if I was there or not. It wasn’t like we would have to hang out with each other. He would do his own thing the way he always did, I would be busy pla

After we finished eating di

Jere and I went into town, just the two of us. I got a scoop of cookies and cream and a scoop of cookie dough with sprinkles, in a waffle cone. Jeremiah got rainbow sherbet.

“Are you feeling better?” he asked me as we walked around the boardwalk. “About what happened with your mom?”

“Not really,” I said. “I’d rather just not think about it anymore today.”

Jeremiah nodded. “Whatever you want.”

I changed the subject. “Did you figure out how many people you want to invite?” I asked.

“Yup.” He started to tick names off on his fingers.

“Josh, Redbird, Gabe, Alex, Sanchez, Peterson—”

“You can’t invite everyone in your fraternity.”

“They’re my brothers,” he said, looking wounded.

“I thought we said we were keeping it really small.”

“So I’ll just invite a few of them, then. Okay?”

“Okay. We still have to figure out food,” I said, licking my way around the cone so it wouldn’t drip.

“We could always get Con to grill some chicken,”

Jeremiah said with a laugh.

“He’s going to be your best man. He can’t be sweating over the grill.”

“I was kidding.”

“Did you ask him yet? To be your best man?”

“Not yet. I will, though.” He leaned down and took a bite of my ice cream. He got some on his upper lip, like a milk mustache.

I bit the insides of my cheeks to keep from smiling.

“What’s so fu

“Nothing.”

When we got back to the house, Conrad was watching TV in the living room. When we sat down on the couch, he got up. “I’m go

“It’s, like, ten o’clock. Watch a movie with us,”

Jeremiah said.

“Nah, I’m go

Wa

Jeremiah glanced at me before saying, “Yeah, sounds good.”

“I thought we were go

“I’ll come back before you’re even awake. Don’t worry.” To Conrad, he said, “Knock on my door when you’re up.”

Conrad hesitated. “I don’t want to wake up Belly.”

I could feel myself blush. “I don’t mind,” I said.

Since Jeremiah and I had become boyfriend and girlfriend, we’d only been at the summer house together once. That time, I slept in his room with him.

We watched TV until he fell asleep, because he liked to sleep with the television on in the background. I couldn’t fall asleep like that, so I waited until he did and then I turned it off. It felt kind of strange, sleeping in his bed when mine was just down the hall.

At college we slept in the same bed all the time, and that felt normal. But here at the summer house I just wanted to sleep in my own room, in my own bed. It was familiar to me. It made me feel like a little girl still on vacation with her whole family. My paper-thin sheets with the faded yellow rosebuds, my cherry wood dresser and vanity. I used to have two white twin beds, but Susa

“big girl bed.” I loved that bed.

Conrad went upstairs, and I waited until I heard his bedroom door shut before I said, “Maybe I’ll sleep in my room tonight.”

“Why?” Jeremiah asked. “I promise I’ll be quiet when I get up.”

Carefully, I asked, “Aren’t the bride and groom supposed to sleep in different beds before the wedding?”

“Yeah, but that’s the night before the wedding. Not every night before the wedding.” He looked hurt for a second, and then he said in his joking way, “Come on, you know I won’t touch you.”

Even though I knew he was only kidding, it still stung a little.

“It’s not that. Sleeping in my own room makes me feel… normal. It’s—it’s different than at school. At school, sleeping with you next to me feels normal. But here I like remembering what it used to feel like.” I searched his face to see if any of the hurt was still there. “Does that make sense at all?”

“I guess.” Jeremiah looked unconvinced, and I started to wish I’d never brought it up.

I scooted closer to him, putting my feet in his lap.

“You’ll have me next to you every night for the rest of our lives.”

“Yeah, I guess that’ll be plenty,” he said.

“Hey!” I said, kicking out my leg.

Jeremiah just smiled and put a pillow over my feet.

Then he changed the cha

I slept better than I had in what felt like a really long time.

144 · je

Chapter Twenty-eight

Conrad

I asked Jere if he wanted to surf because I wanted to get him alone so I could find out what the hell was going on.

I hadn’t talked to him since he made his grand a

We bobbed on our surfboards, waiting for the next wave. It had been slow out there so far.

I cleared my throat. “So how pissed is Laurel?”

“Pissed,” Jere said, grimacing. “Belly and her had a pretty big fight yesterday.”

“In front of you?”

“Yeah.”

“Shit.” I wasn’t surprised, though. There was no way Laurel was going to be like, sure, I’ll throw my teenaged daughter a wedding.

“Yeah, pretty much.”

“What does Dad say about all this?”

He gave me a fu