Pulled Under

“So this was your plan all along,” Ben says as he climbs up and slides in next to me.

“Bwahahaha,” I reply with an evil master villain’s laugh. “And you, Ben Taylor, were just my puppet.”

This high up, there’s a cool night breeze that makes it perfect for snuggling. I’ve known that couples do this and I have always imagined what it would be like. (Spoiler alert: It’s awesome!) Ben puts his arm around me and I slide up next to him, and we just snap together perfectly like pieces in a jigsaw puzzle.

“Are we even allowed to be up here?” he asks.

“Of course we are,” I say. “It’s for lifeguards during the day, couples at night. It really fits right into the whole ‘reduce, reuse, recycle’ philosophy that we encourage here at the beach. Very multipurpose and good for the environment.”

I rest my head on his shoulder and look out at the sea. More than a minute passes without either one of us saying a word. We just listen to the slow and steady music of the waves washing up on the beach and then pulling back into the ocean. Everything at this moment is perfect. So of course that means I have to screw it up.

“Can I ask you something?”

“There’s an ominous begi

“Whose idea was it to break up?”

“What are you talking about?” he asks. “We’re not breaking up.”

“No. I mean between you and Beth. Whose idea was it to break up?”

He lets go of me and turns so that his back is against the side of the chair. I may not be fluent in body language, but I can tell he’s not thrilled with the question. “Why would you even ask that? Everything about this moment is perfect. Excuse me, was perfect.”

“I know.”

“So why would you ask that?”

“I told you. The female mind is complex.”

“It’s not a joke, Izzy.”

“And I’m not joking. I know it doesn’t make sense to you, but this is all new to me. I’ve never had a boyfriend. Nothing even close to one. That means you know every single thing about my past relationship history. So when we’re sitting like this and everything’s perfect, you know what’s going on in my mind.”

“Trust me when I say that I have no idea what’s going on in your mind.”

“Okay, that’s a fair point,” I answer. “But all I know about Beth is that she was beautiful and wonderful and everyone thought you two were a perfect couple.”

“And after I told you that, you ignored me for two weeks,” he says. “In fact, just a few blocks up from this very spot you told me that you couldn’t be the girl I talked to about other girls.”

“Things are different now,” I reply. “And to be honest, since the only things I know about Beth are how wonderful she is, a little part of me could stand to hear how it ended.”

I really don’t know what it is about me that takes perfect moments and twists them into psychodramas, but I can’t help it. I am who I am.

There’s just enough moonlight on his face for me to tell that he’s biting the left side of his lower lip. He’s in deep thought mode, so I stop talking. Finally, after what seems like forever, he responds.

“It was my idea. We were out by the lake. She was talking about the prom and how important it was and how it would be this signature moment in our relationship. I mean, I know it’s a big deal, but it is just a dance. She was obsessed with what table we were going to sit at, where we were going to go for photographs, and I just couldn’t get excited about it. Maybe it’s because I was in a pissy mood about my parents, but I just couldn’t. Then, somewhere in the middle of it all, I just knew it was over.”

He stops for a moment and takes a deep breath.

“Some of my friends said that I should’ve just hung on until it was time for me to come to Florida, but I couldn’t do that to her. She didn’t deserve to be strung along. So I told her that I was really sorry but I couldn’t go to the prom with her and that we couldn’t see each other anymore.”

“You dumped her right before the prom?” I say, almost feeling sorry for her.

He nods. “I know. I’m a terrible person.”

“You’re not a terrible person,” I say. “The timing was unfortunate, but if that’s how you felt, you did the right thing.”

“Just for the record, Beth did not agree with your take on it. She made sure everyone knew how much it was not the right thing. I can’t blame her, I guess. Somehow she did manage to bounce back and find a guy who was more than happy to sit at the right table and smile his way through God knows how many pictures. He’s a good guy, actually. I hope it works for them.”

There’s a pause. Which means of course that I have to keep pressing the issue.

“How did you know it was over?” I ask. “You said that in the middle of it all you just knew.”

He turns his head to the side and shakes it in disbelief. “You really want me to tell you this stuff?”

I nod. “I know. I can’t help it.”

“Somewhere in the middle of all the discussion it dawned on me that it really was more than a dance for her. She sounded like my sister did when she was pla

“And you weren’t in love with her?”

“No,” he says. “I might have been in love with the idea of her. I might have loved the attention. But I didn’t love her, and it seemed incredibly unfair for me to let someone love me when I didn’t feel the same way in return.”

Now here’s a problem.

I have no doubt that I am completely in love with Ben. Not the idea of him. Not the concept of him. Him. I’ve even wondered if I should tell him. But now I think the smart thing to do is to keep that secret to myself. Instead, I lie to him for the first and hopefully only time.

“Lucky for us we don’t have to worry about that,” I say, trying to sound convincing. “We both know that this is just for the summer.”

He doesn’t really answer. Instead he just kind of nods, and I lay my head on his shoulder again. It takes a moment, but he puts his arm around me.

It’s quiet for a while and we just sit there. I can’t help but think I’m doing everything wrong in this relationship. I don’t know why I asked about Beth, but the truth is I really felt like I needed to know that stuff. I put my hand over to rest it on his chest, but he pulls back, and I worry that he’s about to tell me that I’m just not worth the headache. But instead, he says something completely unexpected.

“Is that a body?”

“What?”

“Over there,” he says, pointing down the beach about a hundred feet. “I just saw that dark shadow move. I think it might be a body.”

I look, and when I see it, I know instantly what it is.

“Ooh, ooh, ooh, it’s not a body,” I say, trying to contain my excitement. “Follow me.”

I quickly climb down the lifeguard stand, and he’s right behind me.

“I just saw it move again,” he says as he tries to keep up. “What is it?”

I stop and turn to him. “A turtle!”

I grab him by the hand and we race down the beach together until we get close. We slow down and stop when we’re about fifteen feet away from where a massive sea turtle is slowly dragging herself across the sand. She’s three feet long and weighs nearly two hundred pounds.

We keep our distance, and I put my finger over my lips and say, “Only whisper, and don’t cross her path.”

He nods and replies, “She’s huge.”

“She’s a loggerhead coming ashore to lay her eggs.”

A bank of clouds drifts by and reveals the moon, its light dancing across the turtle’s red and brown shell.

“She’s going to lay them over there,” I say, pointing toward the sand dunes. “Don’t disturb her and don’t let her see any lights, like your phone; it can confuse her.”

“Okay.”

We spend the next thirty minutes watching her. It’s a lumbering crawl up onto the edge of the dunes, and you can’t help but marvel at her determination. When she starts to scrape away an area with her front flippers, I tug on Ben’s hand and we quietly loop around to get a closer look. She uses her hind flippers to dig a nest and then fills it with dozens of ping-pong-ball-sized eggs.