Читать книгу The Boy Most Likely To - Huntley Fitzpatrick - Страница 11

Chapter Six

Early the next morning, I jolt out of bed so fast my brain practically sloshes against my skull. Where am I? The familiar feeling – the burning, dizzy oh shit of it – makes my temples crash and bang.

I got drunk last night.

Or something.

Because, if not, why am I so freaking disoriented?

Then I remember, assisted by the twelve girls in twelve different improbable contortions staring at me. I rub sweat off my forehead, fall back on the hard-as-hell couch I crashed on after too much quality time with the Xbox, and listen to the emptiness.

I never realized how freaking quiet it is when you’re all alone in a building.

Then I’m up, yanking one poster off the wall, then the next, then the next, until the walls are bare and I’m breathing hard.

Running – isn’t that what Jase does when he doesn’t want to think? I rummage around in my cardboard box for gym shorts I can’t find. Just lame gray slacks. Who packed those? And my Asics – nowhere to be found. I pull on the only workout option, a faded pair of swim trunks, and head for Stony Bay Beach. I read once that Navy Seals train by running on sand. Barefoot. It’s harder, a better workout.

I’ll jog to the pier. Gotta be like a mile or something. Good start, right?

It would be, except that a mile’s a hell of a long way. The pier’s still as distant as a mirage and I’m gasping for breath, wanting to collapse in the sand.

I’m seven-fuckin’-teen, for God’s sake. The prime of my life. The height of my physical prowess. The golden age I look back on one day when I’m boring my own kids. But I can’t run like the wind. I can’t run like the breeze. Patsy could run faster, without needing an oxygen tank afterward. I slump down in the sand, falling first to my knees, then rolling to collapse onto my back, hand over my eyes against the early morning light, sucking in air like it’s filtered through nicotine.

Gotta lose the cigarettes.

“Need mouth to mouth?” asks a female voice.

Damn, I didn’t know there was anyone on the beach, much less someone close . . . Alice. How long has she been watching me? I edge my hand away from my eyes.

Ah, another bikini. Thank you, Jesus. If I’m gonna die of shame, at least I’ll die happy. This is one of those Bond-girl types, dark green with a lime green zipper down the front, a little belt cinching in the bottom, about three fingers below where her waist swoops in before her hips fan out. My fingers twitch, will of their own. I shove my fists in my pockets. “Definitely,” I gasp. “I need mouth to mouth. Right now.”

“If you can talk, I think you’ll survive.”

I lick my dry lips. “Don’t think I’m ready for the triathlon, Alice.”

She does an unexpected thing, lying down next to me on her side, tilting toward me, sudden smile, curvy as the rest of her.

“At least you’ve got your running shoes on.” She looks down at my feet. “No, you don’t even, do you? Who jogs barefoot?” Her toes tangle with mine for a second, then move away. She looks down at the sand, not at me, draws a squiggly line between us.

“It matters?”

“Traction, honey,” Alice says.

“I thought that was only when you’d broken a leg. Navy Seals do it. So I’ve heard.”

I wait for her to make fun of that, but instead she smiles a little more, almost undetectably, unless you’re looking hard at her lips, which I may be doing – says, “Maybe put off the BUDs challenge until you’ve built up more . . . stamina.”

There are so many ways I could answer that.

She moves closer; smells like I’ve always thought Hawaii would, green and sweet, earthy, sun and sea mixed together, smoky warm. Her greenish gray eyes, flecks of gold too –

“You’ve only got one dimple,” she says.

“That a drawback? I had two, but I misplaced one after a particularly hard night.”

She gives my shoulder a shove. “You joke about everything.”

“Everything is pretty funny,” I say, trying to sit up but sinking back, my back groaning. “If you look at it the right way.”

“How do you know you’re looking at it the right way?” Alice’s head’s lowered, she’s still circling an index finger in the sand, only inches from brushing her knuckles past my stomach. The morning air is still and calm – no sound of the waves, even.

“If it’s funny,” I wheeze, “you’re looking at it the right way.”

“Yo, Aleece!” I look up and there’s that douche-canoe, her boyfriend, Brad, looming large, big shoulders muscling out the sun.

“Brad.” She’s up, brushing sand from her swimsuit. He pats her on the butt, looking at me in this my territory way.

Dick.

“You’re late. Brad, Tim. Tim, Brad.”

“Yo, Tim.” Brad, man of few, and strictly one-syllable, words. One of those guys built like a linebacker but with a little kid face, all rosy cheeks and twinkly eyes. To compensate, I guess, he has a scruffy, barely there beard.

“So, Ally-pals,” he says to Alice.

Ally-pals?

“Ready?”

“I’ve been ready for a while. You’re the one who’s late,” Alice says, sharply.

Atta girl.

She turns to me, running her hands through her hair, flipping it back from her face. “I’m training for the five K – Brad’s timing me.”

“You’re a runner? How did I not know that?”

She opens her mouth, like why on earth would I know anything whatsoever about her, but then looks down, tightens the notch on the belt of her bikini bottom. Which brings my attention back to her stomach, the belly ring, and I . . .

Roll over onto my stomach.

Brad clears his throat, arms folded, chin jutting. Got it, caveman.

“I won’t hold you up,” I add. Alice shoots Brad an unreadable look, drops down on her knees, bending over me again, her breath biting sweet as peppermint candy. “Sneakers next time, Tim.”

I’m panting, hands on knees, at the end of my first sprint. Sweat slides into my eyes, and I brush my hair back, try to corral what isn’t in my ponytail behind my ears.

Brad uncaps the water bottle, hands it to me, stooping low to squint at my face. Then he says in a low voice, “You wanna tell me what that was about?” He jerks his thumb toward the distant figure of Tim, still collapsed on the sand, head on his folded arms.

“What? Tim? He’s my kid brother’s friend. We were talking.”

He rubs his chin. “I dunno, Ally. That’s all it was?”

Two more sips of water, then I pour some into my hand, rub it over my face.

Tim’s standing up now, shielding his eyes, looking toward us – then the other way down the beach. Now he’s sprinting in that direction, no stretching out, no slow jog to start, right into a flat-out run. Gah.

“Ally?”

“Of course that’s all it was.”