Between Now and Goodbye (14 page)

'I'll be there.'

'Fantastic. Invite your boyfriend if you like, and that other friend of yours. The one who we saw in the grocery store in her pyjamas that one time.' Carly laughs. I remember the time she means. It was about a month ago and Charles' mom was really sick. He needed something urgently from the store, so Libby went, without bothering to get dressed first. She dragged me along with her and it was utterly embarrassing.

'Libby.' I say. 'I'll invite her,' I'm not sure I want her to come with us, but I did make her come home so we could hang out more, so I suppose I should at least invite her. Besides, she's hardly likely to lecture me about breaking up with Charles or anything else she wants to lecture me on, not while Xavier and Carly are around. 'Charles won't be coming.' I add.

'Too busy again?' I know she's rolling her eyes. Charles has bailed on a lot of plans because of his mom and siblings, and Carly, Xavier and my other friends have all noticed.

'I don't know what he's up to today.' I say as I walk into my closet and pick out an outfit. A pale pink and white striped dress, with a beaded waist and neckline, and a tiered skirt. I'll wear it over my pink bathing suit, and put it with some white sandals. 'We broke up.' I add casually as I lay the clothes out over my bed.

'Oh, sorry. Did he break up with you or did you break up with him?' Carly asks.

'I broke up with him.' I reply.

'That's ok then.' She replies, 'Ok, get ready. We're leaving in about twenty five minutes, ok?'

She doesn't wait for my answer, just hangs up the phone. I send a quick invite to Libby and then jump into the shower. Normally I'd spend at least twenty minutes under the warm spray of water, but this morning I'm in and out in five. Then I blow dry my hair, tie it up into a high ponytail, put on some waterproof mascara and some lip gloss, because when we go swimming I really don't want to end up with makeup running everywhere. Then I dress quickly, shove my phone into my purse, put on my sunglasses and hurry downstairs.

My parents are both out at work, so I don't have to give them the run down of where I'm going or who I'm going with. So I just head out of the door to my car.

As I open the door, I find Libby there, dressed in a pair of black shorts over a black floral one piece bathing suit. I glance down, she's got black flip-flops on her feet. A canvas bag slung over her shoulder.

I guess she decided to join us on the boat. I hadn’t checked for a reply from her.

'Hey.' I smile, 'We have to leave right away or they'll leave without us, ok?'

'Yeah, sure.' She follows me to my car. I notice that her hair is damp.

'Did you just wake up and shower too?'

'No, I got up a few hours ago.'

'Your hair's wet.' I say as I slide the keys into the ignition.

'Water fight.' She replies flatly. I pull away and sigh loudly.

'You're mad at me then.' I say, adjusting the air conditioning so that it cools my boiling hot car quickly.

'Good guess.'

'If you're mad at me then why are you even here? You didn't have to hang out with me today.' I snap.

'Because I need to talk to you, and I figured since you haven't picked up any of my calls this morning, this was the only way to actually get you to acknowledge me.'

'I don't need another lecture about leaving the kids. Charles already yelled at me about it last night.' I press down a little harder on the accelerator.

'Trust me, that's only the start of why I'm mad at you.'

'I don't see what else you have to be mad at me about. It can't be about me ending things with Charles, because one, it's none of your business, and two, I already told you I was thinking about ending it.'

'Yes,' she nods, 'and you also told me the day before I left for New York that you loved him. Do you see where I could get a little confused?'

'Whatever, it's done.'

'Why though? Why did you do it?' She's shaking her head and it's making me more annoyed by the second. What does it matter to her why I did it? I'm her best friend, shouldn't she be consoling me after my break-up. Shouldn't she be asking me if I'm ok?

'I didn't want to be with him.'

'His mom is in the hospital, you couldn't have found a better time to break things off?'

'There's never a good time with him.' I roll my eyes. If we're actually going to have a good day today, I need her to calm down and come around to my side just a little bit. 'Look, I care about him a lot. I really do, but more and more recently I've realized that I just don't love him. Maybe I never did. He's just so sweet and in the beginning he treated me like a princess, he adored me.'

'He still adores you.' She exclaims. 'But love can't be all fairy tale moments. If you really love someone, then you have to be able to go through the good stuff along with the bad, that's what a relationship is.'

'I'm sick of spending my Friday nights sat on his couch watching movies, or going out to parties, but having to leave early because his mom needs him home.'

'Ok, I can kind of see where you're coming from. It's a really tough situation right now, and he can't do all the things he used to. Why, though, did you keep telling him that you loved him if you knew it wasn't true?' She asks as we pull into a parking space at the docks.

'It was easier.' I answer, 'If I decided to stay with him, then I didn't want him to think I was having doubts.'

'You didn't think about talking to him about how you were feeling? Telling him that you weren't happy? You could work on your relationship with him.'

'I don't want to spend my summer working on my relationship with him.' I sigh, 'I'm leaving for boarding school at the end of summer, unless of course my parents stop being crazy, and I don't want to go there after spending a summer working through problems with Charles.'

'But...Isn't he worth fighting for?'

'I'm only seventeen Libby, he wasn't ever going to be my forever you know?' I get out of the car and a part of me hopes that she won't follow. That she'll decide to sulk in the car, but that isn't her style. She gets out and so I have to say more. 'He's an amazing guy, and I do love him, but not the way he loves me. I love him as a friend. I don't think I could love him as anything more, and it hurts ending things. I was with him a long time and I'm really sad that it's over, but sometimes it's just time to walk away. Do you understand that? Sometimes you just need to walk away for yourself.'

'Yeah.' Her face clouds over as if her thoughts have just been taken somewhere else, 'Yeah I guess I do understand that.'

'Good,' I link my arm through hers, 'then can we please drop it and have a good afternoon? I want to enjoy this summer with you.' I pull her along towards Carly's boat, and hope that we can let this subject rest now.

Nineteen – Libby

This isn't my first time on a boat. Julie's parents own two boats and I've been out with them a few times. It's not even my first time on a boat without any adults around. Julie's been sailing since she was a kid, and when she turned sixteen, she was allowed to start taking the boat out without supervision. So all in all I'm familiar with being on boats, of how they work and how to sail them. I'm also familiar with the extravagantly designed boats that most people who live at the key seem to own.

None of the flashy gadgets, plush couches or flat screen TVs on this boat confuse me all that much, because I expected all of that. What I didn't expect was to have to answer so many questions about myself and my life.

I've met Carly and Xavier before, and I've heard so much about them that I could probably write their biographies, and yet it would seem that before today, neither of them knew a thing about me, and they want that to change.

'So where did you live before you came here?' Carly asks. She flips her silky black hair over her shoulder. The questions started about my time here, how I met people, who my friends are, if I like my school. Since then, the questions have been coming fast and spreading to my life before moving here.

'I was in Atlanta for a bit.'

'How long is a bit?' Xavier asks, slinging one arm over Carly's shoulders.

'About eight months.'

'And before that?' Carly questions. Head tilting ever so slightly to one side.

'Savannah.'

'So are you like... a Georgia peach?' Carly's eyes start to glimmer, 'Because I totally always wanted to be friends with a Georgia peach.'

'No, I'm not.' I shake my head, 'I only lived in Georgia for a total of thirteen months. I don't think I qualify for peach status.'

'Oh.' Carly's smile drops, but she bounces back remarkably quickly, 'That's a shame. Ok, so before Savannah?'

'A few different places, we moved around a lot.'

'Where?' Carly prompts.

'A few places in Texas, before that it was Colorado, before that Pennsylvania, Michigan, New York, Florida, Kansas. I was born in Oregon.' I say because I feel like we need to start speeding this section up. If I go town by town, it could take a while. I'm guessing states will satisfy them though. At least I'm hoping it does, because I really don't want to be talking about this.

'Wow, you moved around a lot. How come?' Carly unwraps some pink gum and puts two pieces in her mouth. She doesn't offer any to anyone else.

'We just liked to move around. See new places and things like that.' I shrug.

'Was your dad with you then? Your real dad, I mean.' Carly snaps the gum in her mouth.

'No.'

'So...when was he last with you?' Xavier asks. I feel like it's hotter than it actually is. My skin is starting to feel like it's on fire.

'Aren't you guys bored of me yet?' I laugh loudly. 'It's a beautiful day and we're sitting on the deck talking about my housing history. Why don't we go for a swim?'

'I'm not bored.' Carly says. 'Xavier, are you bored?'

'Nope.'

'Julie?' Carly questions. I shoot Julie a quick begging look.

'Actually,' Julie sits up from her sunbathing position, 'I don't really know anything about your dad, other than he isn't around. When did you guys last see him?'

'You guys might not be bored talking about me, but I am.' I get to my feet, 'I'm going for a swim.' And before anyone can protest, which I know they want to do, I walk to the side of the boat and dive into the cool deep water.

I stay under the surface of the water for as long as I can, until my lungs scream at me to give them the air that I've been depriving them of, and I'm forced back up to the surface again.

Once I'm up, my gaze goes to the boat, where all three of them are staring at me, to the beach. I quickly try and calculate if it's possible to swim back to shore. We're quite far out, but I'm a pretty strong swimmer. The only problem is that my bag is on the boat, along with my clothes. Also, I may be a strong swimmer, but I can't guarantee that I'll be able to get back to the beach without getting a cramp, or simply being too tired. Even if I did make it, I wouldn't have my cell phone, so I'd have to walk back to my house, barefoot and in my bathing suit. Not ideal. Still, it is tempting.

I don't talk about my dad. Julie knows that I don't talk about my dad. In the two years that I've known her and Charles, I've only told them a handful of things. Less even. I'm pretty sure that Charles thinks he's dead. Only, he isn't dead.

I dive back under the water. I keep my eyes open even though the salty water stings after just a couple of seconds. I always keep my eyes open while swimming. I never want to miss things.

I kick down further, until the light from above starts to grow murkier, less certain until I'm gliding into a slippery blackness. I feel my lungs burning again and I twist myself around and start kicking back to the surface. Light comes creeping into my vision again, and then I'm up and filling my lungs with air.

I look back to the boat just as Xavier jumps into the water. Cannonball style. He receives a round of applause from Julie and Carly, who both start edging towards the side of the boat. Both of them hesitate, mirror images of each other as they look over the edge, expressions like they're considering jumping into the mouth of a volcano and not into the water where the
ir two friends have just jumped, proving it's safe.

A couple of minutes pass with them doing this hesitant dance. Step forwards. Shriek. Leap back. Giggle. Repeat. All the while I'm treading water and Xavier yells up encouragements, sprinkle
d with just a few light insults along the lines of them being scared little babies. It's the taunts that get them moving, and eventually they link arms and plunge into the water, screaming the whole way down.