Maine Squeeze (19 page)

“So,” Evan said, glancing over my shoulder. “What are you picking up to eat?” he asked quietly.

I followed his gaze and saw Ben walking into the kitchen. Oh, no. I'd been in here too long, and now I didn't even have what I'd come in for. “Food. Right!”

“Let me check if your order's ready,” Evan said. “Hey, Ben. How's it going?”

“Hi,” Ben replied, a little stiffly. “What's going on?”

“All the cooks decided to go on break at the same time. Should be just a second,” I added.

I smiled at Ben, thinking this was terrible. Evan and I were lying to him over something as stupid as why it took me so long to pick up some takeout dishes. Why did we have to lie? But we'd already done it, instead of just saying that we'd gotten caught up in talking. That meant we felt like we had something to hide from him. But nothing was going on, so what were we hiding?

“I am so sorry. I am like the slowest shopper in the world.” I grabbed Ben's hand and squeezed it tightly. “So what sounds good to you?”

Ben looked confused. “Didn't you already order?”

“Well, yeah—a few things. But if there's something special you want …?”

“No, just you.” While Evan went around collecting various containers for us—I had no idea what he would pick out—Ben put his arms around my waist and nuzzled my neck. He was usually physically affectionate with me, but not
this
affectionate, not in public. It was almost as if he was looking for some kind of reassurance that he was the one now, and Evan wasn't. And I was supposed to prove it to him, right now, in front of both of them.

“You know what I was thinking? I was listening to the radio and I heard an ad for this inn up on Mount Desert. We should both ask for a couple of days off at the same time,” Ben said. “So we can go away on a trip together. Before summer's over and we go off to college. You know?”

“That sounds nice,” I said, still distracted by the thought of what had just happened. I felt like I'd gotten caught cheating on Ben. Just because I was having such a good time with Evan that I literally could not tear myself away. I was in Bobb's, on my day off,
lingering
. Usually I didn't come within a half-mile radius on my day off. Not that I hated the job—I didn't, at all. I just enjoyed my time away from it.

“We could go to Acadia, spend a couple of nights camping.”

“Yeah, sure.”

“You don't sound that excited about it. Is it because camping requires cooking?” Ben teased.

Normally I would have made several jokes about my cooking and envisioning the disaster that taking me camping could turn into. But I just didn't feel like even playing along. Going off with Ben, by ourselves, didn't sound that good to me. That was crazy. A couple of months ago I spent days begging my parents to let us do just that. I'd even managed to convince them to let us go to Portland for a couple of days; we stayed at Erica's house—in separate rooms, of course, and under the supervision of Erica's parents. Still, it had been a romantic type of getaway because we'd never done anything like that by ourselves before.

But now? I didn't want to leave the island. Not really. Not at all. And not with Ben.

I should have heard alarm bells ringing as loud as a foghorn. Or at least I should have done everything in reverse and started the day over. The last place I wanted to be was standing in the kitchen at Bobb's with both Evan and Ben.

“Let's go outside and wait,” I said, backing out of Ben's embrace. “Come on.”

“I'll find you, you know!” Evan called after us. “You can run, but you can't hide.”

I turned around and gave him a quizzical look. So did Ben.

Evan held up a brown paper bag. “When your food's ready.”

“Riiiiiight,” I said. “When the food's ready.”

Chapter 16

“Guess what? Trudy just called,” Samantha said when I walked downstairs for breakfast. “We get a catering gig next week, and guess who it's for!”

I sleepily rubbed my eyes. “Orlando Bloom?”

“Close. Remember that guy we saw get off the ferry a couple of days ago—with the blond hair and the goatee and the white T-shirt and the khaki cargo shorts, and he asked us where he could rent a mountain bike?”

“Um … sort of,” I said.

“You remember. We said he was the first actual book club sighting of the year,” Sam said. “Actually, that was what I said.”

“The party's at the Hamiltons' house, and I saw Mr. Hamilton coming to pick him up at the ferry,” Haley said.

“You mean …
the
Hamiltons?” I asked. “The ones with the little cottage on the hill?”

Haley laughed. We both knew how really wealthy people referred to their summer homes around here. “I have a cottage,” they'd say, and that was our clue that it was at least a five-bedroom, six-bathroom house. “Exactly,” she said.

“You really cleaned up the kitchen nicely last night,” Sam commented as she put a filter into the coffeemaker.

“Yeah, well, it's easy when you don't actually cook anything. I mean, it's not too hard to rinse out plastic containers for recycling.” I smiled, thinking of how much my aunt had teased me for picking up carryout food the night before. For some reason she thought it was the most amusing thing she'd ever heard of, and she couldn't wait to E-mail my parents and tell them how I'd had them over for takeout.

The whole time I was trying not to laugh because I kept thinking of how I had no more idea what we were going to eat than she did. I hadn't bothered to open up the containers before she and my uncle came over. I'd expected the clam chowder and lobster salad on a bed of lettuce. I hadn't expected the cold French fries—and so many of them—that Evan had picked out for us.

“So what was the verdict?” Haley asked. “Did they decide we're not such horrible people after all?”

“Yeah. They inspected everything,” I said. “Well, everything downstairs. I didn't let them see the upstairs. I didn't want them finding out about the new paint job in my parents' room.”

“Good plan,” Sam said as she took out three mugs from the cabinet.

“Yeah. Besides, I didn't exactly clean my room or scrub the upstairs bathroom, either.” I smiled. “So what are you going to do with your day off?” I asked Haley, who was busy making herself a slice of toast.

“Absolutely nothing,” she said. Then she laughed. “Yeah, right. I'll be at my mom and dad's, and they'll rope me into helping out, as usual.”

“You should just get out of here and go to a movie or something,” I said.

“Yeah, but it's no fun doing that by yourself.” She wrinkled her nose. “You know?”

“You wouldn't be totally by yourself. At least not on the ferry,” I said.

“True. Maybe I could convince Ben to—”

Samantha held up her hand for Haley to be silent. We all sat and listened to a car pulling up in the driveway. “What's that sound?” Sam asked.

I got up and looked out the screen door. A car was very definitely pulling up in the driveway. And it was the old Volvo—
my
old Volvo. Which meant that I was definitely not the one driving it, because I was standing in the kitchen. And it couldn't really drive itself, which meant …

I watched as Blair climbed out of the driver's seat and slammed the door shut.
Easy!
I wanted to say. If you close the door too hard, rusted pieces of the car fall off!

As I stepped back and watched her walk from the car to the steps, I wondered: Didn't I leave the keys on top of my dresser last night, where I always left them? So had she really come into my bedroom and taken them off the dresser? And now what? Did I have to hide the keys somewhere whenever I wasn't going to be around or awake? Should I sleep with them tied around my ankle?

I mean, who sneaks into someone's room when they're asleep and takes something?

“Hi, guys,” Blair said as she strolled into the kitchen carrying a small plastic bag.

“Where were you?” Haley asked.

“I had some errands to run,” Blair said.

Blair picked up a mug from the ones we'd gotten out for ourselves and poured herself some coffee.

“Funny, I was just about to have some,” Sam muttered under her breath.

“Errands? Really important errands, I hope. Extremely urgent errands,” Haley said. “Like, someone on the other side of the island needed CPR.”

“I was out of conditioner.” Blair held up the ends of her hair. “It's hard to figure out what kind to use out here because it's so humid. You know?”

Haley cleared her throat. “So I'm wondering, Blair. Did you not
read
the list?”

“What list?” Blair asked.

“The rules. The ones posted right there.” I pointed to the poster board on the wall. “The ones I gave you to look over the day you came to visit the house for the first time, and you said okay to, that you said were like something your parents would make you do.”

Samantha removed the pushpin and pulled the list off the wall. “Here. Read and review.” She put it on the kitchen table, next to Blair's freshly poured mug of coffee. “It says that only Colleen drives her car. It also says no big parties.”

“God, you guys are so uptight sometimes,” Blair said as she shook her head. “I mean, really. What's the big deal? It's not like anyone can check on us.”

Except my ever-present relatives,
I thought. Not that Blair would know about them, because she hadn't been around that Sunday morning, even though her overnight guest still had been.

“Yeah, maybe not, but it's still cheating,” Sam said. “It still means breaking the rules.”

“Anyway, it's not just about the list. It's about respecting the basic principles of the house and being a good housemate,” Haley said. “You left like four wet towels on the bathroom floor yesterday. You left your laundry in the washer for three days straight.”

“So?” Blair asked. “Just put it in the dryer.”

“And fold it when it's dry? Like the last three times I did laundry?” Haley scoffed. “No thanks. When I want to do my laundry—okay, maybe
need
is a better word than
want
—I don't want to do yours, too.”

“I'm sorry,” Blair said. “I've been really busy.”

“And we're not?” I asked.

There was a very awkward silence for a minute or so. Then Samantha picked up the jar on the counter that we used to collect and store “house money.” It was empty. We each contributed twenty-five dollars every two weeks. Now it was time for everyone to refill the jar. Haley passed it around the table, and everyone contributed—except when the jar was passed to Blair.

“I don't have it, but I'll get it to you later today,” she said.

“Didn't you make some tips last night?”

“Yeah, but I had to pay back Evan,” Blair said.

“You too?” I blurted. “For what? I mean, um, did you ruin something of his?” Why was I asking? Maybe I didn't want to know the answer.

“No. He loaned me money when we took the ferry the day before. We went into town and had lunch and bought some stuff, and I didn't have enough cash on me.”

I nearly choked on my coffee. Since when was Evan so flush—or generous? And why hadn't Ben told me he saw them together on the ferry?

Then again, it probably wasn't important to Ben. Probably he'd been glad to see the two of them hanging out together, because it might mean that Evan was attached to someone else now. Or had he been too busy flirting with Boat-and-Tote-Bag Girl to notice Blair and Evan?

This was turning into a semi–soap opera—without the international intrigue, romantic sex, and extreme close-ups.

“So, is that okay?” Blair asked.

The fact you're broke? Or the fact you're totally going after the guy I used to be in love with? No—and … no.

“Sure,” I said, forcing a polite smile. “That's fine.”