“Speaking of,” Leland said, unfolding his long legs and standing up, “I’d better get to work. I’m sure I’ll see you around.” He shuffled down toward the beach, not seeming like he was in any particular hurry.

I looked back toward the concession stand, then over to my crookedly parked car. There was a piece of me, a big one, that just wanted to get in and drive, not stopping until I was miles and states away from here. But there was something about quitting twenty minutes into your first day that just seemed pathetic. And I knew that if I left now, it would confirm everything that Lucy already thought about me. So I made myself walk toward the concession stand, suddenly with a lot more sympathy for my sister and what she’d had to face this morning. I took a deep breath before I pulled open the employee door, feeling a little bit like I was going to face a firing squad myself.

The rest of the workday did not exactly go well. Lucy barely spoke to me. She either spoke to me through Elliot, when he was around between lessons, or simply ignored me, leaving several times to make calls on her cell. After the lunch rush, she’d sent me to organize the equipment and supply rooms. It was mind-numbing work—counting and straightening the piles of life jackets, then doing inventory of the supply closet—but at least I was alone, with no uncomfortable pauses or waves of irritation being sent my way. I’d spent my lunch hour sitting on the beach alone, off to the side, in the shade of one of the pine trees. There were groups of kids playing in the water, having the kind of raft-tipping fights that I remembered well. I could see Elliot, out on the lake in a kayak, directing a sailing class around a buoy course, and retrieving one boat when it seemed in danger of floating out toward Delaware. When I returned to the supply room after my break and began counting the cups again, time seemed to crawl, the hours passing with excruciating slowness. When five o’clock finally arrived and I closed up the supply closet, I was exhausted. I smelled like fryer grease and the mayonnaise I’d accidentally spilled on myself, my feet were killing me, and all I wanted was to crawl into bed and not have to go back to this job ever again.

I met Lucy and Elliot outside, as Lucy pulled a metal gate down over the front of the concession stand and locked it. I saw Leland striding up from the beach, guitar over his shoulder, and was surprised to see that there were still some swimmers in the water, a few lone people still bobbing in their rafts. “So,” I said, as Elliot approached me and Lucy yanked on the lock twice, testing it, “what happens if there’s no lifeguard?”

“A sign goes up,” Elliot said. He nodded at Leland, who was loping over to us. “Lifeguard’s only on duty from nine to five. There’s a sign on the chair the rest of the time that it’s swim at your own risk.”

I nodded as Lucy came over, her phone clutched in her hand. She smiled at Leland, then dropped the friendly expression as soon as she saw me. “So we should figure out schedules,” she said, her voice cold and clipped. “I’ll talk to Fred and then call you. What’s your cell?” I told her, and she punched it into her phone, pressing each button a little harder than necessary. “Okay,” she said, when she’d saved it. She gave me a long look, and as I took in the rest of the three of them standing closer together, I realized that they were probably going to be making plans to hang out. Plans that I, without question, wasn’t a part of.

“Oh,” I said, feeling my face get hot. “Right. Great. So just… call me about the schedule, and I’ll… be here then.” I could hear that I sounded like an idiot, but the words were out before I could stop them. I gave everyone a nod, and power-walked to my car as fast as possible.

As I opened the door, before I got inside, I looked back and saw Lucy watching me. She didn’t look away immediately, like she had all day, and her expression seemed more sad than angry. But then she turned away again, and I was reminded of what Elliot had said. He was right—I couldn’t blame her. Because it was exactly what I deserved.

Chapter eleven

five summers earlier

I STARED ACROSS THE DOCK GLUMLY AT LUCY. “THIS STINKS.” I separated out the purple Skittles from the pile in front of me, and pushed them toward my best friend. Lucy frowned down at her own pile, then selected all the greens and pushed them to me. We divided all our candy this way, our color preferences so ingrained that we never had to ask. When it came to things like Snickers or Milky Ways, we preferred them from the beach snack bar, frozen. We would get one, along with a plastic knife, and Lucy would divide the candy bar with a surgeon’s precision. We shared everything, fifty-fifty.

“I know,” Lucy agreed. “It sucks.” I nodded, secretly impressed and a little jealous. My mother yelled at me whenever I said that word, and Lucy’s mother had as well, until recently. But, as Lucy was always pointing out, divorce meant that you could get away with tons of things that used to be off-limits.

Unfortunately, divorce also meant that Lucy wasn’t going to be here for most of the summer, a fact that I was still having trouble getting my head around. Summers in Lake Phoenix meant Lucy, and I had no idea what I was supposed to do without her. We had even gone before my parents, sitting them down on the screened-in porch one night to make our case: Lucy could just live with us this summer while her parents were in New Jersey, dealing with lawyers and meetings and “mediation,” whatever that was. This way, Lucy would be able to take advantage of the Lake Phoenix fresh air, and not be in her parents’ way. She could share my room—we’d even worked out a system where we’d alternate who would get the real bed, and who would get the trundle bed.

But my parents hadn’t agreed, and now, after only two weeks here, Lucy was leaving. I was supposed to be saying good-bye, and even though I said good-bye to Lucy at the end of every summer, this was different.

“Look,” Lucy said, carefully smoothing her bangs down. I loved Lucy’s bangs and was incredibly jealous of them. But when I’d gotten my own cut the fall before, they hadn’t hung even, straight, and thick, like Lucy’s did. They had been wispy and flyaway, always parting in a cowlick in the center and causing my mother to have to buy me a lot of headbands. My hair had grown out by the time summer came, and I never had to tell Lucy that I’d copied her. “My mom said if she gets the house and things work out, I’ll be able to come up here soon. Maybe even in a month.” She tried to put a positive spin on the last word, but I could hear how hollow it sounded. What was I supposed to do for a month without Lucy?