The noise of socializing boosts my confidence with its familiarity— different town, different social strata, same party. I walk through the open glass doors onto the deck, where Ella, Amber, and Leah sunbathe on lawn chairs, surrounded by their friends. I swipe a bottle of water from a cooler and pick a spot on the opposite side of the pool, slipping on my sunglasses and plopping down in a chair.
Ella notices but deliberately ignores me. Even though the summer just started, she’s already tan, tanner than me, and I’m outside every day. I sip my water, taking note of the guy floating in a giant seahorse and the girl making a show of flipping off the diving board. And I wait.
It only takes a handful of minutes before Justin appears poolside and launches himself smack onto the occupied seahorse, sinking the dude floating in it. Where there’s a pool and a bunch of people trying to look cool, competition is inevitable—it’s basically a golden rule, and one that helps me do my job.
The seahorse guy rights himself in the water, laughing and diving onto Justin’s head. And they wrestle, catching the attention of everyone nearby. But pool fights are hard to sustain, and so after a minute, they catch their breath and pick another way to spar.
“Game time!” Justin declares over the music. He climbs out of the pool, wiping his face on the towel at the end of Ella’s lawn chair. “Should we bump it up a notch?”
“Bump. It. Up,” Amber replies, egging him on and lifting her palms in the air.
I spot Tiny chatting up a group at the other end of the deck.
“Asshole,” Justin declares, which earns him laughs. “A friendly game of Asshole, but in the water.”
I glance at Ella, who used that word to describe me only yesterday, but she stares at Justin, her eyes not wandering in my direction.
“Group race. Winner gets crowned King,” Justin continues. “The runner-up is Duke. And the loser is the Asshole. Until the next race in about . . . I don’t know, an hour, the King is boss—he can demand service or dish out shots. The Duke is next in command, and so on down the line. The Asshole is everyone’s bitch.”
So basically, high school.
“I’m in,” the seahorse guy says, pushing himself out of the water.
I toss my sunglasses onto the lawn chair, fully planning on participating. Like I said, competition is opportunity. I make eye contact with Tiny, but she shakes her head. While she loves the water, she’s a self-declared floater, not a racer. Same goes for running. If she’s running, I would too because something apocalyptic is happening.
“Babe?” Justin says to Ella, who’s sipping lemonade and looks content where she is.
I stand, pulling off my T-shirt and kicking off my shoes. “I’m in,” I reply before Ella can.
“Yeah, man,” Justin laughs. “Public enemy’s stepping up.”
Now Ella does look at me. I join the group poolside, where there are already about ten people lining up for the swim race.
Amber throws her phone down on her chair and gives a little shrug, shaking out her bob and readjusting her red bikini. “I’m in, too.” She joins the line, picking a spot between me and seahorse guy.
She eyes me with interest. “You showed,” she says like she’s impressed.
“Wouldn’t have missed it.” I gesture at Ella, who’s now headed right for us. “Scorpio is basically my best friend in this town.”
Amber smirks. “You know her name is—” she starts.
“My name is none of his business,” Ella says, pulling her long hair into a messy bun and squeezing in on the other side of Amber.
“None of his business might be your birth name, Scorpio, but it doesn’t roll off the tongue the same way,” I reply.
Amber laughs, and Ella ignores me.
“Okay, let’s do this,” Justin says loudly. “We’ll all swim to the far side of the pool and back. First one on the deck is the winner. Leah, can you count us off?”
Leah puts down her phone and holds three fingers in the air, her box braids loose and long down her back. “Everyone, get ready.”
Ella glances my direction, and her look is a challenge, one that says she’s going to eviscerate me.
But I know what she thinks I don’t—that she, Amber, and Leah have been on the swim team for four years. However, I also know me, and even though I only have the murky water in the dock and not some fancy pool, I’ve spent all the summers of my life swimming in it.
“Three. Two. One. Go!” Leah says from her lawn chair, and I dive.
The water cancels out the music and the hooting crowd, blanketing everything in a familiar whoosh. And I’m off, shoulders pushing against the water and eyes open. I reach the other side in no time, but with my momentum, my turn is clumsy. Ella’s, however, is graceful. We’re neck and neck as we kick off the wall. And as we approach the finish line, I steal a look at her. She’s a stroke behind, but we’re ahead of the pack—first and second of the group.
I pause, slowing my pace and strategically letting her take the lead. But instead of popping out of the water as the victorious Queen ready to smite the commoners with shots of Malibu, she touches the wall and stops, staring at me underwater. For a second, I’m confused.
Take your victory.
Still underwater, I motion at the deck above us. But my friendly gesture is met with annoyance, and just like in the coffee shop my plan goes to hell. Amber smacks the wall between us and lifts herself out of the pool, leaving us both without a title, frowning at each other underwater.
Now it’s Ella who points to the surface above our heads, eyes narrowed, clearly aware I was letting her win and flat-out refusing to accept the olive branch. Not that it matters at this point, considering half the group is already out of the pool. She points again more aggressively. And while I understand her, I’m not getting out now to take some middling position that no one will notice. I can’t, really. So I shake my head.
She looks like she wants to scream, which is kind of adorable underwater with her cheeks puffed out. She holds up both hands as if to say, What the hell is your problem? And I’m wondering the same thing—how is it that every time I orchestrate a plan, she does something I don’t expect? I can already hear Tiny tearing me a new one.
I push myself down to the floor of the pool and into a seated position, trying to tell her it’s no use and to give up. But she pushes down with me and stamps her foot against the bottom. And next thing I know she’s sitting on the floor of the pool, too, giving me the finger with both hands. We stare at each other. But our standoff is interrupted by lack of air.
She’s already struggling, and I know I don’t have more than five seconds left. She fights, but it’s no use. We both push forcefully out of the water, gasping.
“And we have our Asshole!” Leah exclaims. “Or two Assholes?” she says when neither of us makes a move to jump onto the deck. “I feel like that fail is definitely a tie. You two were practically having a conference down there.”
Everyone around us hollers and laughs. And with a withering look, Ella pushes herself out of the pool, stomping back to her chair, where Justin already sits, drinking her lemonade. He grabs her and pulls her down, giving her a big kiss.
“There she is . . . my favorite loveable Asshole,” Justin says.
Amber snorts. “Now there’s a Valentine’s Day card.”
And so, the public shaming commences. Amber (the Queen) makes me bring her and Leah fresh towels and snacks and has me reapply her suntan lotion (twice), bowing to her and giving her a compliment every time I approach. And Justin (the Duke) makes me his beer bitch and has me replenish all his games of flip cup while wearing a bra on my head. But as the hour winds down, just as I suspected, everyone knows who I am. And I’m in. An accepted part of the group. Accepted by everyone except the one person who matters, that is.
“Okay, Assholes!” Amber exclaims, looking happily at me and Ella. “Time to document your suckage!”
I glance at Ella, who sports boxer briefs around her forehead, but she doesn’t meet my eyes. Tiny, however, is looking from me to Ella and back again from across the deck.
Amber waves Ella and me to her lawn chair where she’s been holding court, and as I walk up, Ella turns away from me, body language that suggests I’m even worse off than I was after the coffee incident, which I honestly didn’t think was possible.
“For my last decree,” Amber announces, looking at us like we’re her favorite snack, “I’m going to take a picture of you two beauties, and you’re going to post it to your IG accounts, where you cannot delete it for at least twenty-four hours.”
Ella looks like she’s going to murder Amber or me or both of us.
“I don’t have one,” I say.
Tiny subtly clocks our conversation from her spot near the snack table.
“Really?” Amber says, surprised. “Okay, then post on whatever social account you have.”
“I don’t have any,” I say and wait for her reaction. This happens on every case.
Amber’s eyes nearly detach from her head. “What? Like, none? Nada? Nothing?”
“Nothing,” I confirm.
Leah arches an eyebrow like I just became more interesting in her estimation. “I don’t know if I think that’s cool or seriously questionable.”
“Maybe another punishment?” I suggest and Ella looks hopeful.
“Mmmm, no can do. A picture needs to happen,” Amber says, assessing us. After a long pause, her eyes light up. “Wait . . .”
She grabs her purse and yanks out bright-red lip gloss. She motions for me to bend down. “Since you’re not posting, you need something . . . extra.” She doesn’t get one smear in before I know exactly what’s happening. Not only will I appear on Ella’s IG with a bra on my head, but I’ll also have a sparkly penis on my forehead.
“Now get together,” Amber says, admiring her handiwork and positioning her phone.
Ella crosses her arms, and I do the only thing I can—I smile.
Leah checks her watch, just as Amber snaps her first couple of pictures, shooting Ella a sympathetic look. “Hour’s up, Amber.”
Amber huffs like Leah’s ruining it. “Fine. But I better see that picture up pronto, El,” she says and then shouts, “Rematch!”
Justin echoes Amber, and Ella looks relieved that our servitude is finally over. She doesn’t make a move to reenter the competition, and neither do I.
As people line up by the pool, I pull the bra off my head and offer it to Ella. “Yours?”
She shakes her head, lips pursed, and turns away.
I swipe a napkin from Amber’s snack spread and wipe my forehead. “Might as well laugh it off, Scorpio. We all fall from grace once in a while.”
She doesn’t look at me.
“And well, it’s your own fault,” I add, because I’m once again in the undesirable position of having to needle her to get a response.
Her head whips in my direction. “My fault? This is one thousand percent your fault. I certainly didn’t need you to let me win.”
I inadvertently smile, because as angry as she is, she also looks ridiculous.
“What?” she seethes.
Leah starts her countdown and fifteen people jump in the pool.
“Nothing,” I say innocently and cough, pointing upward to the boxer briefs she sports like a crown.
Her eyes double in size and she yanks them off. “At least I don’t look like I got into a fight with red glitter.”
I wipe my hand on my head, but barely anything comes off.
“It’s color stay,” she says, and the corners of her mouth tilt up ever so slightly.
“Are you telling me I still have balls on my forehead?”
“Big ones,” she says and suppresses a laugh.
“If I knew all it took to get you to smile was draw balls on my face, I’d have done it an hour ago.”
She makes her best effort to look annoyed, but it’s obvious her heart isn’t in it. “I cannot believe you did that to us.” She sighs, the fight draining out of her. “I could have been lounging with lemonade service; meanwhile I spent half an hour blowing up a giant bunny float and calling Amber ‘your highness.’”
“Yeah, but just think about the possible memes they’ll make of us,” I say.
Her mouth opens. “I will kill you for real.”
We stand there for a couple of seconds, caught in this cycle of fighting and joking, but never actually getting to friendly.
Justin emerges from the water, this time as King. He pumps his fist in the air.
“I’m surprised you didn’t race again,” I say, trying to keep her engaged a little longer. “That could be you right now.”
“I’m pretty good with never playing that game again.” She shakes her head. “Where did you learn to swim like that anyway?”
And before I can even consider it, I say, “It was the only place I could stand to be after my sister—” The instant the words leave my mouth, I look away, shocked and embarrassed. Damn Tiny and that Des talk. Damn my brain for betraying me with the truth.
“I’m sorry,” she says, clearly understanding.
I wipe at my forehead again. “Bathroom?” I say even though I already know where it is.
But as I pass her, she puts out her hand and says, “Ella. My name’s Ella.”
I stop, taking her hand. “Holden.”
“Wow . . . Holden . . . you have those parents, huh?” she says, amused.
Even though my name isn’t actually Holden, I relate in every way. August? Really? “You have no idea.”
“Actually, I do. My middle name is Gertrude.”
“Oof,” I say. “But at least it’s your middle name.”
“I mean, yeah, but still—high school doesn’t care.”
“Truer words were never spoken,” I say, and this time when we make eye contact, the animosity between us is gone.
But so is the conversation. Because a soaking-wet Justin picks up Ella and twirls her in the air. “Babe, you’re dating the Kiiiiing!” he says, and she laughs.
Kyle twirled Des in the backyard, giving her a big kiss, both of them dripping salt water after beating their friends in a race out to the buoy.
Tiny sighed. “I can’t wait to be kissed like that.”
“Gross,” I countered.
Tiny scooped salsa onto her chip where we sat at the picnic table, both of us having lost the past three races (badly). “But look at them. They’re in love.”
“Awesome conversation about my sister, but—”
“Did you see us, little brother? Absolute crushing win,” Des said, ruffling my wet hair with her hand before she shoved a sour-cream-and-onion chip in her mouth.
“I mean, it was hard not to see, the way you two shouted ‘Champions!’ and did ballet moves on the dock,” I said, doing my best impression of her.
It earned me a laugh from Kyle. “This kid is cool. You never told me your little brother was so funny.”
“Lies. I tell everyone,” she said and gave me a big kiss on the cheek, which instantly killed any cool points I might have earned.