A warm breeze blows in off the ocean, but my arms still prickle with chill bumps. The beach lays empty, probably because most everyone is at home having supper. I should be—undoubtedly Memaw is waiting on me despite my earlier text—but a moment of solitude was calling my name, some time to collect my thoughts before being subjected to her full-scale interrogation of my first day.
I wiggle deeper in the sand, stretching my legs out in front of me where my toes can tease the white foam left behind from the outgoing tide. Beside me, an oval depression with a tiny hole in the middle sends bubbles to the surface from somewhere below. I grab a sliver of broken oyster shell, digging deep at the hole, creating a small mountain of sand behind me. Salty water fills in from the bottom, flushing out a small hermit crab that circles around in the pool and then attacks the side wall, burying himself away from daylight. Before he can get away, I gather him in my palms and bring him closer to my face. His wiry legs nip at my skin as he tries to burrow into my flesh.
“Hey there, buddy,” I say, poking my finger at his antennae. He shrinks back into his shell. I capture him between two fingers and hold him in front of my eyeballs. “It feels safe in that shell, doesn’t it?”
I get it, little crab. I so get it.
I lower him into the damp hole, and he scoots away, vanishing underneath a layer of sand.
Too bad I can’t follow.
Loud squawking from a line of pelicans passing overhead draws my attention skyward. I relax, laying back with my arms curled behind my head, and stare at the clouds. Noli-Belle and I used to lay on the trampoline in the backyard and make cloud pictures. Elephants and dragons and rabbits. Now they look formless, uninspired. I close my eyes, blocking them behind a wall of darkness.
One week down. One week closer to going home. At least what’s left of it.
If there’s anything left at all.
My story is the stuff of those urban legends—a dire warning to selfish teenagers to be grateful for what you have in case you lose it all in the blink of an eye. I did lose it all, and it sucks. Majorly.
The loss gutted me, and then I made it worse, tucking myself away in a shell like that damn crab, ignoring Dad, Em, Trent, and anyone else who crossed my path. Being alone forever seemed like the best choice. Alone is good. Easy. Safe.
But then Stupid Me lets my heart flip-flop over the first cute guy who catches my eye in Edisto. I poke my head out of my safe shell, and bam! His phony, playboy reputation smacks me right across the face. I’m pissed at Jett for being that way. I’m pissed at Pepto-Bismol Hair for rubbing it in my face. I’m pissed at myself for the nagging doubts that he’s really capable of everything Rachel suggests.
“CJ?” Her shadow darkens my face, breath heavy and coming out in spurts. “I’ve been calling you…the whole time I was…running out here. Didn’t you… hear me?”
I slit open my eyes. The setting sun’s light dances around Gin’s blond hair like a luminescent halo as she bends over me, hands on her knees.
“What? No, I…I didn’t. Sorry.”
“So? How was your first day?”
I sit up, pinching the shoulders of my T-shirt and shaking it to loosen sand from my back. “Boring, other than my visitors.” I visor my hand over my eyes as I look at her, still standing over me, eyes wide. “You gonna sit down or stand there all day?”
Gin giggles, using her foot to rake the sand smooth over the once-exposed hermit crab hole, and flounces beside me. “Visitors?”
She wiggles her butt back and forth in the sand, so hard her whole body shakes. Always eager. Always optimistic.
“You’re hopeless, know that?” Gin reminds me of myself not so many months ago, how I used to bite at the bit when Emmalyn would come over with some juicy gossip. Our circle had been large, but no one was closer than me and Em. Watching Gin rub her hands in anticipation of my story, I can’t help thinking she’d have been a welcome addition to our duo. “You, Bo, and Memaw, of course, then Jett and his racing partner, Rachel.”
She cocks her head to the side, scrunching her nose. “That pink-haired girl?”
“Yep.”
“What’d she want?”
“To make a point.”
Gin’s eyebrows practically shift into question marks. “What did she say to you?”
I ignore her question. “So, you’ve known Jett your whole life?”
Her shoulders loosen, and a smile creeps back across her face. “Forever. Jett and Bo have been friends since they were toddlers. He’s pretty much been a brother to me. A very hot brother, but still…a brother.” She puckers her lips, a mischievous glint dances across her sapphire eyes. “Why do you want to know about Jett all of the sudden? Are you two—?” She nudges me repeatedly in the side.
My cheeks warm. “No…it’s just…”
“Because I know he likes you. It’s obvious from the way he looks at you.”
“From what I hear, he looks that way at a lot of people.” My knee-jerk response stuns me, and I clamp my mouth shut, turning away from Gin to scan up-shore. Damn my ever-present foot-in-mouth disease.
She clears her throat. “Is this about something Rachel said?” When I don’t say anything, she takes a deep breath and starts again. “Jett’s my friend, CJ. If someone’s talking junk about him, I need to know.”
I pivot on the sand to face her, relaying Rachel’s comments about Jett’s flighty hook-ups with random girls at his racing events.
“She said that?” Gin narrows her eyes again, the smile completely wiped from her face and replaced with a deep scowl.
“Yeah, and that he’s too busy for me and only being nice because I’m a summertime fling.”
Gin balls her fists and slams them into the sand, spraying a few grains against my legs. They sparkle like glitter in the golden sunlight, and a few sandpipers near us take flight. “That’s total crap!”
As she seethes, I muster up the nerve to ask more. “Have you gone to any of these promo events?”
I want her to tell me yes. That she’s first-hand witnessed his upstanding-ness.
She shakes her head. “No, but…come on, you know Jett’s not how she says he is.”
Do I? He waltzed into my life a short week ago and has already created this much havoc. Still, I can’t shake the inkling in my gut there’s something inherently good about him.
“I don’t know. I don’t really know him at all.”
“Trust me. Jett’s a good guy.”
“But how do you know for sure if you don’t go to his racing promos?”
She sighs. “I guess I don’t, but…” she grabs my hand. “That doesn’t sound like Jett. Besides, he’d tell Bo. They’re best friends. You tell your best friend everything.”
Not everything. My current relationship with Em is a testament to that. I swirl patterns in the sand with my finger. “I don’t know what to believe.”
Gin pouts her lips and folds her arms tight across her chest. “Don’t let her pettiness ruin your thing with Jett.”
I snort. “I don’t have a thing with Jett.”
“If you say so.” Her sing-song tone proves her imagination’s running wild.
I roll my eyes and check my phone. Supper is probably cold by now. “It’s time to be getting back to Memaw’s. She’s probably been waiting on me.” I stand up, sweeping my hands from shoulders to shins, the sand gritty against my palms. “You heading back now or staying out here a while?”
“I’m gonna hang out. Watch the sunset.”
I nod and trudge a few steps toward the beach access, pausing to look back over my shoulder. Gin brushes a few wisps of hair from her face and stares back.
“Don’t mention what we talked about to Bo or Jett, okay?”
She smiles, the metal braces stretching across her teeth reflect a glint from the sun. “Sure. What are friends for?”
I return the smile and muddle through the sand drifts toward the sidewalk. She’s right. We’re becoming friends, and for the first time in months, I don’t want to run from it.
A few yawns and some well-placed stretches throughout dinner score me a pass on chores for the night. Memaw says I’ve earned it after a long first day on the job. So, I mop up the last of my fajita chicken on a scrap of tortilla, shove it in my mouth, tell Memaw goodnight, and escape to my room for a hot shower and a tortuous game of Who the Hell is Jett Ramsey?
I hand-squeeze the extra water from my hair and comb out the tangles. The auburn ends stretch all the way to mid-back, much longer than I’ve had it since late elementary school. Mama used to take me to the fancy salon downtown to get it cut and styled on Girls’ Day, but there haven’t been any of those since last summer, and consequently, no haircuts either. I stare into the mirror, french braiding my hair. The braids sort of showed up a couple months after the accident. I never wore them before, but when my hair started to become unmanageable, it was an easy solution to keep it all tamed. That, and the fat end of the braid tossed in front of my left shoulder is a terrific cover-up for any would-be scar sneak peeks.
I flip off the bathroom light and sit in front of my laptop. The saved draft of my email to Em waits in the folder. Pressing Send would be so simple, but for some reason, I can’t. Instead, I open a new search tab and type in “Jett Ramsey” and “racing” in the white box. More than 1,000 entries pop up, mostly highlights from past races. Under the Images tab, a slew of the pictures I saw before—the ones with Jett in those zip-up racing outfits—fill the screen, but toward the bottom are a few shots of him sitting at a long table, smiling and signing autographs.
I enlarge them on the screen, scouring each picture for proof of Rachel’s insinuations. A middle-aged man, Jett’s father Jeff Ramsey as noted in the caption, sits beside him at the table in every shot, and there’s even a few with Trévon and Rachel and another guy I’ve never met. Girls, lots of them, crowd each picture as well. Fangirls with Jett’s number smeared across their big chests and barely-there T-shirts. These must be the girls Rachel’s referring to, but in the pictures, Jett’s not leering at them, ogling their bodies, or even touching them. He’s signing autographs. Unless it’s not autographs, but secret messages with hook-up details for later.
My heart beats triple time, and I slam the laptop closed. Get a grip, CJ. You’re freaking losing it.
My phone vibrates against the wooden desk, the light from its screen reflecting a greenish-glow against the painted surface. I pick it up but don’t recognize the number. Everyone I usually text is entered in my Contacts, but this number features a local 843 area code. I tap the notification and the message appears on-screen.
Hey. It’s Jett.
How did he get my number?
<Me> Hey. How did you get my number?
Waiting on his answer, I plug his information into my Contacts. Stupid, since this cannot become a habit. The least I can do is give myself a friendly reminder of the futility of our relationship with every text. The phone buzzes again, and I smile as his name appears.
<Jett “Jackass”> Gin gave it to me. We need to talk.
Great. Gin went flapping her jaws to Jett after our talk, when I specifically asked her not to. A fire rises from my belly.
<Me> About what
<Jett “Jackass”> Why you were pissed at me today
<Me> I wasn’t
<Jett “Jackass”> Try again
<Me> If you’ve already talked to Gin, why ask me?
<Jett “Jackass”> Because Gin won’t spill.
The fire subsides. Gin kept her promise. I shouldn’t have doubted her. Suddenly, I want to walk next door and high-five the crap out of her.
<Me> It’s nothing. I was busy. First day and all…
<Jett “Jackass”> Come on, Cami. I know it has something to do with Rachel.
<Me> Why do you say that?
<Jett “Jackass”> I’d have to be an idiot not to catch all those weird vibes between y’all. What did she say?
<Me> Why don’t you ask her?
<Jett “Jackass”> I did. She says I’m crazy
<Me> Maybe she’s right about that one
<Jett “Jackass”> Rachel’s only right in her own mind. She said something about me, didn’t she?
<Me> It’s nothing
<Jett “Jackass”> If it’s about me, I deserve the right to defend myself
I tap out the reply, re-read it fifty times, then press send. I drop the phone and clasp my hands over my mouth. Did I really just say that? I turn the phone over and read my words once again.
<Me> She warned me about your shady reputation with fangirls at your racing events
Buzz! An immediate response.
<Jett “Jackass”> What reputation?
<Me> It doesn’t matter. I told her we’re just friends
<Jett “Jackass”> Oh
<Jett “Jackass”> You really shouldn’t believe everything you hear
<Me> You don’t have to explain anything to me. It’s cool
<Jett “Jackass”> Why do you believe Rachel so easily but not me?
Because it’s easier.
<Me> I don’t know. Doesn’t matter.
I lay the phone face-up on the desk and stare at the glass orb I keep on my bedside table; its aqua color swirls around a tornado of crystalline flecks forever suspended in the middle. Mama and Noli-Belle’s ashes, the only physical part remaining of them, are preserved in an art piece to carry with me forever. There was nothing I couldn’t confess to Mama, nothing we couldn’t talk about. What I wouldn’t give to have her opinion now. No sooner do I think it than her voice whispers as a faint memory in my brain. Always follow your heart. It feels the things we’re not yet prepared to see. Something about her nuggets of wisdom always seemed risky. Even more so now.
My phone buzzes again.
<Jett “Jackass”> What can I do to make you trust me?
The million-dollar question, and I have the answer, uncomfortable as it may be. It’s not so much about trusting Jett as it is being able to trust myself when he’s around.