First There Was Forever by Juliana Romano

Author:Juliana Romano
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
Publisher: Penguin Young Readers Group
Published: 2015-03-16T04:00:00+00:00

chapter

forty

That Wednesday on the bus to Clean the Bay, I sat down in the front seat across from Leo. If Hailey wanted to sit in the back and hunt for Nate, she could do it alone. I was done helping her get his attention.

But when Hailey got on the bus a few minutes later, she sat down right next to me.

“So,” she said, “your birthday is less than two weeks away. What are you gonna do? Sixteen is a big one.”

“I don’t know,” I said. “I was thinking I’d do something at Meredith’s house. Nothing major. Just watch a movie.”

“Well, you know I’m not going to Meredith’s house. I don’t want anyone casting any Wiccan spells on me while I’m sleeping,” Hailey deadpanned. “But maybe we can go out to dinner with your parents or something the next day?”

Nate climbed onto the bus and I kept my eyes glued to Hailey’s, using all of my willpower not to look at him. Ignoring him was torture. I hadn’t seen him since Friday night, and all I wanted to do was smile at him or make eye contact or do something to acknowledge him.

“Yeah, okay, something like that,” I said, determined to keep the conversation going until Nate had passed.

At the beach, the sun was unusually hot and bright.

“I’m not wearing any sunscreen,” I said. “So I’m gonna try and stay in the shade today. Like, under the pier.”

“I’ll come with you,” Hailey said.

“Really?” I asked. Hailey was one of those people who was always trying to get a tan. It confused me that she would blow the opportunity to get some sun just to hang out with me, and her new clinginess was unnerving.

We wandered around for a few minutes under the pier without talking and then she said, “I’ve gotta pee. I’ll be right back.”

I watched Hailey trudge away toward the public bathroom in that awkward sand-walking way and then turned back to the ocean. Nate was walking near the water. He paused, bent down and picked something up from the sand, and then replaced it. He stood perfectly still for a long moment, squinting out into the horizon, the sun beating down on his profile. Warm light caught on his nose, his shoulders, his hands. Behind him, the surface of the ocean was a burnished sheet of metal. I thought about our kiss again, his fingers in my hair, the serious, focused look in his eyes the second before it happened. I thought about the moment we shared on the roof of the science building the week before and the way his palm had felt when he pressed it against mine.

“Lima?”

Hailey was back already.

“What are you looking at?” she asked. She turned her head, following the line of my vision until she saw Nate, and then her eyes moved slowly back to mine. The expression on her face was like she was solving a math problem.

“Nothing,” I said. “I was just zoning out.”

“Oh, okay,” she said, sounding skeptical.

And then

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