Full Share (Shore House Book 1) (7 page)

“Hey,” I said when my three-step-behind-her stroll became weird.

Heather kept walking but turned around in her stride. “Yes.”

“My work schedule has me working six days one week and four the next. It alternates.”

“So?” Heather didn’t waste either of our time acting like she cared.

I followed her into her room and watched as she took off her shirt and threw it on the floor next to her bed. She had on no bra, and a deep purple bruise—a hickey—covered the area above her left nipple. It was violent rather than sexual on Heather.

I made eye contact again. “So I was wondering if there’s any problem with me being here some Thursday nights.”

Heather took off her skirt and scraped a dried spot of sauce stuck to the hem. She wasn’t wearing any underwear, and I was tired of being with my roommates without their clothes on. “No one will care, Nora.” My name added on the end of her statement was said with the same tone as “you complete fucking dumbass.”

“Great. Thanks.” I turned to escape her presence.

“Oh,” she said as she wrapped herself in a towel. “Do you remember Lionel Hall?”

“Lonnie?” He’d lived down the hall from us freshman year and was the kindest person I’d ever met. Lonnie existed only to make other people happy. He never once was in a bad mood. He’d hold the door open for you and say good morning before your eyes adjusted to the sunlight outside.

“Yeah.” She stopped moving and looked me in the eye. “He’s dead. Died in a car accident last week.”

My breath lodged in my throat and choked me. I couldn’t swallow. Heather picked up her shampoo and conditioner and passed me in the doorway of her room.

Heather wasn’t just deteriorating. She was barely human.

THE BEGINNING WAS GREAT

I
took my bag and my half-gallon water bottle out of my car and tilted my head as I closed my car door. There wasn’t a sound except the squeaking of the front screen door. The beach house was completely unlocked and, from what I could tell, abandoned. I left my water in the refrigerator and stepped past the box fan that was on a chair blocking the doorway from the kitchen into my porch and stopped short.

The bed—beds—took my breath away. On each side of the porch, there were beds Jack had made out of stacked pallets and painted the most perfect sky blue. He’d brought the sunshine into our dark-paneled porch. My mattress was not only off the floor, but it sat higher than a regular bed. I almost had to climb into it. I ran my hand across the quilt lying on top of it that never touched my skin because of the ever-present, stifling heat in our room.

“Do you like it?”

I inhaled sharply and turned to Jack, who was standing behind me. His feet were covered in sand, which no longer mattered since my bed was off the floor, and his sunglasses were still on.

“Let me guess. It’s fine.”

I turned back to the bed. It was so much more than fine. “I love it.” Jack was stunned. Almost as much as I was. “Thank you.” I rested my bag on my bed.

“I, ah . . . just got home from work a little while ago. I was going to go down to the beach if you want to come.”

“Yeah,” I replied.

Jack was just standing there, smiling at me and making me feel more comfortable than I did even alone in my own apartment.

“That sounds good. I just have to change,” I added.

“Of course.”

I left Jack standing by my bed and changed in the bathroom. The house was a different place without the rest of the people crammed into it. No yelling or loud music. There was no tension, no darkness. Only Jack, and he was peaceful.

I stood on my tiptoes to see my chest in the mirror and arranged my bathing suit, making sure everything that was supposed to be covered by the red bandeau top was. I left the bathroom and practically tripped over Rob’s guitar and wished it was Rob here with me instead of Jack. I was ridiculous. Rob had a girlfriend. He was always going to have a girlfriend, and it was never going to be me. I gathered my clothes in my arms and returned to my bedroom where Jack was waiting for me.

“You ready?” he asked.

“Yes.” Jack was holding a sheet and a bottle of wine. “Wine?”

“I think a half share brought it down last weekend.” He read the bottle in his hand.

“Cabernet. Do you like wine?”

“Wine’s fine. You’re going to need to uncork it, though.”

Jack pointed at me. “Smart.”

We both searched the drawers for a bottle opener. I finally found one behind the butter door in the refrigerator. Because of course. I shook my head and handed it to Jack.

“Glasses?” he asked.

“I don’t think we should take glass to the beach.” The bottle was enough of a hazard. I searched for disposable cups.

“Good thinking. We’ll share the bottle.” Jack started toward the front door.

I grabbed my tank top and followed him.

“How was work today?” he asked as we waited for the traffic on Route 1.

“It’s like we’re married. Hi, honey. How was the office?” I mocked him.

“It should be like we’re married. Maybe have sex after we put the kids to bed.” It made perfect sense to him. I opened my mouth to tell him I’d taken a vow of abstinence when he said, “Don’t bother lying.” He stopped walking and stared at me. He’d never seemed so serious. Possibilities flew through my head. They all ended with me in Jack’s bed instead of Mila. I was a high school girl in my mind. “It’s Manifest Destiny.” Jack took my hand, and we started walking toward the beach.

I gathered my thoughts and circled around the concept of Manifest Destiny. “As in I’m territory to be occupied in the name of God?”

“As in, it’s inevitable. I haven’t heard from Jesus himself. Yet.”

We climbed the dune. The beach was nearly empty. The sky was a red hue that reflected off the ocean. The gray-turquoise water sent pink waves crashing to the sand. “Wow. It’s beautiful out here.”

“It’s my favorite time of day. I come a lot during the week.”

“Why don’t we ever come at this time on the weekends?”

“Because there’d be no water left in the entire town if we didn’t go back and shower early.” I helped Jack spread out the sheet and sat down in the center. “I’m going for a swim. You want to come in?”

“No. I’m going to stay right here.”

“Keep an eye on me. The guards left.” The stand had been abandoned in the soft sand. It was after five.

“Afraid you’ll drown?”

“The Coast Guard helicopter dropped divers in to save a guy last week, but he didn’t make it.”

“Here?”

“Right down the block. Undercurrents. They’ll kill you. That’s why it’s best to keep things obvious.” Jack turned around and ran into the ocean. He lifted his legs high above his knees when he reached the breakers and dove into the coming waves.

I didn’t take my eyes off him. Fear gripped me. If the Coast Guard couldn’t save someone, I doubted I could. I didn’t even have my phone with me to call 911. I walked to the edge of the water and wanted him to come out.

He’s fine. He’s not going to die.
I picked up three perfect shells and a broken one from the surf.

Jack dodged a couple of waves and then rode one to shore. Relief filled me when he finally stood next to me at the water’s edge. “You coming in?”

“No. I want you to come out.”

“Do you miss me?” He was grinning as if I’d told him I loved him.

“You scared me with all that talk of drowning. I can’t save you.”

Jack held me at the waist and rested his forehead on mine. “You could save me.”

I was the one drowning. This was perfectly normal for Jack. A girl in his arms on the beach. His closeness was a shock to my entire system. Nothing about it was normal. “No, I can’t.” I stepped away from him and walked back to our sheet. I took a huge sip of the wine and sunk the bottle into the sand behind us.

Jack plopped down beside me, soaking wet and oblivious to how his closeness made me anxious. Or maybe completely aware and enjoying it. Either way, I was unnerved. “Look. We’re going to be together.”

I nodded. “Manifest Destiny. I heard.”

“So now you know.” He took a sip of the wine and handed me the bottle.

It was thick and I craved a glass of ice water. I drank more, hoping to douse the need, but it only made me thirstier.

“What you probably assumed, but can’t be certain about, is it’s going to be incredible.” I laughed a little at him. “I’m serious.” His voice steadied and was completely void of any humor. He wasn’t the cocky cartoon character Ricky was. Jack was a man with the secret that I’d want him for the rest of my life if he had me just once.

I had a secret, too. I wasn’t going to hook up with some guy I’d met at the beach, or in a bar, or my daughter’s school.

“I’m going to make you forget your name.”

“That would be great.”

“You won’t be able to remember what anyone else was like.” I could feel my cheeks blushing. “Have you had a lot of lovers?” He was so incredibly likable.

“I stopped counting at eighty-nine.”

Jack paused. He appeared disturbed until he took another sip of wine. Then he seemed like he didn’t believe me. “I feel like we’re wasting precious time.” He smiled, placing the entire conversation within the gentle space of Jack Randall.

“Wasting time and missed opportunities are my hobbies.”

“I’m not surprised.” Jack stared out at the horizon. He was quiet, and I hoped this conversation was over. He rested back on the sheet and stared at the sky. I laid back, too. “Did your parents take you to the beach for vacation when you were young?”

The shore houses my parents had rented were some of my happiest memories. We’d go the same week every year, and some of the families in the surrounding houses came down the same week, too. It was a giant block-wide vacation. Those days seemed a lifetime ago. “Sometimes.”

“Where else did you go?”

“We went to Disney World when I was little. My mother was aghast at the commercialism, so the next year we went to the Rainforest in Jamaica, but the political and economic depression appalled her there.” I sighed. “Then we went to Paris. See how this is going?”

“Quite well, it sounds like to me. I had a few day trips to Ocean City, Maryland and once a summer we got to ride the rides. Was she satisfied in Paris?”

My mother was never satisfied. I stared at the sky and hated her. “She’s a big fan of the French.”

“But not you?”

“Can we talk about something else?”

Jack turned on his side and rested his head on his bent arm. “What do you want to talk about, Nora?”

I wanted to stop talking. Why did everyone in the world want to talk so much? Get to know one another . . . Couldn’t we all just be near each other? Share an experience without delving into each other’s fucked-up stories? I took a deep breath and asked, “Why did you make us beds?”

Jack froze, and I took some pleasure in finally finding a topic that made him uncomfortable. “I made the beds because I thought it would make you happy.”

I rolled on my side and faced him. “Did I not seem happy?”

“Since the first minute you set foot in the house, you’ve looked like you might drive away and never come back.”

I was surprised. The thought had never crossed my mind. And I was a runner.

“I thought maybe if you had a bed, you’d stay,” he continued.

“I wasn’t planning on going anywhere.”

“Not yet.”

The sun was low behind us. The moon rose over the ocean. Thursday was coming to an end. Jack and I stayed next to each other until darkness surrounded us.

“Are you hungry?” he asked.

I was content. There was nothing I needed in the world. I could lay there next to him until the end of time as long as he didn’t ask me to have sex with him. I let myself off the hook of how fucked up that thought was. “I’m good.”

Jack turned his head toward me. “That almost sounded sincere.”

“It was.” I let the wine warm me until my eyelids were a thousand pounds and I couldn’t hold them open any longer. When consciousness became painful, I closed them and fell asleep next to my roommate.

My eyes didn’t open again until the moon was high in the sky. The breeze blew the sheet I’d wrapped over my shoulders off me. I stayed still for a few seconds, trying to recollect where I was and how I’d gotten there. I was too groggy to be scared. I just was. But I wasn’t sure who I was, or where I was. The first memory that came back was of him. My head rested atop his chest, and his arm was around my back.

“Jack?”

“I’m right here. I was just about to wake you up.” He pulled me closer to him and I closed my eyes again, feeling safe in his arms. “We fell asleep.”

That little moan escaped my lips. The sound you made when you were asleep just inside the gates of heaven and nothing would drag you out. Jack squeezed my shoulders and ran his lips across my temple. The touch of his lips pulled me from sleep and delivered me right to him.

“What time is it?” I asked.

“I don’t know, but I think it’s late. We should go back.”

“But it’s perfect here.”

Jack ran his hand through my hair. He pushed it back off my shoulders with a light touch. “It is.” He pulled me on top of him, and suddenly, I was awake.