Loving Summer (Loving Summer Series) (3 page)

            “Going for a swim?” I ask.

            Rachel nods. “I think it’s the only way my body is going to believe that I’m really here.”

            She heads downstairs, to the pool. I go with her, but don’t change. I’m not going swimming just yet. Drew’s there, and he takes one look as his twin sister jumps into the pool before stripping off his t-shirt and jeans. In seconds, he’s down to his boxer shorts and he jumps right in beside Rachel, sending up a spray of water. Yes, I watch. I’m human, after all.

            Nat is making himself at home too, going through Aunt Sookie’s collection of video games, half of which people she’s worked with have done voice acting for. He turns on the TV, which occupies most of one wall, flicking through the channels one by one to try to see if there is anything either of us wants to watch. There isn’t, right then.

            “You can’t be bored already,” I say with a smile.

            Nat shakes his head. “I’m not. I’m hungry though. How about we go see what Sookie keeps in her fridge?”

            “Sure, but you won’t like it.” I already know what’s there. I can almost hear Nat groan with disappointment as he opens the door, revealing rows of vegetables, fruits, and cold pasta.

            “Seems like your aunt eats like a bird,” Nat says. “Do you want to go with me to the market to pick up some real food for the grill?”

            He wants me to go with him? I can’t turn down a chance like that to spend some time with Nat. Even if it is just a trip to the market. “Sure. Let me get my purse.”

            Nat pokes his head out through the screen door to talk to the twins. “Summer and I are going to pick up some groceries. Need anything?”

            “Chips and all that good junk stuff Sookie won’t let us have when she gets back,” Drew says with a grin.

            “Yeah, like ice cream and plenty of chocolate syrup and caramel,” Rachel adds.

            I shake my head. “Aunt Sookie already has that covered.”

            “Then nuts, sprinkles, chocolate shells, marshmallows… everything we need to create a Kitchen Sink,” Rachel says. A Kitchen Sink. I haven’t eaten one of those in three years. I’d forgotten how much fun it could be with them around.

            I grab my purse and Nat puts his arm around my shoulders again as we step out back. It’s easier than walking through the house to the front door. “We’ll get everything for a feast. It’s about time you and your aunt get a taste of my culinary skills.”

            In the pool Drew laughs. “Grilling meat isn’t much of a culinary skill.”

            He hauls himself out of the water; his muscles flat and well defined. I spend so much time training for volleyball these days that it’s easy to tell myself I’m just taking an interest in another fitness fanatic, but he
does
look gorgeous. Not as gorgeous as Nat, maybe, because there isn’t that history with us, but still pretty hot. His presence is hard to ignore, and I find myself taking him in from head to toe.

            He throws on his shoes. “If Nat’s showing off his ‘culinary skills’ I’d better go too.”

            “Like that?” his brother says. “You’re wet, bro.”

            Drew looks across to me and shrugs, those muscles of his moving in complicated ways. “You mind or do I need to change?”

            I stare at him, then remember to answer. “A t-shirt would be good.”

            “You don’t mind about the boxers?” Drew asks, and he moves a little closer to me. Is he trying to tease me? His boxers are wet, dripping, and cling to him like a second skin. My mouth nearly drops open. I can feel myself getting ready to blush, but I’m ready with an answer. “I didn’t notice them. I’m more interested in the water you’re planning on dripping on the rugs while you go through the house.”

            Drew grabs a towel, and while he’s busy drying off, Nat takes my hand. “Come on,” he says. “We should get going, or there won’t be time to cook.”

            “Hold on,” Drew insists, rushing inside. He comes out in just over a minute wearing jeans and another white t-shirt. Maybe he didn’t dry himself that well, but the t-shirt clings to his muscles.

            “That was quick,” I say.

            “With all those one night stands of his,” Nat explains, “he had to learn to dress fast. He has to get out of there before a girl can think he might actually care.”

            I look at Drew and he shrugs again. “They know what they’re getting into,” he says. “Why complicate things with emotional stuff?”

            “You’re a pig, you know that?” Rachel calls out from the pool.

            “You want to join us, Rachel?” I ask.

            She shakes her head, getting out of the pool and heading for a lounge chair near it. “I’m fine here. It’s going to be good having some time away from these two.”

            “Then we should go,” Nat says. His hand is still in mine, and it’s so gentle and warm there. Compared to his brother, he’s a total gentleman.

            The three of us drive over to the nearest Trader Joe’s and Nat starts picking out food for the grill: corn-fed beef, scallops, fish. He seems to know what he’s looking for, and pretty soon, he’s filled most of a cart with it. By the time he’s done that, Drew has been around the store and comes back with a cart of his own, filled with soda, chips, hot dogs, hot sauce and more, exactly the kind of junk food he said they were going to get.

            “Glad you remembered,” Nat said.

            “Like I’d forget the hot sauce.”

            While they’re doing that, I become aware of two things. The first is just how well the brothers still get along. It seems three years haven’t changed that. The second is that there are two girls around my age, maybe a little older, checking them out. I can’t blame them, but they’re pretty obvious about it, just watching them and talking in low voices to one another. One, a dark haired girl whose tight clothes do a lot to emphasize the curves she has, even comes over and pushes what looks like a slip of paper into Drew’s hand. They both walk off then, giggling.

            “What just happened?” I ask.

            Nat shakes his head with a smile. “Just the Drew effect. I’ll be back in a second. I just need one more ingredient.”

            He heads off, leaving me with Drew. I look at him. “The Drew effect? Seriously?”

            “I get it most places,” he says, starting to grin but then stopping himself. “Honestly, it can get pretty annoying.”

            “Oh, poor Drew,” I say. Like pretty girls giving him their number is really a problem.

            “I mean it,” Drew says. “Think about it. If I was a pretty girl, and guys were constantly coming up to me harassing me, judging me just by my body, that would be a problem. But because I’m a guy, that’s somehow okay?”

            “So, girls just want your body?” I ask, as innocently as I can. After all, I’ve stared at him.

            “Ever since I got in shape and made the football team…it’s been non-stop.”

            “Why can’t you stop it?” I look around, hoping to catch sight of the girls and tell them to leave Drew alone, but they’re long gone.

            Drew shakes his head. “It’s just what guys do. A girl throws herself at you, you go with it.”

            “Nat doesn’t,” I point out.

            “No, Nat doesn’t,” Drew agrees. “He never takes a chance. Never does anything. He wouldn’t know a good thing if it were standing in front of him.”

            I’m suddenly, hotly, angry. Drew can’t talk about Nat like that. “Nat might not have your body, Drew, but he’s considerate, kind… he wouldn’t do anything to hurt a girl.”

            I can feel tears starting to form in my eyes. Why? Why should they?

            Drew takes in a slow breath. “Look, I’m just trying to be honest, Summer. I’ve forgotten what it’s like to have a girl around me who only wants to be friends. Except Rachel, every girl my age is suddenly a prospect.”

            “Well I’m not,” I say sharply. “I’m not the kind of girl who could sleep with a guy without it meaning something, the way it works for you, so I guess you have one girl who’ll never be anything else. Besides…”

            I glance over at where Nat is still hunting for his missing ingredient, his height making him easy to spot.

            “You’re still into Nat,” Drew says, “so even if you were that kind of girl, you wouldn’t be into me. Three years, and you still love him? Summer, let him go. He’s not ever going to feel that way about you.”

            “You don’t know that,” I insist.

            “I’m his brother,” Drew says. “I know.”

            Nat comes back, a jar of something in one hand and his cell phone in the other. “I know,” he says, “Chrissy, I miss you already. No, don’t worry, there’s nothing here that could ever make me forget you.” Chrissy?

            I push the shopping cart away, heading down the ice cream aisle. After this, I’m going to need it.

            “I was trying to tell you,” Drew says, keeping pace with me. “Nat has a girlfriend.”

            “He knows how I feel,” I insist.

            “But he still isn’t with you,” Drew points out. He puts a hand on the cart, bringing it to a halt. “You need to move on, or this summer is going to be a hard one for all of us.”

            He leans forward, wiping away that tear from before, and I realize how lucky I am right then. Drew isn’t the little boy he was, but he’s there for me. Nat will be too, even if it isn’t the way I want, and Rachel is the closest friend I’ve ever had. Maybe that will be enough to deal with the fact that the guy I’ve cared about all these years wants someone else. Maybe.

.

Chapter
3

B
y the time Aunt Sookie comes home, Nat is already cooking up a storm in the kitchen, with Drew working hard alongside him to produce the feast that they’ve promised us. Rachel and I are in there too, watching them rather than helping out, talking about what things have been like at school and how different they are from how they used to be.

            “When did you change your hair?” I ask. “
Why
did you change your hair?”

            Rachel shrugs. “It was just more… me, I guess. I didn’t want to look like everybody else anymore.”

            “You never looked just like everybody else,” I say.

            Rachel shakes her head. I don’t think she believes me. “What about the volleyball? You’re up for the state team?”

            Of course, she’s been reading the stuff I put up on Facebook. That’s what it’s for, after all.

“Just the school team at the moment,” I say, “but I’m hoping for state.”

            Aunt Sookie chooses that moment to come home. She’s thirty-six now, and to me it always looks like she’s just hitting her prime, like being in her thirties has only made her more beautiful. She doesn’t always agree, because she thinks that auditions were easier in her twenties, but I think she looks great. There’s that long auburn hair that falls almost to her waist, and those cheekbones that I think I got from her. Her eyes are a deep green that always makes me think more of Nat than anyone in our family, so that it sometimes looks like she’s more his aunt than mine. Her skin has the tan that anyone who lives in Malibu over the summer acquires, and she always has great taste in clothes. At the moment, she’s wearing a white dress that shows off just how in shape she is, and probably has most of the students at her acting academy either jealous or admiring her.

            She seems tired though. It’s nothing about her appearance. That’s perfect, though she seems to be wearing a lot of makeup around her eyes, like she hasn’t been sleeping and she wants to cover it up. Where the tiredness shows is when she’s greeting Drew, Nat and Rachel. Aunt Sookie hugs them, and talks to them about how much they’ve grown, but she’s so quick to take a seat at the kitchen table. Maybe it’s just been an exhausting day.

            “Are you okay?” I ask her, reaching out to take her hand.

            “I’m fine. Just tired.” She smiles back at me. “I don’t know how we’re going to eat all the food the boys are preparing for us though.”

            “They’ll eat most of it,” Rachel assures her. “They eat like total pigs.”

            “Well, they’re growing boys.”

            Rachel shakes her head. “If Nat grows much more, his head is going to be brushing the ceiling.”

            “You’ve grown a lot too,” Aunt Sophie says. “I barely recognized you when I walked in. It’s hard to think that it’s been almost three years since I last had all of you here together, and I guess plenty of things have changed.”

            “A few,” Rachel admits, and I nod. So many things have changed for me too in that time. Yet there are plenty of things that haven’t.

            “You’re all growing up,” Aunt Sookie says. “It’s kind of sad in one way, because none of you will be interested in my old stories anymore.”

            “Hey, I remember those,” Drew says from where he and Nat are cooking. It looks like they’re almost done and they start to lay out plates of food. Rachel and I move to help them. Aunt Sophie stays where she is. It really must have been a long day.

            “I remember too,” Rachel says. “Wasn’t there something about a princess and a pirate?”

            “You remember then?” Sookie says. She smiles. “Of course, it’s all kids’ stuff. Not really the kind of thing you’d want to hear now.”

            “I think I’d kind of like to hear it again,” I say, bringing over a couple of plates piled high with hot dogs, burgers, steaks, and a mixture of all the other stuff we got from the market. It seems that once Nat starts cooking, he doesn’t stop.

            “I’d like to hear it too,” Nat says, taking another seat and smiling. “I remember you telling it lots of times.”

            To my surprise, Drew and Rachel want to hear it too. I guess it’s not for the story, because we all know it’s kids’ stuff really. The kind of story that you could tell a six or seven year old, because that’s how old we were when Aunt Sookie first started telling us it. It’s more about remembering those times, like seeing an old photograph, or going back to a place you used to visit.