Recklessly (19 page)

“Crap! My underwear is still in their pool,” Lana said, unable to get her giggling under control. “Oh my God.”

“Lana! Why were they home? Holy shit! You said they always leave during the U.S. Open…”

“Me and Grayson swam in their pool; they weren’t there last year. I was making a guess. Taking a gamble. Betting my underwear, apparently. But you know what? Life is too short to not do things you’re going to have to explain once you’re on the other side, you know?”

“You’re crazy…” he whispered with a chuckle.

“Sorta. Kinda.” Lana snuggled against him and tucked her head into the curve at his neck. That warm, velvety feeling returned, the one that had swathed him earlier when he held her. “But you liked it.”

“I did…I do…” He kissed her forehead. If he were back at the party, he would’ve been surrounded by eager, adoring people, severely intoxicated and taking photos until he saw spots. Right now, his clothes were heavy and damp with pool water, he was cold, he was dirty from the lawn, his lungs felt like they were being wrenched, and somehow there wasn’t any other way he would’ve wanted this night to go. The brief heart-to-heart had certainly been unexpected, but everything about Lana surprised him, he realized. She was this beautiful, witty, sexy, unapologetic, carefree…biker. Artist. Reader. Dancer. Mom (sort of). And for thrills and the written word, they were clearly kindred spirits. Describing her as “keeping him on his toes” was probably going to be an understatement.

Maybe she
was
something of a tornado: very little warning, discombobulating.

Two short ticks sounded before the sprinklers whipped water all over them. “Maybe this is a sign we should be at a house we’re actually welcome at,” he said.

They walked briskly back to his rental house and were as clandestine as possible when they walked in, but everyone was too drunk to notice anyway, so they slipped upstairs to his room. After they both showered, he gave her one of his t-shirts and hung her dress up to dry.

As Wes changed into fresh clothes, he said, “Hey, look, if you ever want company on a ride down here when you come and see Sadie
—just company and a ride,
I don’t want to interfere—let me know. I’m down here a lot to surf. I just wanted to make sure I extended the offer.”

“Thank you,” she said. “Consider the offer…considered.”

“I’m really glad you kidnapped me tonight.”

With a sly smile, she said, “Me, too…but you’re
still
kidnapped ‘cause I’m stuck up here until my dress dries, and I want something else. So,
I’m taking it. And I think we’re both going to like it
very
much.” Lana reached into her bag for
Lord of the Flies,
patted the empty side of the bed and curled her finger at him.

Chapter 6 Tragedy and Rebirth

Once Mrs. Cartwright concluded her speech and cut the ribbon off Erin’s memorial bench, a deluge of white balloons rose up into the clear sky. Wes was still clutching his and staring at the tiny gold plaque on the seat with her name etched into it. She’d become a name etched on things. A rock that was part of a roadside memorial at the accident scene. A grave stone. A tattoo on his arm where the letters of her name were buried. Even Abel didn’t know about that.
Were you and Erin a forever thing?
Lana had asked. Yeah…when he thought she wasn’t fucking another guy.

He’d avoided speaking during the dedication, which was good because he had abandoned rational thought when Marcus strolled up to join the group congregating around the bench. Now he was talking to Erin’s mom several feet away, and Wes was sneering at him. Wes valued his friendships, so once you were in with him, you were blood—you were
Abel
—which was why his animosity toward Marcus was still trapped somewhere within him where he couldn’t dislodge it.

Wes had gone to visit him a few times in the hospital as he recovered in the initial weeks, even after finding out the truth, but the friendship had actually ended the first day he and Erin crossed that forbidden line in Wes’ mind. He didn’t ask for an explanation and he hadn’t gone to receive an apology; he just wanted to be there for his former friend until he got better.

And Erin? Why didn’t she just leave him? Did she like the thrill of having a secret? Was that how she got her kicks? Anger vised him everywhere it could, anywhere it could fill. His brain. Heart. Bones. Breath. Soul. He cast his eyes over to the photo of her perched on an easel, forever immortalized at nineteen.
What was the point of making me hate you? ‘Cause I do hate you. I realized I really, really do.

“You all right, bro?” Abel said, startling him. Wes inadvertently let go of the balloon and it went sailing into the clouds. At nineteen, as a rising surfing celebrity with exploding endorsements and a huge female fan base, he was already blind to every beautiful and willing woman because Erin was all he needed. In some fleeting moments of insecurity in the aftermath of her death, he had spent some time wondering why he hadn’t been good enough. Why he hadn’t been enough, period. Oh, yes, Mr. Definition of Cocky had a chink in his armor back then.

“I don’t know if I should’ve come. Brings back a lot of old stuff. Way too much.”

“You did what you came to do. Mrs. Cartwright knows it was hard for you; she seemed grateful you were here.”

Wes nodded. “You ready?” They started for the parking lot.

“Wes…” The voice behind him was so meek, the light wind nearly overwhelmed it, but he still recognized the speaker immediately. Marcus. Abel slowed his pace, retreating from Wes’ line of sight, and Wes’ stride became a purposeful act of escape. His heart was cramming its way into his throat like a sledgehammer was forcing it up from below. Everyone knew Wes as the laidback, diplomatic one, but all he ever saw when he looked at Marcus was a replay of every memorable moment between
him and Erin, and he read it as foreplay, which made him angry still. Every single arm thrown around her shoulder. Every joke made between them. And as with the Brody situation, Wes was well aware that he could hold a hell of a grudge.

So, he would punch Marcus today if he got the chance.

He hoped Marcus would and wouldn’t give him the chance.

“Not the time, dude…” he heard Abel say. “He’ll talk to you when he’s ready or maybe never.”

Marcus shouted, “I just have one thing to say to him!” Behind him, the scraping of shoes hinted at a brief shuffle that must’ve caught Abel off guard because Marcus was suddenly at Wes’ side, eyes blazing.

“What? What the hell do you want from me? You didn’t get enough last time?”

“I know you’ve convinced yourself that we were just fucking to screw with you or that we didn’t give a shit about your feelings, but I loved her, too, Wes! For real. I was
in
love with her!”

“Yeah? Well, you love another man’s girl from afar. That was always the only option.” Under a shade of rage, he thought to lunge for him, wanting so badly to toss Marcus to the pavement. But instead he said, “So, fuck you.”

“I loved her and she chose you, you know! We were arguing about her wanting to be with you.
Just you
. She was ending it with me. She wanted to be with you, dude. You won. You can let it go.
You won.
”

*

He was calling Lana before his brain caught up to what his fingers were doing. He didn’t want to have sex; he really just wanted to talk. Not to Abel. Not even Dylan, who knew what it was like to lose someone close. Just to Lana. And he really wanted to talk about something pleasant, like books. And to see her eyes spark because he always managed to pick something she loved, and he loved the feeling he got because her eyes sparked.

He
needed
to see something beautiful today. Something pure and simple and beautiful. Like her big, brown eyes. He remembered how slowly they had moved across the page that night they read
Lord of the Flies
together. She had probably read it a million times—the pages were worn, passages underlined in various highlighter shades, and the corners floppy—but her gaze still glided over every word. At one point, she had tapped her finger to the page so he wouldn’t turn it. The character Piggy had just been murdered in the book, and without asking, she’d read the scene again. Then she had insisted they discuss it, put-the-book-down-because-I-can’t-go-any-further discuss it. He remembered thinking how cute she looked after she snapped the book shut and sat up, urging him to do the same, with her brow all puckered, hands wringing, voice agitated. He had kissed her to shut her up. She smiled. It worked.

When his friends had asked where he’d been that night when they finally made it back downstairs, he had made vague insinuations about their romp at the house, but the most amazing part of the night, he discovered as the days passed, had been up in the room, listening to her breathing when she fell asleep briefly curled up with her head on his stomach.

He missed that. He missed
her.

Even though he had seen her most of the week in Orange County, her phone had been off since the U.S. Open ended, and an entire week had gone by where he hadn’t heard from her. Wes wasn’t the type to phone stalk, but she hadn’t returned his text or phone call. And Lana was who he wanted to have a conversation with, and feeling that way brought on more uncomfortable emotions. Like he was needy. But there was so much stuff crowding his head.

Stuff like finding out all this time Erin wanted to be with him. How was he supposed to reconcile that with hating her for so long?
She loved me. She wanted to be with me.
Repeating Marcus’ words to himself only served to wash him in confusion and stagnant moodiness. He’d been holding resentment all this time when she was planning to make it right? He would’ve doubted Marcus, accused him of just trying to find a way for Wes to forgive him, but Marcus had stuffed a crumpled letter in Abel’s hands before turning to go.

There was unanticipated relief accompanying the news, and perhaps a new lens through which to remember her. It was as though the shroud of spite he’d put over their time together was torn away, replaced with something strange, almost peaceful. Her touches, laughs and kisses for him didn’t feel like taunts anymore, but what were they? Secret appeals for understanding? An omen for the forgiveness she’d planned to eventually—but never get the chance to—ask for? And what the fuck was he supposed to do with all of it after all this time?

He mulled it over at home for a while, holding her unopened letter—his faded name etched in her rushed, slanted, purple handwriting on the front—after turning down Abel’s suggestion that they hit the surf for a few hours. What he did instead was take a drive to Marina Del Rey with Hunter S. Thompson’s
The Rum Diary
in his front passenger seat.

“Who is it?” a voice called when Wes knocked on the door to Lana’s apartment.

“Grayson? Hey, it’s—”

“Oh, I know who it is,” Grayson lilted as he swung the door open. “And you’re in a suit. How’d I get this lucky?”

Wes laughed. “Uh, I’m actually…” He trailed off as Rick strolled by and walked into the kitchen, and Wes was way too irritable for any commentary from him right now. “Can I talk to you out here?”

Grayson nodded, stepped out into the hallway, and shut the door behind him. “What’s up?”

“Um…well…I haven’t heard from Lana since the U.S. Open—”

“Me neither,” Grayson said, in a rather striking aloof tone before he shrugged.

Disappointment spilled over Wes; he was already drowning in his miserable day. He raised his eyebrows. “Uh, is that normal?”

“Yeah. She’ll probably call me tomorrow. We made a deal that she can’t go more than seven days without calling me or I won’t speak to her ever again and I’ll kick her out of the apartment.”

“So…she just disappears?”

“Pretty much,” Grayson said, leaning back against the door. “Last year, she rode all the way to Phoenix and stayed an entire month. Lost a job she had back then and everything, but she found one in Phoenix. Bartending at a dive.” Grayson laughed with an eye roll. “I had to call
everyone
she knows just to track her down. And when I called, she was talking to me like it was totally normal that she’d be in Arizona. For a month.” He sighed then pinned an inspective stare on Wes. “Is that for her?” he continued, motioning at
The Rum Diary
with his chin.

“Yeah…but I’ll give it to her myself.”

“You want me to tell her you’re looking for her when she calls?” Grayson said with a smile.

Wes’ jaw clenched.
Yes.
“No…it’s okay. We’ll just talk whenever she gets back.”

Grayson was quiet for a moment, doubt heavy in his gaze. “You sure, Wes?”

“Yup. Thanks, man.” He could feel Grayson’s eyes on his back as he descended the stairwell.

His house was alight with voices when he returned, and cars he recognized lined both sides of the street. Pausing on the stoop, Wes attempted to will the number one to appear on the text app on his cell phone, even if it was just to indicate a message of, “I’ll call you soon.” He was happy that his friends were at his house, but he was grouchy. He could blame it on Erin’s memorial if anyone inquired, but this was really about Lana not texting or calling him back, that she was somewhere unknown, not wanting to talk to him as much as he wanted to talk to her. He was actually distraught and feeling a little rejected by her absence.
Whatever. Just a fucked up day.

When Wes swung the front door open, his friends, all veteran day drinkers, greeted him with boisterous hellos and raises of their third round of drinks,
if
he divided the empty beer bottles equally. Thank goodness they’d rented a party bus tonight. It was his usual crew—Ribsy, Kai, Abel, Christian, Damon and Leko—and some other surfers he knew from around L.A. Within seconds, someone was shoving a bottle in his hand, and Wes was falling into a chair with a quarter of the beer gone before he hit the cushion. Liquid relief. Except his phone being in his back pocket was like dangling over a pit of crocodiles. He pulled it out and set it on the end table next to him, annoyance streaming through him when he met the blank screen. He took sporadic peeks over at it as they all drank, but he managed to insert strategic bursts of laughter to fake attention in response to Abel’s nonsensical story.
Seriously? She can’t turn her phone on? Return one fucking phone call or a text? One? Who the fuck does that? Wait. Me. All the time.