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Authors: J.C. Isabella

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BOOK: Saving Summer
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“Newsflash, they already know.” Celso tied the full bag off and opened another. “You’re just too distracted by boobies to notice.”

“At least I get to see boobies,” Damian growled at his twin. “You have to pretend like my friends are your friends.”

“Boobies? You sound like a pair of kids.” I glanced between my brothers, wondering who would throw the first punch, and if I’d survive breaking them apart. “Come on guys, let’s not do this. You’re both hung over and need sleep.”

“He started it.” Celso nearly ripped a hole in the new bag with the amount of force he used to shove in more trash. “But dumbass doesn’t seem to comprehend that we have the same friends, and most of the time, they can’t tell us apart! And why is that? Oh yeah, because they’re idiots!”

Damian frowned. “We look nothing alike.”

My brothers weren’t identical, exactly. They looked scary alike, but Damian had darker hair, and was a little shorter than Celso. So it wasn’t rocket science once you got to know them.

“Let’s just clean this up, then we can eat something.” I shook my head and went back to fishing shit out of the pool. I didn’t want to look in the hot tub. No telling what I’d find.

 

Two hours later the backyard looked almost normal. The smell was special. Like a mix of piss and beer. I hosed down the deck while eating a slice of cold pizza. Damian had passed out on the couch, and Celso was off tromping around the island in self-reflection or meditation. Whatever it was he did helped chill him out.He knew how to keep his temper in check with a little work. Damian hadn’t mastered the art of taking a step back. He hit first, and asked questions later.

Thankfully, I wasn’t blessed with the Cortez temper. I really didn’t need to pass out or go for a walk to chill. I was just cool. Stuff really didn’t bother me that much…unless it involved crazy parties and girls that should know better than to get involved with them.

I pulled a shirt on, and walked barefoot across the island to the big gray house with a wide wraparound porch. The paint was peeling, and some of the steps creaked dangerously when you walked up to the door. But I didn’t have to go that far.

“Hey, Summer.” I tried not to laugh. She wasn’t kidding about trying to knit. She was seated on a stool tangled in yarn, looking like she wanted to scream. “How’s the blanket coming?”

“Hah hah,” she grumbled, blowing a hunk of rich brown hair that had fallen in her face.

I walked up the steps and crossed my arms over my chest as I leaned against the railing. I wasn’t sure what brought me here, but Summer was the only other person on the island who would be just as bored as me. I knew I didn’t want to spend the day with my brothers. And my friends, Sam and Ryan, were driving up north for a comic book convention. I didn’t read comic books, and decided not to go. Something I deeply regret now. At least I could have gotten off the island for a week.

“Actually, I…uh, I was wondering if you wanted … to do something?” Smooth. Really smooth. Why not just start stuttering and run away like I used to? But, I wasn’t a kid anymore. I’d asked girls out before, but none of them had ever been as pretty as Summer. None of them said yes either, not when they were so into my brothers. They were hard to compete with. Suddenly I felt like I’d lost my nerve.

Man up, Gael.

I can do this.

I can do this.

“Not like a date,” I wanted to kick myself. Thank God Damian and Celso weren’t here to witness my massive fail. They’d never let me forget it. “I mean, you’re bored, I’m bored…”

She stood from the stool, let the yarn fall to the porch and gave me a smile that I wasn’t sure was for real. It was beaming. A perfection of pink lips and shiny perfect teeth. “Really? I was hoping we could hang out or something.”

“Yeah, I got a boat. We could get off Half Mile for the day.”

“Lou?” Summer shouted. “I’m going out with Gael!”

Lou poked her head out of the screened door leading into the house and her wrinkled face cracked in a wary smile. “It’s a Cortez!”

I nodded, “Hey, Lou. How are you?”

“I’m great,” she grinned and came onto the porch, leaning on a carved wood cane. “Where are you taking Summer?”

“Honestly, I’m not sure. I just figured we could go into town or walk around the tourist traps for a while.”

“I’ll be right back. I just want to change and grab my bag.” Summer ran into the house. I heard her banging around, and while she was gone, Lou hobbled closer.

I took a small step back.

“I got rules, Gael.” The old woman nodded, chewing her wrinkled bottom lip. “Summer is home before eleven. Don’t do anything illegal. And if she winds up pregnant, I’ve got a meat cleaver and a shovel.
Comprende amigo
?”

I wasn’t scared of her, but the threat came so unexpectedly, I nodded and gulped. “Yeah, yeah. I got it. I won’t let anything happen to Summer. I swear.”

She nodded and grinned. “I know. I’d be stopping her from going anywhere if it wasn’t you here. If it was Damian, I’d change the locks and barricade the doors.”

My brother had a glistening reputation. That was for damn sure.

“Ready!” Summer bounded out of the house, having changed completely. She was wearing a white sundress, sandals, and a blue straw purse was slung over her shoulder. She slid on a pair of white sunglasses, and I had to wonder how I got lucky enough to get stuck on an island with her.

“So, you have a bathing suit?” I asked, thinking we could head out to a sandbar too. Maybe she liked collecting shells. Maybe I could talk her into fishing. Maybe I was just happy to have her company, and it wouldn’t matter what we did.

She nodded, “Under my dress. I also have sunscreen and granola bars and water.”

“That’s kind of hot.” Damn, I had to use the word hot. I was just getting to know this girl.

“What?” she asked as we wound our way around the island.

“That you’re prepared. Sometimes it irritates me when people don’t think.”

She giggled, and I helped her down the dock where my boat was tied up. It wasn’t Athena. And it wasn’t Lady Luck. Nope, my boat was called…

“Wilbur?” Summer eyed the boat a little uneasily. “What’s keeping it afloat?”

“It just needs a new paint job. She’s perfectly safe and seaworthy.” I gave her a hand inside and tossed her the keys. She started the engine while I untied us from the dock.

I motored Wilbur slowly away from the island, watching Summer lean over the side to trail her fingers in the glassy water.

“Look, ten o’clock,”

She glanced at where I was pointing and smiled at the dolphin catching a fish. “He’s huge!”

“Yep, nice and fat from tourist handouts. That’s Elvis. He does a little dance for treats if you get close enough.” If I had some fish I’d just caught, I would have taken her closer to see his trick. It wasn’t right to feed dolphins, to make them dependent on humans, but Elvis was a special case. He seemed to still be able to take care of himself, and sneak a few treats from the locals. He was the only one I ever fed.

“Where are we headed, Captain?” Summer stood beside me at the helm, pretending to look at something through the binoculars I had sitting behind the wheel.

“To find treasure.” I turned the boat in the direction of a small sandbar. “Thar she be!”

Summer gave a little hop, “Aye matey… Thar what be? I don’t see any treasure.”

“You have to dig it up, silly.” I let the boat run aground on the island and killed the engine. Summer followed me out of the boat.

“One…two…three…four…” I pretended to count fifty paces around, until she was following me in circles.

“What are we doing?” She laughed, screaming at me to stop.

“Twenty seven…twenty eight…what comes after twenty nine again?”

“Gael!” she sat in the sand and watched me, tears in her eyes from laughing so hard. “What are we doing?”

“Looking for treasure.” I kept a straight face, knowing there was really nothing on the island…nothing much.

“I give up,” she sighed. “You win. Game over.”

I crouched down and started to dig with my hands. Summer crawled over and eyed me, like she wasn’t buying my act. But it wasn’t an act. She joined in, and we dug down at least a foot before we hit a wooden box.

“Holy crap!” She sat back on her heels and stared at me. “I thought you were kidding.”

I laughed. “It’s not actual treasure.”

I tugged the box out of the sand and eyed the small bike lock on the front. I didn’t have the key. One of my brothers had taken it and lost it. But a rock was just as good. I found a decent sized one and began hitting the lock. It snapped, and I opened it to reveal…

“Dirty magazines?” she slapped my arm. “That’s terrible!”

I eyed the glossy covers and frowned. “Nope, these must have been added by one of my brothers. This is the Cortez Treasure Box. We’ve had it since we were old enough to drive Wilbur.”

I dug deeper and found a few other new things. A box of cigars. Two hundred in cash. And…”Here they are.”

“Fireworks?” Summer laughed. “We went through all of this for fireworks?”

“Not just any fireworks. These are banned. The big bad boys that no one is supposed to have. People have burned down forests and houses with these babies. I was thinking we’d set them off once it got dark.”

“What if we burn something down?”

I gestured around us. “We’re on a little patch of sand, surrounded by water. The only thing that will burn down, if they get out of control, are a few palm trees and some tropical flowers.”

She laughed. “Well, I guess we’re going to have a really explosive time tonight.”

I put everything back in the box and piled the sand on top of it. Then we headed for the boat, with our loot carefully hidden in a towel I’d brought with us.

Chapter 5
Summer

“I’m guessing after you live here for so long things aren’t as much fun as they used to be.” I took a bite of my Key Lime Pie on a stick that had been dipped in chocolate and frozen like a giant popsicle and hummed with delight. Gael sat beside me on a bench as we watched boats sail in and out of the small harbor.

“It’s still fun, but not as much fun. Being on vacation all the time, makes me want to go to the city and live in a high-rise and take a taxi instead of walking everywhere. That would be a fun vacation.” He smirked, wiping a streak of chocolate off his mouth. “But, I guess I grew up lucky. I never had to feel smothered by tons of traffic, or wish I could see the ocean.”

“I have the best of both back home. I live in Charlotte, but it doesn’t keep you from seeing anything green or pretty, and we can drive to the ocean. It’s got a lot of things I like, but it’s not Half Mile Isle.”

“Yeah, Half Mile is something that I’ll remember forever.”

I finished my pie pop and tossed my trash in the garbage. Gulls called angrily overhead, eyeing me as if I’d offended them. I wasn’t about to share food. I’d get pooped on or dive-bombed, and that was bound to piss off anyone else standing around me.

“So we did the pirate museum and the aquarium…” I glanced at Gael sideways, wondering what his next idea would be. So far, he’d dragged me around, guessing things I’d like to do. He’d been spot on…though I wasn’t really into the pirate stuff, it had been fun.

“I was thinking we get out of the heat…see a movie or something?” he seemed to want my input here.

I shrugged. “That sounds good. But where do you normally hang out? What do the locals do?”

He frowned. “Well, most of the time I’m in the shed, or at Sam’s house in the converted attic with him and Ryan. There isn’t a lot to do here, in my opinion.”

“But where do the local people our age go? I mean, you don’t have a mall. So is there like a bookstore or café?”

“Actually, we could go to Molly’s. It’s a coffee shop with music. People I go to school with hang out there.”

“I’m guessing you don’t go a lot.”

He shrugged. “Yeah, the really popular people go there. Like Damian and Celso.”

“And you’re not popular?” I found that a little hard to believe.

“Well, I’m the smart guy. I have the highest grade in my class and was chess champion for two years in a row. I don’t really get a lot of attention from the popular crowd.”

I honestly couldn’t see why he wasn’t just as popular as his brothers. He had an amazing smile, and a head full of rich brown hair. He was cuter than his brothers, especially when he wore glasses. He wasn’t wearing them today, and I suspected he had in contacts.

It was hard for me to understand why Gael wasn’t more popular, but with older brothers like Celso and Damian, I could see that it was hard to find your place in the social circle at school. I had the same trouble with my older sister. It was hard coming up behind someone everyone loved, and then feeling like you fall flat a little bit and disappoint. Sometimes I wondered if my parents felt the same way. I knew they loved me, but I felt the pressure growing up, trying to be like her but never quite making it, and then realizing that I didn’t want to be like my sister. I was perfectly happy being me.

“Wow, so this is where the locals go?” I asked as we walked into Molly’s.

Gael got us a table by the window, watching people walk up and down the sidewalk. It was in a more residential part of town. Less filled with tourists. The inside wasn’t much. Just some blank white walls with posters of old bands, pictures of coffee in black and white, and pictures of the people who worked at the shop.

Gael went to the counter and got our creamy blended coffees, leaving me to survey the people inside. There weren’t many people. Just an older couple in a corner reading a travel guide, and a girl around my age with her laptop seated on a couch near the door. She was tiny. Thin. Her blonde hair was so pale and fair, that it almost looked white when the sun hit it.

“That’s Violet. We go to school together.” Gael waved to her, and the girl blinked at us for a second. She smiled slowly, and left her seat to join us. She was a lot shorter than I was. I had to wonder if she even hit the five foot mark. “Hey, this is Summer. She lives on Half Mile with Lou.”

Violet took the seat across from me after shaking my hand. “Hi, it’s nice to meet you.”

BOOK: Saving Summer
10.38Mb size Format: txt, pdf, ePub
ads

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