The Last Best Kiss (22 page)

I explain about the music festival, how it’s on a fairground just a few miles away from the hotel. He shakes his head unhappily but thanks me for the information.

“They should have told us when we booked our room,” his wife says as the elevator door closes behind them.

“Well, that was a downer,” Eric says. “Our mere presence made them sad.”

“Eh, they’ll pop a bunch of sleeping pills and be fine,” Oscar says. “That’s what my parents would do, anyway.”

We head through the big French doors in the back of the lobby, which lead onto a series of outdoor pathways, one of which leads to the pool, and hot tub area. There are groups of people talking and laughing and calling out to one another, but once we get inside the pool gate, only two people are actually in the hot tub: a guy who’s sitting down and a girl in a bikini who’s straddling him. Their mouths are pressed together, and his hands are roaming around her back.

We hesitate, but then Phoebe shrugs. “It’s a public place,” she says, and barges ahead. The rest of us follow her and start taking off our bathrobes and flip-flops around the edge of the tub.

The girl becomes aware of us and slips sideways off of the guy’s lap. She whispers in his ear and he nods, and before we even get in, they climb out of the tub and walk away.

“What about Hil and Lily?” asks Phoebe as she and I dip our toes carefully in the water to see how hot it is. Not as hot as I’d like, but hot enough. “Where are they?”

“It takes them longer to go up and come down,” Oscar points out. “All those extra flights.”

“One of the downsides to having a penthouse suite,” I say. “Extra elevator time.”

“All that canned music,” he says. “It’s just miserable.”

Eric wades right into the tub and makes a braying sound as the hot water hits his chest. “Nice. Can someone turn on the jets? I forgot.”

“No, don’t,” Oscar says, following him down the steps and settling on the bench. “I find them overstimulating.”

“Seriously?” I say. “You delicate hothouse flower, you.”

“I can’t help it if I have hypersensitive sensory-input issues,” Oscar says. I don’t think he’s entirely joking.

“I like the jets,” Finn says, stripping off his tee and joining the two guys in the water. “That’s two for, one against.”

Phoebe says, “I don’t like them. It’s nicer when it’s quiet.”

Finn looks at me. “Deciding vote,” he says. “Looks like you have to have an opinion of your own for once, Anna.”

I stare at him. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

“Yeah,” Phoebe says. “Anna’s as opinionated as any of us.”

“Well, not as opinionated as
you
,” Oscar says to her. “But she’s right in there with me and Eric.”

“All right, then,” Finn says, and crosses his arms over his chest. “Jets or no jets?”

I don’t actually care, but I pick no jets because he voted for them, and he just implied—not for the first time, not even for the first time this
evening
—that I care too much about what other people think. Also? He’s made me sad tonight. Even if our conversation was supposedly just clearing the air and all that . . . I feel a little bit broken at the moment.

So I say, “No jets.”

Ha. Showed
him
.

Oscar pumps his fist in triumph. “She loves me the most.” Not exactly the message I was going for, but I’m okay with it.

“Or me,” Phoebe says. She steps down into the tub and immediately snuggles into a spot next to Eric.

“Keep your hands where we can see them,” Oscar tells them.

“Does the sight of other people’s affection make you uncomfortable?” Phoebe asks sweetly. “Maybe you should see a therapist about that.”

“Trust me, I have.”

I pause on the second step of the hot tub to let my legs adjust to the heat and realize Finn is watching me. It’s too dark for me to see his expression. His eyes glitter a little in the dark, but he looks away the second I glance at him. I’m suddenly self-conscious about being in a bikini: I’m so much curvier than thin, athletic Phoebe, who’s the only other girl out here now. I quickly sit down on the bench between Oscar and the steps, gasping as I sink into the hot water.

“Oh, good,” Finn says, looking past the rest of us. “Here they are.”

I turn. Hilary is striding toward us. She’s wearing a bikini and a sari kind of thing that ties at her waist. Lily is following more slowly. She’s still wearing her leather corset, but she’s changed back into jeans. She’s also barefoot.

“I couldn’t get her to put on her bathing suit,” Hilary says when she reaches the tub. “I tried, but she’s being weird.”

“She’s really stoned,” I say, but Hilary instantly shushes me.

“I can’t hear that,” she says. “Seriously. If Dad starts asking questions, at this point I can honestly say that as far as I know, Lily hasn’t done anything illegal tonight.”

“Like he’d even care,” says Lily, coming up behind her. “Did you see that blond he was talking to at dinner? Bet he brings her back to the room tonight.”

“Shut up,” Hilary says with real anger. No, not just anger—panic. “Just shut up, Lily.”

“They’re our friends,” Lily says, waving her hand around the hot tub. “We can be honest in front of them. Our dad cheats on our mom,” she tell us all.

Hilary grabs her shoulder and swings her around so they’re nose to nose. “Shut the fuck up.”

“Fine, fine.” Lily suddenly kisses Hilary on the cheek. “Whatever you want, babe. I love you.”

Hilary shoves her away. “God, I can’t wait until she comes down.”

“I thought you didn’t even know she was high,” Oscar says.

“You can shut up too.” With an almost violent jerk, Hilary undoes the knot at her waist and tosses the fabric onto a lounge chair. She plunges into the tub. I look at her with sympathy. Tonight hasn’t been any more fun for her than it has for me.

“Aren’t you coming in?” Finn calls over to Lily, who’s still standing on the deck. “This whole thing was your idea.”

“Mm-hmm,” she says noncommittally.

“Go back to your room and put on a bathing suit.”

“I don’t think she should wander around the hotel by herself,” I tell Finn quietly. “Someone should go with her.”

He nods. “Yeah.” He stands up in the center of the hot tub. Water streams off his shoulders. They’re so much broader than they used to be. Much good it does me now. But I still look. I can’t seem to stop. His torso narrows down to a waist so slender that his board shorts sit low on his hips and you can see the bones jutting out above them. “I’ll go up with you. Keep you company.”

Lily wags her finger at him. “You’d like that, wouldn’t you? Get me all alone up there? Help me take off my clothes?”

Phoebe snickers. Finn crosses his arms and glares at Lily. “Do you want to put on a bathing suit or not?”

“Nah. Too much work.” She suddenly plunges into the hot tub.

“Your jeans are going to be soaked!” Hilary says, horrified.

“I’m really worried about that.” She ducks down, so her head is completely underwater. She stands up quickly with a yelp and wipes her hair out of her eyes. “Man, that’s hot!”

“What the hell’s wrong with you?” her sister hisses. “You just ruined that top—and it cost a fortune.”

“It’s not ruined.”

“It’s leather,” Hilary says. “It’s
ruined
.”

Lily shakes her head like a dog, spraying us all. “Who cares?” she says. “Who cares about anything? Just relax for once, Hil. Or don’t. Doesn’t matter to me.” She turns to Finn and throws herself against him.

“Ugh,” he says, peeling off her arms and moving away from her. “Wet leather.”

She looks around the tub. Phoebe and Eric are cuddling together with Phoebe’s head on his shoulder. Lily suddenly sends a big splash of water right at them. It hits Phoebe in the eyes, and she springs upright.

“Oh my god, Lily! Why are you being so annoying!”

“Why are
you
?”

“What have
I
done?”

“Look at yourself,” says Lily. “Just look at yourself.” She giggles.

“I’m going back to the room,” Phoebe says, rising to her feet and tugging Eric up. “This stopped being fun.” They wade out of the hot tub. “Oh, great—no towels,” she spits out angrily. She drags on her terrycloth bathrobe and uses its belt to wipe off Eric a little before he puts on his T-shirt, and then they head back into the hotel.

“Nicely done,” Hilary says to her sister. “Really. You’re charming tonight.”

Lily sends another splash her way, then puts both her hands in the water and starts churning it up. “It’s a whirlpool!” she cries.

“I think Phoebe had the right idea.” Oscar glides onto his feet. “Who wants to ride up in the elevator with me? We can press all the buttons before we get out.”

“I do, I do.” I follow him out of the tub.

“Let’s all go up,” Finn says. He rises and holds out his hand to Lily. “Come on. This didn’t turn out to be as relaxing as we’d all hoped.”

Lily lets him pull her up. Her clothing is so waterlogged that she has to struggle her way out of the tub. “I want to swim in the pool first,” she says as the water pours off of her. “A quick dip.”

“You can’t swim in those clothes,” Finn says. “They’re too heavy.”

“People jump in pools in their clothes all the time. Haven’t you ever seen a teen movie? You go to a party, you jump in a pool. Or get pushed in. Hil, you want to come with me?”

“You’ve got to be kidding,” Hilary says. She has the hot tub all to herself now. She leans her head back and closes her eyes. “It’s freezing out. I’m going to soak for five more minutes and then go to bed.”

“One quick dive and one lap,” Lily says to Finn. Her wet jeans stick to every curve of her narrow legs. She looks unearthly with her wet black hair, smudged dark makeup, and the sagging leather corset, like some sort of bedraggled modern-day witch. She turns toward the pool.

Finn grabs at her arm. “Don’t,” he says. He’s shivering in the cold air, still wearing only his wet board shorts. He has his T-shirt in his hand, but he’s too busy dealing with Lily to put it on. I wrap my bathrobe around myself and wait for Oscar to finish drying himself off with the towel he (and he alone) had the foresight to bring down from the boys’ room.

Lily breaks away from Finn. “I’ll be fast,” she says, and trots toward the pool. “Watch me—I’m going to dive.”

“The sign says not to.” Finn points to a poster on the side of a wall. “Seriously, Lily—it’s really shallow.”

“Who cares?” she says, right before leaping up at the edge and—as Finn shouts at her with rising panic—curving forward in a swift and messy swan dive. She disappears under the water as Finn shouts again. He races over, still calling her name, and Oscar and I are right behind him. We all crouch at the edge of the pool, staring down, trying to see where she is, because she’s taking too long to reappear. It’s Lily, so she’s probably teasing us. She’s probably holding her breath and will pop up in a second, laughing at us.

Only she doesn’t.

We’re all shouting her name now, and I don’t care if she comes up laughing at us for being worried, I just want her to
come up
, and then there’s movement in the water and a flash of something dark above the water, some part of her—but it’s not her head or her face—and Finn slides in feetfirst—and we can see how shallow the pool is now, because his feet touch and he’s standing with the water around his waist and that’s bad, very bad—she dove in, and it’s that shallow—and he’s dragging her up by what turns out to be her arm, and then he’s got her shoulders and he’s struggling to get her out of the water. She’s not helping him—she’s not moving at all—she’s deadweight, her head flopping back—and Oscar and I are trying to help, catching at whatever part of her we can, the two of us pulling and hauling as Finn pushes her up toward us, until we’ve got her completely out of the pool. Even with three of us, it’s a struggle. Her wet clothes are so heavy, and she’s so floppy.

Oscar and I roll her onto her back, but her eyes aren’t open—she’s not responding at all. Finn hauls himself out of the pool and kneels down next to us.

I keep waiting for her to look up and smile and tell us she’s joking, and I’m going to be so mad at her when she does because I’m scared right now. Really scared. And she shouldn’t make me feel this scared.

I feel someone at my shoulder and look up. Hilary’s standing over me, dripping water. She’s saying “Is she okay?” over and over again.

I look back down at Lily again. There’s a trickle of water coming out of the corner of her mouth and that scares me so much I want to start screaming and never stop, but the other part knows I can’t do that and is thinking about what we should do because we have to do something. I manage to say, “Who’s got a phone?” and I’m surprised at how normal my voice sounds because I feel like I should be shrieking. No one does. “Run inside and get them to call 911,” I tell Hilary. I have to repeat the direction, but it sinks in and she dashes—still in her bikini and soaking wet—toward the lobby doors.

“What do we do?” Oscar’s voice is so hoarse, I can barely make out what he’s saying.

“I think we should turn her on her side,” I say. “If she swallowed water, it’s better for her to be on her side.” I took a junior lifeguarding class a million years ago. That one bit of information seems to be the only thing I remember from it.

“She’s breathing, right?” Finn is looking at me like I should know.

Actually, though, I do—I can see her chest moving. “Yeah, I think so.” As we carefully turn her on her side, I can see streaks of something darker in the bleached strands at the bottom of her hair. I touch them and look at my fingers. “Her head’s bleeding,” I say.

Oscar makes a choking, gasping sound.

“I told her not to dive,” Finn says. “I should have held on to her. If I hadn’t let go—”

“It’s not your fault,” I say. “She pulled away.”

Hilary’s back at the pool gate. She opens it and runs across the courtyard toward us, followed by a pudgy middle-aged man in a suit and tie.

“The ambulance is on its way,” he says as they get to us. He’s panting from the short run. Or maybe from panic. “Is she breathing?”

“I think so,” I say. “But she hasn’t opened her eyes.”