Thirty Sunsets (9 page)

“It’s okay,” I tell her, the moonlight seeping through the window like a gauzy warm blanket. “What’s it like to be sick all the time?”

Olivia laughs ruefully. “My doctor says pregnancy isn’t a state of sickness, it’s a state of health. I think he’s in a state of denial.”

I smile. Olivia had a reputation in high school as a total airhead, and, granted, I don’t think she’ll be delving into quantum physics anytime soon, but she’s brighter than I gave her credit for.

“Seriously,” I say. “Doesn’t it get you down having to sprint to the bathroom twenty times a day?”

Olivia pauses, then replies, “I don’t mind. It’s a reminder that even though he’s the size of a jelly bean now, he’s right here, safe and sound.”

My brow furrows. “You already know it’s a boy?”

“No,” Olivia says sleepily. “It’s way too early for that. But it feels like a boy to me … I guess because he seems so much like Brian.”

“So Brian makes you barf twenty times a day?”

Olivia laughs again. “Well, indirectly, yes.” She sighs. “I just love my baby so much. I guess that’s why he seems like Brian.”

I knit my fingers together. Yes, I’m getting used to the fact that she’s pregnant, but I’m not getting used to this sense of inevitability. As in
Duh, of course Brian and Olivia are going to have a baby. Of course they’ll be a family. Of course Brian’s future is set in stone.

I’m thinking we’re in an all-of-our-options-are-still-on-the-table kind of phase. Not that I get a vote, of course, and not that I even know what that means. I can’t think too hard about the specifics: how I feel about abortion in general, how I’d feel about my own niece or nephew being aborted, how I’d feel about my niece or nephew being somewhere out in the world with a different family …

I shudder.

Okay,
now
I’m thinking about it. And it sucks.

But still … Brian being body-slammed into a precarious-at-best future at the age of eighteen? That makes me shudder too. Then again, Brian sure isn’t
acting
like he’s being body-slammed. He’s acting like he’s voluntarily thrown himself at Olivia’s feet, and there’s nowhere he’d rather be.

“Speaking of being down … ” Olivia says hesitantly, and my brain does a quick replay for a reference point.

“What?” I prod her.

“You’ve seemed … down lately.”

I swallow. I’ve been trying really hard the past few days to cut the crap with Olivia. Really, I have. Yes, the pregnancy revelation totally freaked me out at first, but hey, it is what it is, and whatever the future holds, Olivia and I are bonded for life at this point. I mean, she’s carrying my DNA around in her uterus. Even if that disappears tomorrow—through whatever mechanism it might disappear, which I’m now consciously willing myself not to think about—we’re connected now in a cosmic kind of way. I don’t know how I feel about that. I just know I feel it.

And frankly, the pregnancy makes her interactions with Brian considerably less puke-inducing than before. They’re not a couple of lovestruck kids anymore contemplating the intricacies of fruit-free McDonald’s parfaits. They’re parents. God, that’s hard to absorb.

Plus the fact that she notices way more than I ever gave her credit for. All those curled lips and narrowed eyes in high school? Maybe I was misinterpreting. Maybe she was trying to figure me out rather than judging me.

And who’d have thought she would notice the funk I’ve been in for the four days that have passed since Sunset Number One, which,
gasp
, shockingly turned out to be Sunset Number Finito?

My fingers are still looping in and out of knots. I take a deep breath. “I met a guy.”

Pause.

“Really?”

I shake my head, grateful Olivia can’t see me blush. “It’s nothing.
Truly
nothing. It’s so stupid. I just … I met this guy on the beach our first night here. We took a walk together. He kinda … indicated I’d be seeing more of him. And the crazy thing is, I really wanted to. Then I saw him on the beach the next day and he blew me off.”

The sound of the surf lapping onto the shore sounds like a heartbeat.

“Oh,” Olivia says.

Why did I tell her this? Was I concerned that she still wasn’t quite clear on my status as a loser? Stupid, stupid, stupid.

“Hey, if he’s not into you,” Olivia says, aiming for breezy but conveying a mortifying hint of pity, “then who needs him. Move on.”

“Right … ”

“I mean it, Forrest. You’re amazing. You’re smart, and you’re gorgeous, you’re … ”

Oh god, please make this stop.

“ … drop-dead beautiful,” Olivia continues, and my nails are piercing my palms so hard, they just might be drawing blood. “And you can do
sooooo
much better than some jerk who blows you off a day after—”

She stops abruptly, the wheels in her brain clearly spinning.

“A day after
nothing
,” I assure her. “We didn’t even kiss. It was just a stupid walk on the beach. I can’t believe I’m making a deal about it. I can’t believe I’m
talking
about it.”

Maybe I can convince her in the morning that this conversation was just a dream. Maybe I can hitchhike to Mexico and start a new, humiliation-free life.

“I’m glad you told me,” Olivia says, and hey, that makes one of us.

“I mean it,” she says. “I never had anybody to talk to about this kind of thing.”

I bend over the side of the bunk to look her in the eye. “
What
kind of thing? Guys have never done anything but worship the ground you walk on.”

Olivia shakes her head. “Do you really believe that?”

“
Hello
, I’ve witnessed it,” I say, then hop off my bunk and sit on the edge of her bed.

I sit there for a moment, then hear her sniffle.

“Olivia?”

She dabs her eyes.

“Olivia? Are you crying?”

She shakes her head roughly. “It’s nothing, just hormones … ”

“No way. Something’s wrong. What is it?”

She sniffles some more. “I just … it’s just nice to have somebody to talk to.”

I pull a lock of hair behind my ear. “You have Brian.”

She nods quickly. “I know, I know. He’s great. But I mean a girl. I’ve never really had girlfriends.”

My eyebrows knit together. “What about Casey and the other cheerleaders?”

Olivia shrugs. “They’re not real friends. They’re catty bitches, to be honest … a few of them, anyway. They hung around me because we were on the squad together, but everything was so competitive. They were always making little digs to knock me off balance. Maybe because my mom’s not in the picture? I dunno … I’ve never been able to figure out why girls are always weird around me. Your friend, Shelley: that’s a
real
friend. Good friends build you up, not knock you down.”

I press in my lips. “It really pissed me off when you and Casey were dissing Shelley at the graduation party.”

Olivia’s eyes widen. “It was Casey, not me!”

I stare at her evenly, and she blushes.

“You’re right,” she says. “I should’ve spoken up. The way you stood up for Shelley? That was … incredible. I thought to myself that very instant,
That’s the difference between Forrest and me
.”

I bite my lower lip. “I don’t always stick up for people.” I feel a stab in my stomach, thinking of the times I’ve either halfheartedly defended Olivia or snarkily dissed her myself.

She smiles. “I just envy that you have friends,” she says. “And your mom.”

My eyes narrow. “You’ve got a mom too. I met her, remember? At the football game? I thought she was your sister?”

I feel a pinch in my chest as I remember their laughter as I walked away, incredulous about what an idiot I was.

“She loved that,” Olivia says in a small, tight voice. “She’s probably told that story a million times: ‘Olivia’s friend thought I was her sister!’ ” Her face crinkles again.

“Isn’t that a good thing?” I say consolingly, not sure if I should touch her or not. “I mean, isn’t it cute that your mother is so gorgeous, people think you’re sisters?”

More sniffles. I reach over to the dresser, pluck a tissue from the box, and hand it to Olivia.

“I wouldn’t mind people thinking I had a sister if I had a mother,” she says bitterly.

“But … you were laughing too. I remember.”

Olivia’s dewy eyes stare into space, a mixture of contempt and despair. “I want a
real
mom. Not some beauty queen who breezes into town a few times a year to try to outshine me.”

Now I
do
touch her … tentatively at first, resting my hand on her arm, then squeezing gently. “Does she know you’re pregnant?”

Olivia nods, still staring into space. “It just gives her more ammunition to tear into my dad. He’s a moron, how could he let this happen, she saw it coming a mile away, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. Oh, and the baby’s supposed to call her Aunt Olivia. She doesn’t want anybody knowing she’s a grandmother.”

The waves are still pumping their gentle heartbeat.

“Your mom’s name is Olivia too?”

Her eyes narrow. “I hate it. I hate my stupid name.” Then her gaze suddenly softens. “I’ve tried to get Brian to call me something different. I know it sounds stupid, but something like Liv—some people call me that—or even my initials, OJ … ”

“Yeah,
that’s
not gonna work,” I wisecrack, and Olivia giggles.

“It doesn’t matter,” she says. “Brian says nothing sticks, and besides, he loves my name and he wants me to love it too. He says you have to love all of yourself, even the things you hate, before you can really open your heart to someone else.”

I wrinkle my nose. “I think he read that on a Hallmark card,” I tease, and I’m relieved when Olivia laughs.

“But he’s right,” she says wistfully. “If I hate my mom, or my name, or my thighs, or whatever … that just sucks up energy that I should be using to love my life, to love the people in my life. Like my baby.”

“Deep,” I say, and I actually really mean it. How ridiculous does my guy-on-the-beach story sound now?

Olivia peers at me and says, “I’m sorry that guy on the beach hurt your feelings.”

OMG. My skin actually tingles as I wonder if she just somehow read my mind.

“I’m thinking we should go bikini shopping and make him eat his heart out,” she continues.

I shrug. “Embarrassingly enough, I actually sorta tried that. The day I borrowed your bikini? Didn’t work. Besides, I’m more of a Speedo kind of girl.”

But Olivia looks determined. “Bikini shopping. Tomorrow.”

Whatever expression I have on my face makes her press harder. “Trust me,” she says. “This is my area.”

“I’m well aware that fabulosity is your area,” I say, and again, I’m relieved when she laughs.

“You know what pisses me off the most?” I say. “I feel like he stole the beach from me. I haven’t even been able to walk on the friggin’ beach for fear of running into him.”

“Oh, you’ll do more than
walk
on the beach,” Olivia says. “You’re gonna
strut
on the beach. You’re gonna
own
the friggin’ beach.”

Now she’s making
me
laugh.

And as improbable as it seems, I’m thinking: Sure. Why not. What the hell.

Yes.

What the hell.

fourteen

“But I made pancakes!”

I glance at Olivia, who’s turning gray just from the very mention of the word.

“Sorry, Mom,” I respond, “but we want to get an early start.”

Mom puts her fork on her plate, peering at me incredulously. “An early start on shopping?
You
?”

“Wacky, huh?” I say, sticking my head in the refrigerator. “Liv, want a cola for the road?”

“Cola!” Mom moans. “You girls need some food!”

“What are you shopping for?” Brian asks, setting his own fork aside.

Olivia shrugs as I hand her a Coke. “Just stuff.”

She and I giggle, at which point a veritable flurry of alarmed glances unfolds at the breakfast table. I’m not sure what has them more flummoxed: my sudden BFF status with Liv (hey, she said she prefers it) or my newfound penchant for shopping.

“What kind of stuff?” Dad asks.

“Uzis, ammo, that kind of thing,” I say, popping the lid of my can.

Olivia laughs some more. “She’s kidding,” she tells Brian. “We’re buying bathing suits.”

“
More
bathing suits?” Mom says, and it’s obvious she’s referring to Olivia’s stash, not mine.