Darkheart

The Past: Guys & Dolls

To her credit, Ashley had known she and Heather weren't particularly the best of friends anymore, and she'd never pretend they were just so she could spend some time with a couple of beautiful foreign men. But Heather was as forgiving as she was practical, so when she'd called Ashley to ask her to accompany her and her brother to the beach that night, she'd made it clear they were okay. "Listen, Ash, I know we've had some arguments, but I've known you forever," she'd told her friend. "And I really want you to come, ok? I don't want to be alone. So can we just forget anything we've argued about and have some fun tonight? These guys are super hot--like, real men. And their accents . . . oh my God, you'll die!"

On her end of the line, Ashley had laughed. "All right, I'm sold! I'll be there."

After hanging up, Heather had plopped back onto her bed, smiled wildly at the ceiling, and squealed with delight, unable to believe her fortune.

Now, here she was, her brother in the driver's seat and her friend in the backseat and she riding shotgun, pulling into the public lot. It was overused, this beach; everyone in town came during the summer. There were other stretches of sand and stone amenable to lake swimming, but they were either property of the resort or a twenty-minute drive minimum. For visitors, the space presented an idyllic panorama of quaint summer fun with its pier and treat vendors and boat rentals, the marina within walking distance, and the charming impression that the land curving out past the resort was hugging the water. But to residents, the familiar territory was one they'd traversed since they were small children, getting sand in their sandwiches on summer picnics, bruising their knees (or having their first kisses) on the playground equipment, chasing seagulls out of the grassy sun-soaked expanses, attending local festivals and fundraisers around the barbeque pits and pavilions, climbing the trees near the lot and daring one another to dip into the ice cold water or else be pushed in. Bonfires and volleyball nets were often set up in the sand, and castles were decorated not with shells but with the pebbles and beach glass to which the sand quickly gave way.

Yes, to Heather, this place was as much a part of her as was her own backyard, and yet how exciting it felt tonight, anyway.

They climbed out of the car, Heather suddenly hyper-aware of how she looked. She'd put up her silky hair, worn her cutest swimsuit--a white two-piece with a cherry pattern--dabbed on a bit of sparkly liner and some glitter, and coyly unbuttoned her shirt over her suit. She knew she looked good. Heather didn't brag (she wasn't like that) but she also wasn't blind. She saw the other girls in her age bracket and knew she'd been blessed. There was nothing wrong with admiring herself, so long as she didn't get bitchy about it. The funny thing was that she hadn't always been so confident in her appearance. Throughout middle school, there'd been plenty of girls who'd developed before she had, and while she'd always liked her face--those aqua green eyes she'd been somehow gifted were unrivaled--the rest of her hadn't been much to look at until the summer between eighth and ninth grade, when she'd developed some curves. She was no Pamela Anderson, but she had enough to fill a B-cup, and with her flat tummy and long legs, Heather had gained a sudden pride in her appearance. She'd begun wearing things a little tighter, a little shorter, putting on a little more makeup, and though her mother had pushed back a bit at first, the woman had been too wrapped up planning her wedding to Danny's father to push too hard.

The first time she'd met Danny had been when her mother had invited him and his father for Thanksgiving, Heather's freshman year; she and her future brother had been awkward around each other at first, he a roly poly, grungy, disgruntled thirteen-year-old and she self-conscious about her new figure. But when they'd actually begun to talk to each other, Danny had made her laugh with his snarky comments about their parents' relationship, and the ice had broken. It'd been easy enough to get along with each other after that, when they'd seen each other only once in a while. But the closer their parents got, the more they'd been forced together, and as Danny had rocketed through puberty, grown into a taller, slimmer, handsomer version of the angry boy she'd first met, he'd begun to change. Their interactions had developed some sort of edge, as if a kind of barrier had risen between them. Danny had begun to make jokes at her expense, to say crude things about women, to even make some comments about Heather's mother.