Blame It On the Beach

Chapter Twenty-five

"You guys ready to hit the beach?" my dad asks on Monday, when Quinn and I come downstairs holding our towels.

We nod, and when my mom appears we start the walk down to the beach.

"Are you guys planning on doing anything tonight?" my mom asks as we set our towels down on the sand and my dad sets up the umbrella.

"Milo and I were gonna go see a movie," I say, taking out my sunscreen.

"Alone?"

I exchange a glance with Quinn. "Uh, yes," I say, rubbing lotion onto my arms.

"Don't worry, Quinn," my mom says, winking at her. "We don't need her to have fun."

"I know, right?" Quinn responds. "You can go off with your boy-toy, Em. Nora and I will have a party of our own."

I roll my eyes at them as they laugh. "Why don't you just adopt her, Mom?"

My mom takes off her coverup. "I would, but I don't think Julie would allow it," she says, smiling.

Quinn chuckles. "Actually, my mom would probably thank you," she says. "She's got the crazy twins to worry about."

"What are Sam and Erin doing this summer?" I ask.

"They go to a day camp upstate," she says, spraying sunscreen over her legs. "They love it. They get to run around all day and do a bunch of activities. It's any 10 year old's dream."

"I miss them," I say, smiling when I think of Quinn's rambunctious but adorable siblings.

"I don't," Quinn says, but I know she's kidding; she's really close with them. 

My parents sit under the umbrella, my dad taking out the newspaper and my mom taking out a book. "Don't go in the sun yet!" My mom says, seeing us about to get up to go in the water. "The sunscreen hasn't taken effect yet."

"It's been, like, five minutes, Mom," I say. "That's enough time."

"Alright," she says, sighing, and Quinn and I jog to the water's edge.

"The waves aren't big for once," she says, grinning when she sees them.

"Should we just jump in? I'm pretty hot," I say, and she nods. We time it so that we're jumping straight into a small wave, and I'm instantly refreshed as the cool water surrounds me and pushes me back a little.

We stay close to shore, the water up to our chests, and I float on my back, looking up at the sky and the scene of the beach before me. I shut my eyes, feeling myself relaxing as the sun sinks into my skin.

"Wave alert-" I hear Quinn say, before a gust of water envelops me. I come up spluttering, coughing water out of my nose, and I hear Quinn chuckling. "Hey, I warned you," she says, seeing my glare as I fix my hair.

"I still can't believe you hooked up with Sawyer," Quinn says, as we swim out a little deeper.

"Me neither," I say, drawing patterns in the silky water.

"Isn't it funny that after all these years of wanting to get with him, when you finally did you liked someone else?"

"I guess," I say, my thoughts returning to Milo-- they're bound to, every few minutes.

"Hey, remember the deal we made the first day we came here?" Quinn says.

"Yeah, that I would get with Sawyer and you would get with Josh," I reply, thinking back to that first day, which feels like so long ago, even though the time here has gone by so quickly.