Ritz Carlton. I’ll meet you in the lobby.
Chapter 23
California
The day Beau and I went to Santa Monica for the Segway tour, I had more or less made peace with the fact that I was going to fall off a scooter and die. But I kept reminding myself that my life was already in shambles.
Things can’t exactly get worse.
As we signed away the rental company’s liability for “life-altering injuries,” though, I gave Beau a sidelong look. “I don’t think my new personality includes a traumatic brain injury if I get to choose.”
He looked handsome in aviators and a linen shirt as he handed me a helmet that appeared to be child size. “In that case, make sure to wear your safety gear.”
When I told Gemma that Beau and I were going out, she screamed into the phone.
“It’s not a date,” I said. “It’s a side quest.”
“If that’s what makes you feel better,” she said with a laugh.
The man who showed us how to use the Segways kept saying we’d “glide” once we got the hang of it. Like we might actually take flight, instead of wobble past a juice bar on two wheels.
My incredulity must have been showing, because Beau, with a playful smirk tugging on his lips, leaned in and whispered, “Are you ready toglide?”
“Emotionally? Never,” I said. But the heat of his whisperedbreath lingered on my ear, and it was doing twisty things to my stomach.
On second thought. Let’s glide.
The sunset painted the sky in shades of pink and red as we cruised along Ocean Avenue. The Santa Monica Pier streamed below us in a blur of lights, pulsing soft and fast as carnival music drifted through the air. At one point, I nearly clipped a guy who was skateboarding down the street with a giant pole like some kind of landlocked gondolier. When I made a face and swerved to avoid hitting a palm tree, Beau laughed—a full, unrestrained laugh.
That was new.
And it made me want to hear it again.
Luckily, Beau had scheduled a lineup of questionable experiences for the next few days. He was still calling them side quests. And on Monday, we tried a trampoline workout at a strip mall in Venice, where I discovered muscles I didn’t know I had and made Beau laugh with a string of “tramp” puns. Tuesday was drawing class, where I leaned in earnestly—careful with every stroke of my pencil—and attempted to render a bowl of fruit, and Beau drew a perfectly chiseled seagull with abs. By Wednesday, we had moved on to sushi making, where I was politely banned from using the blowtorch.
It didn’t exactly feel like rediscovering myself, but it didn’t feel like rotting on the sofa in my apartment either. We didn’t talk about Redwood or my job. We just kept finding little hits of humor in the absurdity of each new adventure. Beau had a way of approaching every new hobby with a mix of nonchalance and skill. He was athletic, artistic, and truly funny.
I told myself we were friends, nothing more. Because I didn’t have the capacity for more. But every time he called with a new class or hobby for us to try, I couldn’t deny the lift I felt in my chest. We went on like that for weeks. We tried stand-up paddleboarding, aerial yoga, circuit training on the beach, aerobics on a vibrating plate. Every class was more out there than the last. They all offered tiny bursts of dopamine. Like I wascrawling back to who I used to be. Or who I would be once I healed.
My body was tired every night when I lay down to go to sleep. A heavy sort of exhaustion that yanked me under almost as soon as my head hit the pillow, so there was no time to stare at the ceiling and second-guess all of the choices that had led me here.
“Why are you good at everything?” I asked him one afternoon in a woodworking class.
We sat beside each other at a workbench, surrounded by the dry scent of sawdust. There were little blocks of pine in front of us, and we were supposed to be cutting pieces to make a pencil cup. Beau had already measured and sliced his blocks with neat, perfect passes on the miter saw, and the instructor kept stopping by to admire them, nodding like Beau had channeled some divine geometry. Meanwhile, I’d nearly sent my block flying in my first attempt with the saw, and now I stood squinting at my shaky pencil line, bracing myself to try again.
He shrugged. “I was an Eagle Scout.”
Of course he was.
Sweet, sometimes nerdy, devastatingly decent Beau. I don’t know why his confession made me think of Simon and the note he’d left. But it did. And my heart dipped, like it always did when I remembered the part of myself I hadn’t told Beau about. The part I probably never would.
Eagle Scouts don’t deal in the morally gray. And they definitely don’t sleep with their bosses. There’s probably an oath about it and everything.
He’d never look at me the same way. And I couldn’t bear to see the admiration in his eyes dim. So I kept my secret tucked away—a quiet divide between us—and pretended it didn’t sting.
But that wasn’t the worst part.
The worst part was every time he laughed or flashed that off-kilter smile, I wanted to kiss him. I wanted to lean in and press my mouth to his and see if he tasted like spearmint or bubble gum. I wanted to know if he’d kiss me back. If he’d pull me into his arms and hold me there.
