We didn’t talk on the drive up to the villa, and when we got there Everett shooed me inside, insistent he’d bring our bags in. I obliged, both because I was freezing and because I didn’t think I could be in a car with Everett and the contours of his chest through his wet T-shirt for a minute longer.
When he did come inside, bags in tow, I was dripping rainwater onto the terra-cotta tile floor of the entryway, head tilted back to look up at the blown-glass chandelier hanging high above us.
“No wonder concierge Ralph hates us,” I said as Everett paused next to me, setting our bags down and following my gaze. I looked over at him, eyes tracking the line of his neck for a minute, the angle of his jaw, the short beard there. “You’re probably used to places like this, though, aren’t you?” I asked, now that I knew he was the son of some industry person.
It took him a second to look at me, but when he did, there was a flash of something there that wasn’t just humor. “Something like that,” he finally said.
“Something like what?” I asked, pressing. He’d leaned down to grab our bags, and he paused, gaze flicking my way.
“We should probably figure out some food, right?” he said. “Are you hungry?”
“Everett,” I said, following after him as he started toward the living room. “Something like what?”
“Something like what you said,” he answered. “I’ve been in houses like this growing up, yes.”
“Did you grow up in a house like this, though?”
He set our bags down next to a lush white couch, big enough to fit our entire friend group and then some. There was a huge kitchen to one side, a dining space set two steps above the living room, a staircase off the foyer we just left leading to the six bedrooms this place advertised, a pool out back. A massive stone fireplace sat under the mantel across from the couch. Everett headed toward this and busied himself with an amber-colored jar of long matches.
“Everett,” I said.
“Not exactly,” he said in my general direction, not quite over his shoulder, as he leaned toward the fireplace to set a match against the kindling already set on top of the wood there.
“Not exactlyis the same evasive answer assomething like that,” I said. I wanted to sit down on the couch but I was still in my raincoat, water running down my shorts and onto my legs. “Not exactlytells me nothing.”
Everett straightened and turned to me, running a hand through his wet hair. He paused before he answered, a struggle playing out on his face. To tell me or not, I assumed. To let me in or keep me always a few inches away. It was what I’d been feeling about him all week, this push and pull. A desire to get to know him better but a nervousness over what that meant, where it took us.
“My father is Ben Astor,” he finally said, voice devoid of emotion. A simple delivery of information that he had to know would shock me. Would shock anyone he told.
“Ben Astor, the actor?” I asked after a quiet, stunned moment. Everett nodded. “Thereally famousactor?”
“Yes, he’s the guy who was in all the heist movies and World War II movies and rom-coms in the nineties,” Everett said, in the most disinterested tone I’d ever heard from him, before walking over to the kitchen.
“I didn’t even know he had a kid,” I said.
Everett huffed out a laugh as he opened the fridge. “He has kids.”
“Plural?”
“Plural,” he said. The fridge was stocked with exactly two bottles of water and he pulled them both out, setting one on the counter in front of me.
“Thanks,” I said. I considered Everett as he took a drink, trying to reframe him in this new context. He’d had some energy about him, almost like he’d been tailor-made for his exact life, and I wondered how much this revelation informed that now, if at all. But something else poked at me too, nagging. “Why didn’t you tell anyone else this week?” I asked.
Everett had leaned his elbows on the island, hunched over his water bottle as he twirled it back and forth on the marbled surface, and he looked up from under his brow at this. “My dad and I aren’t close,” he said. “I don’t tend to bring him up. And I’m not...” He shook his head. “I’ve never really been part of a friend group as close as this one. You guys seem to know everything about each other.”
I nodded. “We do,” I said. “One time, Davi asked me to look at a zit on his back.”
“Did you?” Everett asked.
“Of course. I’m a good friend. And he was going on a third date with a girl he was obsessed with that night. Davi is very self-conscious of any weird bumps on his body.” Everettlaughed. “So it wasn’t just because you wanted to tell only me?” I asked jokingly, trying to keep the mood light.
“Oh, you’re the only person I want to share anything with,” he said.
My heart skipped a beat, and I had to glance away for a minute before I could look at him again. “See, you’re always saying things like that,” I answered. “Making me think we’re more important than we are.”
“Are we not important?” he asked then, looking fully at me.
It knocked me silent for a minute, the sudden shift in tone. “We’re not I-only-want-to-share-things-with-you important,” I said.
