Page 71 of Fish Out of Water

The sting was gone. Every little insult Jake tried trading with Robbie these days fell flat, and Robbie noticed it too. He must have, because he didn’t bother poking fun at Jake anymore at all.

Every afternoon for the next week, Jake continued to work at the beach. Robbie didn’t say anything, and as long as Jake kept his mouth shut, he could keep volunteering in peace. But Robbie was, if nothing else, sharper than Jake was sometimes willing to admit, and on a particularly peaceful Monday evening, he confronted Jake.

“When does your community service end?” he asked. “It has to have been around sixty hours by now, right?”

“Oh, yeah, I guess so.” Jake shrugged and looked down so he didn’t have to face Robbie and out himself as a liar quite so willingly.

“What are you doing, Jake?”

“Fulfilling my?—”

“Stop. I’m giving you a chance to tell the truth, so take it before you make everything worse—again.”

“I didn’t want to stop seeing you every day,” Jake admitted, the words tasting bitter as they left his lips.

“Youaredone, then?”

Jake nodded.

“And you’re only here to be with me?”

Jake nodded again.

“Jake…”

“I just got used to it, that’s all,” Jake said quickly. “I wasn’t ready for it to end so abruptly. You get it, right?”

Robbie shook his head. “This has to stop.”

“I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have lied.”

“You do that a lot, but mostly to yourself. I don’t really care if you try to do it to me; just know that I see right past it. You have to remember that I know you better than anyone else here.”

“Almost anyone,” Jake said.

“Anyone,” Robbie repeated. An amused smile played on his lips, and Jake took this as his opportunity to ask a potentially volatile question he’d been avoiding for weeks.

“Hey, Robbie?”

“Yes?” Robbie’s eyes roved over Jake.

“When can I see your house?”

“Someday, maybe,” Robbie said cagily.

“You’re not embarrassed by how fucking huge it is, are you? Is it all modern and gross like your parents’ house?”

“No. I just don’t bring many people over. It’s a bit of a sacred space to me. It’s the one little corner of the world that’s just mine and no one else’s.”

“And I would ruin your peace. I get it.”

“You and everyone else.”

“I let you into my house.”

“Isabel let me intoherhouse, you mean. And I’ve been there before.”

“Not in my room.”