Page 5 of The Breakup Artists

“I mean,wow, Holden, you’re so dreamy. And look at those muscles, you must work out... on your boat, in between buying an island and drinking a martini with your pinkie in the air,” she says overarticulating with gestures and facial expressions.

“Damn. That was convincing. Maybe we should switch spots on this one—you get close to Ella, and I’ll do the brilliant strategizing.”

“Pffft,” Tiny says, disturbing the droplets of water around her mouth and enjoying that I just called her brilliant. While Tiny takes the acting lead on a case here or there, she’s more than happy to hand over the majority of it to me, naming herself the mastermind; but if you ask me, it’s because she gets too attached to the subjects. Even the wordsubjectbothers her—They’re people, August. PEOPLE, capitalP, she says.

“Put your game face on, August.” Tiny kicks her feet up, splashing me in the process. “Because tomorrow we officially start the biggest case we’ve ever had.”

I smile and lean back in the water, letting it hold my weight. Summer. Is. The. Absolute. Best.

2

valentine

(an awesome name that i’m shocked my parents came up with)

Purple Post-it notes cover my puzzle mat, detailing Ella’s life. I lean over them on the soft cream carpet of my bedroom floor, chewing on one of the strings of my white hoodie.

A fuzzy unicorn alarm clock blares a magical whinny at me, and I reach up to my bedside table, turning it off without looking. Since we started Summer Love a couple years ago, I’ve set an alarm on days we’re working, not to wake up—I’m up by nine no matter what, dancing and singing to wildlife (as August puts it)—but to wake up August, who’d gladly sleep until two without noticing. It’s not that he won’t set his own alarm, but he’ll hit snooze until the last possible second and then stumble out of his house like an unkempt swamp monster with good hair.

I take one last look at my Post-its. There’s something about this case that’s making me nervous, like there’s something important I’m missing, and it’s driving me nuts. I scour Ella’s social media again and check all my notes, but whatever the thing is eludes me. So with a sigh, I roll up my puzzle mat, putting it back in its canvas bag, hidden from my parents.

I grab my shoulder bag off my vanity chair along with my fake catering outfit and leave the lavender-and-white room—a color combo I chose when I was eleven that still makes me happy. I head downstairs to our living room, which looks like it was plucked straight out of aHamptonsmagazine with its tans and navy blues. The couches are oversized, the art is impressive (or so my parents’ friends say), and my dad’s music awards on the far wall always get ooohs and aaahs.

I make my way into the kitchen, where my parents sit at the breakfast table next to a large picture window facing the water. Dad’s typing away on his laptop and Mom’s doing a crossword puzzle in the newspaper.

“Morning, Valentine,” they both say, looking up.

“Morning, parents of mine,” I say, giving Dad a quick hug. He’s not my biological dad, but he’s the one who raised me, and the one who proposed to my mom a mere six months after she found out her IVF worked. She desperately wanted a baby but never knew if she might have a partner in it. She likes to joke that he behaved like she impregnated him. And when I was old enough to fully understand, he offered to adopt me, which I said I’d only agree to if I could have his last name. He cried. And not that it matters, but anyone who saw us together would assume we share DNA. Even though my biological dad is supposedly Italian and not Indian like my adoptive dad, I have straight, dark hair and dark eyes with long eyelashes that resemble his. I also have my mom’s small nose and heart-shaped lips.

“Have some food,” Dad says with a smile, gesturing at the table. “Your mom’s ordered the good bagels again and those warm chocolate croissants.”

I grab two of everything for me and August on my way down the table to give my mom a kiss on the cheek.

“Ialwaysorder good bagels,” my mother, a serious connoisseur, corrects him. She even wears her blond hair in what can only be described as a bagel-shaped bun on top of her head. Only in this moment, she’s too smiley. Don’t get me wrong. My parents are happy people, but her grin is suspiciously big.

I look from one to the other, to see if I’m missing something. “What are you working on over there?” I ask Dad.

“Actually,we’reworking,” Mom corrects me with an uptick in her voice. “Planning your dad’s company party.”

Now I smile, too. Dad’s big work party—an annual event of epicness August and I look forward to all year, also known as an upscale cookout that we host for Dad’s fellow music producers, important execs, and some of their top clients. It involves transforming our backyard into a sea of white twinkle lights and pitched tents. Some drool-worthy musicians inevitably wind up stopping at our little town country store or homemade ice cream shop in their limos, and it’s the talk of the town for about a month afterward, not to mention the celebrity gossip sites.

But as I look at Mom, a half-finished crossword puzzle by her coffee cup, my thoughts flash back to our case. Ella’s mother told us that she used to do theTimespuzzle every Sunday with her daughter. Hmmm. Methinks I have an idea. I pull out my phone and grab a quick picture of the answers my mother filled in. Then I slather the two bagels with cream cheese and wrap them in paper napkins.

“I’m out,” I say to my parents.

“Another catering job?” Dad asks, looking up from his computer screen. “You’ve been working hard this year.”

“Yup.” I lift my ironed white shirt and black dress pants as evidence. Truthfully, I wouldn’t mind if they knew about Summer Love—well, besides the fact that they’d kill me for lying about it for two years. But August cares. A lot. He says if my parents know, then his mom will find out. But what he won’t say is that his mom would immediately spot the reason we started this business in the first place—August’s sister, Desiree.

Des passed away two years ago in an accident, which August analyzed front, back, and sideways for answers that don’t exist. An event he felt driven to rationalize, like if he could come up with the right answer, then maybe it’d hurt less, or better yet maybe she’d come back. And his analysis always led to the same thing—Des’s boyfriend, Kyle. But that was before. That was when he still talked about her.

After he stopped, I thought he’d slowly relax into being himself again, but he didn’t. He got quiet. He quit theater, he quit soccer, and he quit the one thing I never thought he would—coming over. But I devised a plan to get my best friend back, a plan that focused on the thing he was obsessed with—crappy relationships. So Summer Love Inc. was born. And August the breakup artist is similar to August when Des was still around. But August in his everyday life is still closed off, not with me of course, but with the world. He just doesn’t trust it anymore.

“Have fun, Valentine. Text us what time you’ll be home,” Mom says.

Shoving my breakfast spoils into my shoulder bag, I stare out the window toward Bentley’s yard, where he’s doing push-ups, once again shirtless. As ridiculous as he is, it’s hard not to admire the view. I say a quick goodbye to my parents and step out the back door onto the porch. Bentley looks up when the door closes behind me.

I head straight for him. “Yo, Bent,” I say, doing my best bro voice, crossing the grass with purpose. “Wicked push-ups, man.”