Page 44 of The Last Thing You Said

“So do you miss your boyfriend?” she asks, handing me a glass of lemonade.

“Yes.” I take a tentative sip. “What’s in this?”

“Vodka, what else?” She sits down. “Are you in love with him?”

I shrug. “I don’t know.”

“Well, I suppose we could try to figure that out. We’ve got all night.” She picks up her phone from the arm of her deck chair and starts tapping on the screen. “Let’s see, searching for are you in love quiz.”

“Hannah . . .”

“Here we go. ‘Number one: When you first saw your special someone, you A. Thought he was cute. B. Didn’t find him attractive but he grew on you. C. Didn’t give him a second look. D. Were deeply attracted to him.’”

I roll my eyes and Hannah laughs.

“‘Number two: How often do you think of your sweetheart when you’re apart?’ ‘Sweetheart’? What is this, the 1940s? ‘A. Every waking moment. B. Several times a day. C. Once or twice a day. D. Hardly ever.’ Well, Lucille? Your answer?”

“Hannah.”

“Fine.” She continues to scroll. “Oh, wait, one more. This one’s perfect for you. ‘Your sweetheart gives you a romantic card. What do you do with it? A. Sleep with it under your pillow. B. Scrapbook it. C. File it away. D. Toss it.’”

I slip my hand into my pocket and find the agate. I haven’t told Hannah about it. “Would you stop already?”

“Don’t you want to know?”

“I’m not going to find out from some quiz you found on the Internet.” I pause. None of these questions sound like anything I would ask myself about Simon—well, maybe the one about thinking he was cute. He is definitely cute. But . . .

Deeply attracted.

Every waking moment.

Carry it in my pocket.

I take a long drink of my lemonade. It’s strong, and the alcohol swirls through me, loosens me. “What about you? Is Dustin your special someone?”

She laughs. “I don’t need to take a quiz to know I’m not in love with Dustin. He’s fun and we always have a good time, but Dustin is not true-love material, at least not for me. And shoot, who says it has to be true love, anyway? I just want to have a good time, try new things, meet new people. Nothing wrong with that, am I right?”

“I guess not.”

“You like Simon, though, right? You have fun with him?”

I do. He’s sweet and attentive. He takes me to the movies, we play mini-golf even though he has not improved, I sit at the lakeside patio with him while he paints. It’s one of the things I like best about him, how he’s able to capture his surroundings in watercolor and acrylic. Sometimes we walk down to the beach between our houses, sheltered from view by thick trees, and kiss, falling to the sand, until our lips are bruised and our breaths come heavy.

“Yes. I like him.”

Her glass is empty, so she reaches for mine and takes a drink. “Lucille, it’s okay to like Simon. If not Simon, some other guy. You don’t need anyone’s permission.”

What she doesn’t say: especially Ben’s permission. She’s right.

“And nobody said it had to be love,” she continues.

I blow out a long breath. The idea of falling in love with Simon—of falling in love with anyone but Ben—scares me. The swirl spirals down, reaches my toes, but now it’s more than looseness, it’s relief, too. Nobody said it had to be love.

But there’s plenty of summer left for me and Simon, and I’m going to make the best of it. “I know.”

“Just remember that, okay?” She shakes her big blond hair. “Want to watch the fireworks from the middle of the lake? Dad got us a new paddleboat.”

A few days after the Fourth, I’m eating breakfast at the resort and Tami announces, “Our nephew is getting married in Duluth in a couple of weeks, and I wondered if you would like to come along to help with Emily.”