“This was messy,” Lacey said on a sigh.
“And now I have to clean up the mess,” Tessa said. “So don’t tell anyone else.”
“I won’t!” She crossed her heart like a little girl. “I promise. I swear, I promise!”
“I’m going to tell them myself, in my own way, at the right time.”
“Absolutely,” Lacey agreed. “And what about Roman? Should he…leave? Should we stop seeing each other? Should I?—”
“Are you kidding? Roman is the man who will make you my daughter—in-law.”
Lacey’s eyes widened. “Oh, I don’t?—”
She put her finger on Lacey’s lips. “I know it. You know it. And he knows it. And now we all get to sit back and watch it happen. And I get to wear pink at your wedding.”
“You’re crazy,” Lacey said, hugging her again. “And I love you.”
“I love you, too.” Tessa pulled her head down, back on her lap, enjoying the maternal pleasure of soothing this sweet girl, rocking with the boat.
Dad would have loved this, she thought. Smiling, she looked up. Heck, he probably had a hand in the whole thing.
August 23, 1991
You know how sometimes you get an idea in your head and you just know that it’s going to be magic? Not maybe. Not possibly. Just straight-up, stars-aligning, Disney-movie magic?
Well. That’s what I thought today would be. I’ve been planning it all week in my head. My Sunset Picnic Idea. Capital letters and everything. Summer is coming to an end (SADNESS!) and this would be the most perfect way to say goodbye to it.
I thought, wouldn’t it be so cute if all the summer kids—me, Tessa, Kate, Eli, Peter (), even Crista, I guess—went down to the beach at golden hour and had a sunset picnic together? Like, with snacks and music and one of those giant patchwork quilts Aunt Jo Ellen keeps in the linen closet that smells like dryer sheets?
So I told everyone. Three days ago. I made invitations, too. “Thursday evening. Beach picnic. Bring a blanket and your fun self!”
Kate said she’d come. Tessa said she’d totally be there. Eli gave a thumbs-up. Even Jo Ellen said it was a cute idea and offered to get juice boxes and cut-up watermelon for us. Peter just ignored it, but I knew he’d come with everyone else.
So I packed snacks. Not just random boring ones, either. I made PB&J tea sandwiches and washed strawberries with lemon so they’d taste fresher. I packed them in the green cooler and stuck a little Polaroid camera inside just in case I wanted to take cute friendship pictures for the scrapbook I haven’t started yet. I wore my new sundress, the pink one with the eyelet lace straps that Mom said makes me look “way too grown-up.”
But then, last minute, no one could come. Kate felt bad, but she forgot she had to catch up on her summer reading for English class in the fall. Tessa fell asleep on the couch with a wicked sunburn. Eli went off with his other stupid summer friends like Dustin Mathers. And Crista was in hours-long time out for some bad thing she’d done that didn’t fly with Mom.
I was so sad, I decided to just go have my picnic alone in a classic pity party.
Just me and the beach. And the snacks. And the sign I dragged down from the kitchen and propped up in the sand like a sad little billboard of rejection.
Then—
PETER.
I heard someone jogging down the stairs from the deck and when I turned around, it was him.
“I come bearing drinks,” he said. “Did I miss everyone or…?”
Imagine me trying to look casual while I was actually two seconds away from crying into a peanut butter sandwich.
I admitted they all bailed.
Peter looked at me for a long second, then dropped down onto the quilt like it was exactly where he meant to be all along.
He cracked open a root beer like he was Tom Cruise and it was real beer.
Then he said…“Their loss.”
