Michelle works as the general manager at The Dunk, because her dad doesn’t trust anyone else to run their family business. After locking the entry doors, she slides her jangling gaggle of keys into the front pocket of her black waist-apron and begins wiping down the tabletops.
I stand up from the table nearest the register, to stretch my arms and legs. Almost every Tuesday through Sunday, from eight p.m. to eleven p.m., I sit at this table to keep my best friend company while she closes up the restaurant. Sometimes, I help her clean so we can get out of there faster. Mostly, I use the time to edit photos on my laptop while chatting with Michelle.
“Is there any chili left?” I ask, closing the lid on my MacBook.
Michelle makes a mean chicken and white bean chili. Her mom, Monica, started making it for me when we were kids, when she realized I couldn’t eat their original chili recipe because it contained pork sausage. It was one of the rare times my mother’s Jewish heritage resulted in the creation of a culinary masterpiece.
Michelle grabs a clean towel off the shelf under the counter and heads toward the dining area. “Julio! Pack me a quart of chili, please!” she shouts toward the kitchen.
“Okay, Mitch!” the cook shouts back.
“Want to hit the beach tomorrow?” I ask as I slide my laptop into the snug foam compartment of my waterproof travel case.
Michelle sprays lemon-scented cleaner on the table next to mine and nods. “Fuck yeah. I need a beach day,” she replies, then sinks down into the seat across from me. “Which one?”
“Portuguese?” I reply, closing my laptop case and taking a seat again.
Michelle slides her phone out of the pocket of her blue skinny jeans, her top lip curling in disapproval. “Portuguese Beach is so crowded in the end of June.”
“Not on Monday mornings. We can get there early to get a good spot, then book it when it starts getting too crowded in the afternoon.”
She shrugs. “That’s probably better. It’s not like I need a tan.”
Every time Michelle references her skin color, it makes me sad. It reminds me of the one time she let down her guard and admitted to me how she hated the way people treated her differently in the summer, when her cinnamon-brown skin became a rich coffee-brown. We all have things we hate about ourselves, physical features that feel more like betrayals than assets. For me, it’s the bump in my nose I inherited from my Jewish mother. For Michelle, it’s her skin color. For our other BFF, Allie Kim, it’s her slanted eyes. Maybe that common thread of self-hatred is why we’ve been best friends since elementary school.
I pull my phone out of my pocket and text Michelle a single, lonely poop emoji.
She looks up from her phone screen. “If you need to release the chili demon, just go. You know you don’t have to ask to use the restroom.”
I smile as I let out a fart. “Not necessary when I can let it out right here. I just wanted you to look up from your phone.”
She rolls her eyes as she understands this reference. “You have to dump him. Stat. That guy gives me the creeps.”
The “him” Michelle is referring to is Tyler Bradford, the son of Mayor Tom Bradford, whom I started dating four months ago. Tyler has an annoying habit of texting me emojis to get me to look up from my phone when we’re hanging out. Michelle and Allie do not like Tyler. To be fair, I don’t know if I even like him. But in my opinion, being alone during the summer is worse than being alone during the holidays. If I do dump Tyler, it will be in September or October.
“He’s not that bad,” I say, opening up my bank account app to check my balance for the tenth time today, a new and disgusting habit I acquired recently.
Michelle looks up from her phone again and cocks an eyebrow. “The guy nicknamed you his ‘little oyster.’ He’s a creep.”
The smile on my face vanishes when I see my account balance. “Ugh. I need some new clients ASAP.”
Michelle’s face softens. “Are you in trouble? Like, are you not going to be able to pay your phone bill, or something?”
“It’s not that bad…yet. But I definitely need to figure out a way to bring in more clients or it’s R.I.P. Winters’ Weddings.”
She turns her attention back to her phone, types something, then turns the screen toward me. “Maybe if you put your photos on Instagram, like this girl, you’d get more business.”
I stare at the Instagram profile for a girl named Elizabeth Messina, who Michelle follows on Instagram. “Yeah, and maybe if I hadn’t failed my final exam, I’d have a degree I could use to get a job.”
“You didn’t fail your final. You refused to retake it,” she replied as casually as if she were commenting on the weather.
“Really? This again?” I reply, my voice climbing an octave. “You’re saying I was supposed to fight my way past the sweaty paparazzos so I could give a solo show of pictures depicting the places where my boyfriend and I had sex? The boyfriend who dumped me on Instagram?”
Her eyebrows shot up as she looked up from the screen. “I’m just saying that maybe you could have chosen some different pictures and hired a bodyguard to get you past the paparazzi. If you really wanted the degree, that stuff shouldn’t have stopped you.”
I shook my head. “You know what happened the last time I tried to create another Instagram account.”
I narrowed my eyes at her, telepathically willing her to remember the time I created a new profile for Winters’ Weddings. A client named “Isla” messaged me on Instagram and booked me to do her engagement shoot at a nearby vineyard in Sonoma. She even paid the fifty-percent deposit. When I got to the vineyard, I parked my car and entered the barn, where we planned to meet. “Isla” and her friends were there with their cell phone cameras at the ready to record my reaction to a cardboard cutout of Ben down on one knee proposing to Becca Kingsley, the pop singer he dumped me for. I vomited on the straw-covered floor and ran to my car.
I shook my head when Michelle didn’t acknowledge this catastrophe. “Forget it. I’m not arguing about this again.”
“You’re the one who brought up your cash flow problems. I was just offering social media as a solution. A little self-promotion can’t hurt, you know? And yet you still shoot me down, as usual. Anyway, we both know that’s not what this is about.”
“What are you talking about?”
She purses her lips. “I’m talking about that gigantic chip on your shoulder. It’s been there since Hunter’s graduation last month.”
My eyes widen. “Are you kidding me right now? Are you accusing me of being jealous of my little brother?”
“There’s a difference between bitterness and strength. You’ve gotten more bitter with every year that passes since you and Ben broke up. If you’re not careful, you’re going to push away the people who helped you get through that shit-storm. Which is sad, because we’re the ones who actually love you.”
I lower my gaze and take a deep breath to tame the angry lion inside me. I also try not to think about Ben, but the tattoo on my wrist makes that impossible. Michelle is pretty strongly implying that what Ben did to me indicated he was obviously not one of the people who actually loved me. But after three years, I still look at the tattoo on the inside of my left wrist and wonder if that’s true. Could Ben have been pretending to love me for all those years?
I lay my hand over my wrist to cover the words “i love us” written in Ben’s handwriting. He has a matching tattoo on the inside of his left wrist in my handwriting, if he hasn’t attempted to get it covered up. During the four years that Ben and I were officially together, and the few years before when we hid our relationship from our families, we only got into one huge fight that almost tore us apart. Almost.
I remember vividly how I told Ben I loved him, but I didn’t think I was secure enough to be with someone famous. He told me I had nothing to feel insecure about. “I don’t like myself without you. Actually, sometimes I think you’re the only thing I like about myself. I love you, Charley, and I’m not ashamed to
say I love you more when you’re mine. I love us.” After that, “I love us” became our slogan. I cringe inside as I remember how we joked about trademarking the phrase.
“Let’s change the subject,” Michelle says, probably reading the signs in the painful expression on my face, the signs my mind has wandered into the dark corner where I hide my memories of Ben. “If you don’t want to do social media — which I totally understand — then, maybe all you need to do is figure out what’s worked in the past, you know, to generate business.”
I lean my head back and sigh. “I feel like this is the hundredth time we’ve had this conversation. I don’t know why you put up with me.”
“Because I love you,” she replied casually. “Okay, I remember when you were booking wedding shoots more than six months in advance because you were so busy. When was that? Two years ago? Maybe you were doing something back then that you might not be doing now.”
I shook my head. “That was pretty much right after the breakup, when I first started the business. When people were still googling ‘Charley Winters ugly cry’ a thousand times a day. Bookings have steadily decreased since then.”
Michelle winces at my reminder of the time a paparazzo published a video of me ugly-crying while talking to my mom in our backyard shortly after the breakup. The video went viral and, at its peak, the phrase “Charley Winters ugly cry” was Googled more than 800,000 times in one day. The video is still on every celebrity gossip channel on YouTube. I don’t have the emotional fortitude or the money to hire a lawyer to force Google to take it down.
Michelle stands up and rounds the table so she can wrap her arms around my shoulders. “The only good thing I can say about Benjamin Hayes is that he’s smart enough not to show his face around here anymore. I hope he gets antibiotic-resistant chlamydia and his dick falls off.”
I laugh a little too hard and another tiny toot comes out. “I don’t think that’s how chlamydia works.”
“I’m still holding out hope. And you really need to stop eating so much damn chili,” she says, giving my shoulders one more squeeze before she sets off toward the back of the restaurant. As she rounds the counter, she glances back at me and flashes me a beaming smile, which quickly disappears as her eyes become fixated on something outside.
I glance over my shoulder toward the storefront and a flicker of intense pain fires through every nerve in my body when I see Ben standing on the other side of the glass.
2
A Great Team
Then
There are a million posts on the internet touting tips and tricks for looking better in photographs. Photoshop and FaceTune aside, the truth is that the best way to look good in a photograph is to be photogenic. Half of that is being comfortable in front of a camera — few people are. The other half is being naturally good looking: clear, even-toned skin; lithe muscle tone; symmetrical, proportional features; bright, clear eyes; full lips, white teeth, and a gorgeous smile.
Ben Hayes has all those features. He is far and away the most photogenic person I’ve ever known. And he’s mine.
Ben pushes the glossy wooden canoe into the lake and quickly hops inside. I hand him a wooden oar and he uses it to push the boat away from the muddy bank. Once we’re about ten feet from the shore, I switch places with him, so I’m seated at the rear of the boat with my back to the forest we just hiked through to get here, and Ben sits with his back facing the center of the sparkling lake while he rows.
I watch him for a while, admiring the taut grooves in the muscles of his neck and arms. “Are we just going to fish or are we going to swim, too?” I ask, briefly lifting the front of my butter-yellow T-shirt to flash my coral-pink bikini top underneath.
Ben shakes his head and laughs. “You’re always full of surprises. And if you want to swim, we’ll swim. You know my kitten always gets what she wants.”
I lean forward and lick his cheek. “Thank you.”
He smiles. “Careful. You’ll lick off my makeup.”
“Oh, I’m sorry. Let me put it back.” I grab his face and lay the flat of my tongue against his cheek and leave it there.
“Are you done yet?”
“Ah-oce,” I reply, without breaking contact.
“That’s cute,” Ben says, then he lets go of the oars and pulls me down so I’m lying across his lap. “Now, let me show you how momma cats lick their kittens.”
I laugh uncontrollably as he licks his way up the entire side of my face and across my forehead. “Okay, okay. Stop!” I plead as he goes for the other cheek.
He lets me go and grabs the oars again. “When are you going to understand, I always win the licking game?”
I unzip my backpack and pull out my camera as I try to catch my breath. “That’s ’cause you’re such an expert licker.”
He shakes his head. “You should probably get your shots before I toss that camera overboard and fuck you right here.”
Ben doesn’t hesitate or get shy when I begin taking pictures of the muscles rippling beneath his skin while he’s rowing. This is one of the things I love the most about him. He’s the perfect subject.
Besides being insanely gorgeous, he has incredible instincts for how to pose and emote. He never looks at the camera unless he’s asked to. He’s a natural-born model, which is why I still find it hard to believe that, after so many years together, he still loves me. I’m definitely not winning any Most Photogenic contests.
Still, with my photography skills and his stunning good looks, we make a great team.
I lower the camera to look at him without the lens between us and I smile at how much better he looks in 3D. “Take off your shirt,” I say, and a split second of discomfort flashes across his face. Or maybe I’m just imagining it, because as quickly as the unease appears, it’s replaced by that charming smile that never gets old.
He lays the oars across his lap then beckons me. “I’ll take it off, but I require payment,” he says, then he taps the corner of his mouth. “Right there.”
I place my camera on top of my backpack and stand slowly, so as not to disturb the balance of the canoe. Stepping forward, I lean over to kiss the corner of his mouth. As usual, he turns his face at the last second so my lips land on his.
He takes my face in his hands as his tongue slides into my mouth. An involuntary moan issues from my throat, and he echoes the sound back at me. His grip on my face tightens and I chuckle as he pulls me into his lap. But my laughter quickly turns to silence when he wraps his arms around my waist and buries his face in my neck.
I curl my arms around his solid shoulders, placing my hand on the back of his head to stroke him softly as I hold him. Ben calls it “getting his me time” when he does this, and he’s been doing it a lot more often lately. He’ll take me into his arms or pull me into his lap and hold me, so tightly it aches in my body and my heart. Sometimes, we’ll stay like this so long, he’ll fall asleep in my arms.
In the past, he’s insisted he needs his “me time” when he starts to think about his mother, who died of stomach cancer when he was eight. But I question why he seems to grieve his mother’s death more with each passing year. It seems to me that he would feel less heartache as time passed.
Either way, I don’t question it. If something is bothering Ben, something he doesn’t feel comfortable sharing with me yet, I’ll have to be patient. He was patient with me for the three years we had to hide our relationship from my family. The least I can do is hold him when he needs to be held.
About ten minutes pass before Ben slowly lets go and flashes me a sexy smile as he peels off his gray T-shirt. “I fucking love you. You know that?” he says, tossing his shirt onto the bottom of the boat.
I pull off my T-shirt and nod. “I’m kinda starting to get that impression.”
He places the tip of his index finger on the hollow of my throat and traces it down to the valley of my breasts. “I don’t want you to ever doubt that. No matter what happens. Promise me, kitten. Promise you’ll never doubt
that.”
I swallow hard as I once again get a sense that he may be hiding something. “Ben, what’s wrong?”
“Nothing,” he replies quickly. “I’m just… Your graduation is coming up fast. And you’ll be able to start traveling with me. I… I don’t want you to think badly of me when you see me autographing tits and putting on a show for the fans. None of that means anything.”
I cock an eyebrow. “But I’ve already seen that. I’ve been to your shows. I’ve been on set for videos. I know what you do when I’m not around. It doesn’t make me think badly of you. It makes me feel lucky that, despite all that shit, you stay faithful. You are staying faithful, right?”
He narrows his ocean-blue eyes. “I would never cheat on you. You know that.”
Oddly enough, I do know that. As handsome as Ben is, he’s even more loyal.
When I was sixteen, and we were still hiding our relationship from my family, he found out that Henry Kincaid, a creep in my trigonometry class, lifted the back of my skirt as we were leaving the classroom. The next day, as school let out, eighteen-year-old Ben was waiting outside for Henry, who was too afraid to protest when Ben insisted they “take a walk.” No one but Henry and Ben know what happened on that walk, but Henry and his friends never harassed me again.
And that was just the first of many things Ben has done to prove his loyalty. When we’re out in public, he smothers me with chivalry and affection. When we’re alone, he pampers and worships my body and my heart.
When Ben is home, we do everything together. Every place we go together becomes our place. Every year we stay together is our year. And summer is our season.
Ben and I met the summer I turned eleven, when my family moved to Bodega Bay. We met on Campbell Cove Beach, and I love reminding my big brother Mason that I met Ben first. Everyone who meets Ben feels like knowing him is a privilege. Before I met Ben, summer was just another season I looked forward to for beach days and extra ice cream cones. After we met, summer became my favorite time of year. Once Ben and I got together, when I was fifteen and he was seventeen, summer became my home.