Lee’s face twitched. Flatly, he told me, “I’ll be with Rachel over the holidays. I made us a schedule and everything.”
“Well…well, that’s okay, because Brown’s not that far from Boston.”
“So I get to go to the East Coast and see you and Noah and Rachel. Great.”
Okay. This was what I’d been expecting.
Weirdly, it was almost a relief to see him losing his cool—even just a little. I hated the idea of Lee resenting me for this but not telling me. The thought that he would, and would go talk to Rachel about it but not me, brought that queasy feeling right back again. I couldn’t have him start pushing me away already.
“Sure,” he went on, striding across the kitchen and grabbing a carton of juice out of the refrigerator. “Yeah, the four of us can spend every holiday or long weekend together, and I don’t get to spend quality time with you or Rachel. Or Noah!”
He tore open a cupboard, snatched out a glass, hammered it down on the counter, and slammed the door shut again.
“You’ll get to spend quality time with us, Lee.”
“I saw what long-distance did to you and Noah. Before Thanksgiving it screwed everything up for you guys. And yeah, I know, you worked it out, and you guys are good now, but I’m not gonna let that happen to me and Rachel.”
“I’m sorry,” I whispered. “Lee, I don’t mean to make you feel like you have to choose between me and Rachel. We’ll…we’ll figure it out, right? We always do. We can make a schedule for the time we’ll spend together, like you’ve got with Rachel.”
Lee gave me a long, stern look, but I could tell it wasn’t completely serious. I still found myself wishing he’d yell at me, that he’d really just lose it, the way he did when he discovered I was dating Noah behind his back. I could see it, bubbling away under the surface.
But Lee wasn’t an angry guy. He never had been. Which was why he was narrowing his eyes at me now, tilting his head and telling me in a cool, offhand voice, “Rachel gets Labor Day. But I guess…I guess I can give you National Cupcake Day.”
“I promise I will make you the best, most incredible, most unforgettable cupcakes you have ever dreamed of.”
He raised his eyebrows at me, and we suddenly both cracked a smile. I’ve always been the worst at baking. Notably, one disastrous Home Ec class a few years ago.
“I promise I will get Levi to make you the best, most incredible, most unforgettable cupcakes you have ever dreamed of,” I corrected myself. Levi loved baking so much that he’d actually gotten a job in a bakery, in addition to his shifts at 7-Eleven. If National Cupcake Day was Lee’s and my new thing, I would absolutely be counting on Levi to make it killer. (Especially since there was a solid chance I might make it quite literally killer by accidentally giving us food poisoning.)
Lee’s smile faded too quickly, but he still didn’t shout, or even pull so much as a puppy-dog face. He fidgeted and paced a little, and I knew he was stewing over all of this and how much it changed everything.
“Say something, Lee,” I mumbled. His silence was killing me.
“This was supposed to be our year, Elle, remember? We were going to take senior year by storm, have the best time ever before we went to college and everything started changing. But it’s already changing, isn’t it? And we did. And now this was going to be our best summer ever, our last summer. It’s barely started and it’s already ruined. It’s not just our college plans. Mom and Dad are selling the beach house and…Nothing’s turning out the way it was supposed to, you know?”
He flopped down again on the stool next to me. I snaked my arms around him, grateful when he didn’t push me away. Lee smooshed his face into my shoulder.
“I promise I’m pleased for you about Harvard,” he said into my sweater.
“I know.” I did. “I haven’t…I mean, I haven’t accepted my place yet. Or turned down Berkeley.”
Lee drew back suddenly, shaking his head. “No. Elle, come on. Don’t make me that guy. You’re right, it’s a great opportunity. How could you turn it down? And if it’s what you want, I’m happy for you. Really! Even if I don’t look it right now.”
I bit my lip, feeling a little guilty.
I’d wanted to come and talk to him about it before I officially turned down Berkeley. It was my decision to make, but Lee meant the absolute world to me. He always had. If it had really broken his heart, if he’d asked, I knew I would’ve rethought it.
I felt guilty, because I knew he wouldn’t ask me to do that. And Lee knew it, too. I was giving him an out we both knew he would never take, not in a million years.
Not sure how to apologize for that, I told him, “I promise I wasn’t trying to keep secrets from you again. It wasn’t like that. I just got the letter a couple days ago, and…I needed to decide. You know, everything was happening with the beach house, and I didn’t want to make you more upset if I didn’t need to, if I’d decided on Berkeley, but—”
“But you didn’t.”
“I’m sorry.”
“What about Brad, though?”
That was something that I couldn’t talk my way around or do anything about. But now I’d come clean about the college stuff, I told him, “About that. My dad’s got a fancy lady.”
Lee made a choking sound and pulled back to gawp at me, his face scrunched up and one eye squinting. “He’s got a what?”
I explained about Linda, who Dad had been on a not-first date with last night, only just stopping myself from off-loading on him about how bizarre I found it all and how it felt like a lot to get my head around.
Lee gave a low whistle. “Mr. Evans, you sly dog. Who’da thunk it?”
“Ew. Don’t call my dad a sly dog. That’s gross.”
“Do you know what this Linda looks like?”
“No.”
“Last name?”
“I’d have looked her up online if I had a last name.”
“At least someone’s having fun this summer,” Lee muttered, his dark mood from a few moments ago returning in the blink of an eye. I could practically see the storm clouds gathering around his head again.
It was obvious that he wasn’t going to argue with me about this, though. He was obviously going to make every effort to be happy for me, be proud of me, and I loved him for that.
I had to make it up to him somehow.
And as soon as the thought crossed my mind, I knew exactly what to do. He was devastated about the beach house and about me turning down Berkeley—even if he wouldn’t show that quite so much. Lee wanted this to be our final hurrah, an amazing, unforgettable last summer before everything changed and we had to start growing up. And I was damn sure going to make that happen.