“Well, just as a heads-up…Lee and I might have told a few people to stop by tonight. Kind of a…housewarming thing.”
I narrowed my eyes, looking between the two Flynn brothers, who had wide eyes and big, innocent smiles plastered on their faces. Rachel gave me an uneasy glance.
“How few are we talking?” I asked.
Lee sipped his champagne again, pulling a face as he swallowed it, and waved me off. “Just an intimate gathering…”
* * *
• • •
Lee and Noah’s “intimate gathering” quickly showed itself to be a full-fledged Flynn brothers party.
They’d thrown a few truly epic parties at their house the last couple of years. Noah was usually the mastermind behind it all, and even though he’d been too cool to hang out with us at school, he had always let us tag along and invite a bunch of our own friends. Their house was so big, it was the perfect place to throw parties.
But the beach house was always cozy, intimate.
Which, I guessed it was right now, too. The seven people crammed onto a single couch was pretty cozy. The butt that brushed against mine as someone scooted by was pretty intimate.
Music pumped through the house like a heartbeat. People had brought cases of beer, bottles of vodka and soda for a mixer, and sparkling cider for the designated drivers. People squashed into the lounge, the kitchen, the rumpus room. They spilled outside. A group of girls sat with their legs dangling in the pool. A couple of guys had stripped down to their boxers to jump in. I watched now as they splashed at the girls, who shrieked, giggling.
Rachel had started to stress out, so I had given her my second glass of champagne. She’d polished off the rest of the bottle by now and had moved on to a can of beer. Her cheeks were flushed, her hair a little frizzy, and she looked like she was having a great time.
Lee was in the rumpus room—I could hear him yelling over a raucous game of Hungry Hungry Hippos. Noah was in the lounge catching up with some of his old football buddies. He caught my eye, winked, and shot me a smile. My heart skipped a beat as I smiled back at him.
Despite us being at the beach house, it felt just like old times. Noah had rounded up a bunch of people from his classes, who were back home for the summer, and he and Lee had forwarded the invite to a bunch of our friends, too. I spotted Ethan Jenkins and Kaitlin from school council, and Tyrone, who’d been head of school council and graduated a year before us. Rachel’s drama club friends were here somewhere.
The doorbell rang, and I flitted from mopping up a spilled beer by the couch to the front door, wondering which idiot had flipped the latch so it locked.
Olivia and Faith, girls from my class, were on the other side of the door. They squealed and jumped to throw their arms around me—something that took me totally by surprise, considering we’d always been friendly but never, like, best friends or anything.
“Girl! We’ve missed you!”
“You saw me, like, days ago at graduation.”
Olivia giggled, hiccupping, and I realized they were already a little tipsy—which probably explained the hugging.
Faith, meanwhile, was looking around with wide eyes and saying, “Oh my God, Elle, this place is…it’s so…quaint?”
“Cozy,” Olivia supplied.
Faith nodded. “Totally charming. But you guys have it all to yourselves! That’s so killer.”
“Yo, Liv, you want your shoes back or what?”
The three of us looked to see Jon Fletcher, a guy from the football team, climbing up the porch. He had someone with him I didn’t recognize. He waved a pair of bright pink sandals with cork wedges from the end of his finger, a case of beer tucked under his other arm.
“Ooh! Oh yeah!” Olivia turned to take them off him, throwing herself onto the creaking porch bench to pull them back on. “They’re cute as hell, but my God are they impossible to walk in,” she told me, teetering as she got up and almost falling into Faith with another giggle.
“Hey, Elle.” His hand now free, Jon greeted me with a high five and a grin. He glanced past me, raising his hand in a wave. “Lee! Hey, man!”
“Fletcher!” Lee yelled back. He slung his arm around my shoulders, and a little beer sloshed out of his open can. “Good to see you.”
“Oh, hey, this”—Jon stepped back, nodding at the guy beside him—“this is our new buddy, Ashton. Hope you don’t mind we brought him along.”
“This place is packed,” I said, smiling at the new guy. “What’s one more?”
There was something weird about Ashton, though, and I couldn’t put my finger on it until the four of them came inside and he ended up standing next to Lee.
They looked freakishly alike. Although, where Lee was dark-haired, Ashton was a sandy blond. He was skinnier, too.
He was wearing jeans, a green hoodie, and a Berkeley cap.
Which Lee had just noticed, too. He pointed at it and said, “Good to meet you, buddy. I’m Lee. So, you a Berkeley guy?”
“Just finished my freshman year,” Ashton told him with a wide grin and bright eyes.
There was an uncanny resemblance when they smiled like that. They had the same kind of zeal in their expression.
“Dude! No way!” Lee exclaimed, grabbing his shoulder. “I start in the fall. I have, like, a million questions.”
Immediately, I got a pang somewhere in my chest. Something horribly like jealousy. My own welcoming smile stiffened into a grimace.
Ashton laughed, oblivious to my reaction. “Fire away.”
“C’mon, we’ll get you a beer.” Lee drew him to the kitchen and I stood there, stomach sinking, feeling forgotten. Just a little bit.
No. No, this was a good thing. If I was ditching Lee to give up on our joint dream of Berkeley to go to Harvard instead, it was good that Lee had found someone he’d know at Berkeley. This was a good thing. A brilliant thing. I was excited for him to make a new friend.
(Was this how Lee felt when I told him about Harvard?)
The door opened again, commotion outside, and it was a welcome distraction.
Oliver, Cam, Dixon, and Warren all piled indoors, laughing at some joke. They spotted me instantly, shouting my name. Cam pulled me into a hug and Warren proffered a bottle of wine.
“Compliments of my big sister,” he said.
“Ooh! Classy! Thank you.”
I moved to take it but he pulled it back. “No, no. It’s not for you.” He thought for a second, already working to get it open. “Okay, Evans. You can share it. But only because I like you. And because I need you to open it for me.”