Float

Original Edition: Chapter Eighteen

It was just six inches.

That's what she said.

I found Lena standing in the kitchen, munching on a granola bar as she poured herself a large bowl of frosted flakes. Rachel had left for Marlin Bay earlier that morning, and by the looks of it, she'd overslept and left in a hurry; her coffee mug was sitting on the edge of the kitchen counter and she'd left her favorite strawberry-flavored, SPF seventy lipstick on the table with her paint swatches and collection of brushes.

"Feeling better?" Lena asked me through a mouthful of whole grains.

"Slightly," I nodded, "but you should still watch your back."

Lena rolled her eyes at my threat, and I couldn't help but smile.

We both knew she could take me in a fight.

With both hands tied behind her back.

Blindfolded.

It took Lena less than three minutes to wolf down her bowl of cereal. As she was finishing off her second granola bar, she shot Jesse a text message asking him to drop by the house and pick us up. I wondered why we needed to get in a car to drive to the beach, considering it was a five-minute walk from Rachel's house, but I decided against asking questions. I was too focused on the butterflies in my stomach to think about anything else.

Blake Hamilton said—or rather, wrote, in crayon might I add—that he wanted to see me at the beach today, which meant that he was sneaking out of his house to tag along with the Fletcher twins, Alissa, and me.

I wasn't sure whether to be excited or to pee my pants.

The past two days on lockdown had given me plenty of time to read, re-read, and overanalyze the absolute shit out of Blake's adorable little note. I had almost committed the whole thing to memory. There was one line, however, that kept popping up in my head, even though I wished I would forget it.

I will not try to do it again, I promise.

"You alright there?" Lena asked me, peering across the kitchen at me, her eyebrows knit together in concern. "I think you're about to grind your own teeth off."

It was only then that I realized I'd been clenching my jaw.

I pried my teeth apart and forced a sheepish smile.

Lena narrowed her eyes at me.

"So, when's Jesse getting here?" I asked, trying to change the subject. I reached up and ran my fingers through my hair. I hadn't bothered to blow it dry though, much less take a brush to it, so my fingers promptly got stuck in an abnormally large knot.

"He said—" Lena began, but was cut off as a car horn sounded outside.

"I'm guessing that's him?" I prompted, wincing as I managed to yank my fingers free from the bird's nest that was my hair.

Lena nodded and set her empty bowl in the kitchen sink, then wiped her hands off on her light-blue tank top. She snatched her cell phone up from the counter and then we both tore through the living room like professional sprinters. Well, Lena was like a sprinter. I was like a three-legged dog galloping along behind her.

The second I stepped through the front door and out onto the porch, I realized that there was something off.

It wasn't boiling.

I mean, it was still pretty warm outside compared to my hometown, which averaged a high temperature of thirty-two degrees during the month of August. But I wasn't instantly drenched in a sheen of sticky sweat, and I didn't feel like the humidity had smacked me in the lungs. The only thing that was smacking me was the wind, which was so strong it had blown my soaking wet hair back from my face, tangling it behind me.