{WATTYS 2021/2022 SHORTLIST}{Editor's Pick} {Featured Story}
One girl. Two boys. An impossible choice.
Stella LaFever, a theatre student from California, can't wait to spend a summer in Newport, Rhode Island, with her best friend. She is in despera...
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Chapter Song: Secrets by Maroon 5
Adrift was packed. The crowd rowdier and thicker than it had been last time.
Blue and purple lights swirled around the dance floor and bar, making everyone look like they were underwater.
We found Spencer, Graham, Wyatt, Marcus, and West leaned casually against the quartz countertop. Laughing.
"That's one fine ass group of men," Leona noted. Tugging down on her black miniskirt.
"Yeah," I breathed. Eyes darting between syrupy brown and jade green. West in a white collared shirt and black pants. His hair tousled. Spencer in deepest navy blue. Spencer broad. West tall.
Before I had time to order my thoughts, we were hugging them all—all except West—and drinks were pressed into our hands.
"You remember Stella, right?" Spencer asked West, beaming down at me. "You two met at Castle Hill, I think."
"How could I forget Stella!" West blurted out before opening his arms and wrapping me in a tight hug. He smelled like fresh air and expensive cologne. I drew in a breath against the hollow of his throat as he crushed me to him.
Leona gave West a dragging glance. "I seem to remember him spilling chocolate milk all over her."
West's body went ridgid, before he unwrapped me from his arm and took a step back. "Guilty as charged," he said.
Spencer let out a burst of laughter. "Joon! I need to hear this story."
My eyes widened. No, you don't.
Leona grabbed my hand. "Come on, Stella. Let's go dance before he spills something else on you. Like tea."
Spencer leaned down and pressed a kiss to my lips before Leona could pull me on the dance floor. It was the casual sort of see-you-later kiss a boyfriend would give. I saw surprise bloom on West's face.
"Save me a dance."
Leona and I grabbed a shot from a cocktail waitress and downed it as we made our way across the crowded dance floor.
J. Crew button-downs swayed behind Lily Pulitzer dresses. Drunken, rich Newport partiers were so much different from SoCal kids. Our beach bars back home had ice luges and goldfish races and airy ocean breezes. The faint smell of weed lingering in the air—not Polo cologne and good Cuban cigars.
Scents I'd come to identify with wealth and privilege.
"Girl, that was so awkward. I wanted to fold myself up inside my purse. Please don't make me do that again. You need to tell Spencer about West."
