Old Orchard

Carla

"Craig! What are you doing here?" my sister brittles out in her oh-my-gosh type of voice. Flying into the room, you would think he has gone a year without seeing his best friend – which he is in love with – instead of a couple of months.

"Late graduation present" Craig shrugs as if his dad did not show up to graduation and that buying him a plane ticket to Maine to surprise his friend would make up for his absence. I sulk around the two of them to get to the couch when I spot Luke sitting there watching the two of them. This will be good. He coughs, letting them know that other people are in the room.

"Oh, this is Luke," Annabelle says to Craig, whose left eyebrow arches as in he is asking, how do you know one another look. "He works at the shelter, and he knew my grandmother," she finishes answering his unspoken question. "Luke, this is Craig – my best friend from home." I want to stop her and say a best friend who is backflipping over the moon in love with you as if him not putting a guilt trip on his dad into buying him a ticket to see you is not evidence of that. Oh, and did I mention he just told me he is still going to drive out for the big Fourth of July bash... Still.

I sit on the old green chair that is still in pristine condition. Grams always kept a blanket on it, so you were not sitting on the original fabric when people sat down. If it were the sixties, these couches would look brand new, but you can tell they are old since they are out of date. I am not a fan of corduroy on anything. I hope I can talk my dad into buying some new furniture before they come to see us. Hopefully, I can persuade him into seeing it as an early birthday gift.

Luke raises his body off of the couch and looks at Annabelle as if he will say something but heads for the door. He gets enough courage to say whatever it is because he turns around. "Are we still going running in the morning?" Oh, this is news to me. It must be how they know each other so well. I will have to pepper her with questions about him after Craig goes to bed.

"Cool. I have always wanted to go for a morning jog on the beach," Craig speaks before Annabelle can respond. I want to laugh. Craig – working out? I cannot remember the last time he did any physical workout besides swimming and golfing. He has always made fun of Annabelle for running – he tried getting her to go out for the track team, but even then, he thought it was ridiculous to be outside running around in circles. Annabelle's face screams that she is thinking the same thing as me. I know that he just wants to join in because he is jealous or territorial.

Logan must have been jealous to send me that message. I had not heard back from him since I had sent my last message to him. I figured I would not get a response since I responded three days after he sent it to me. I was already thinking of putting a picture of Oliver and me up the next time we hung out – maybe then I would get a response from him. I am shaking the thoughts of him holding my hand out of my head, of him hugging me, of our first magical kiss.

After our paddle boat skip day, it was hard not to skip out on our tutoring session. Since I had been so committed to the tutoring lessons, I rarely had anyone checkup to make sure I was actually on school premises. To make myself feel better, I knew that Logan did not need a tutor deep down. If I had not been a senior, I would have asked Mr. Donners how they picked out who needed a tutor or not. At this point, I was still questioning why Logan was faking why he needed a tutor when he did not.

Sitting out on the beach on one of the last chilly fall days that year, I look up from my Staticis material and dare a peek at Logan from underneath my eyelashes. I let my eyes rake over his body as he works on his own work for school. I move from his dark mid-length hair to his blue eyes that are sweeping the book in front of him, and his eyes are drawn in, and I now knew this was his concentration look from the past few weeks I had been studying him. Sensing my eyes on him, he gave me that faint smile that I tried my hardest to pull on his face anytime I was with him. My stomach would start doing somersaults any time he looked at me, but when that smile appeared, it made everything go into overdrive. "Hey," he mumbles, still trying to keep the smile from jolting across his face.