Starting With You

33. Hands off, jackoff. Return to Jensen.

Teddy

LAKE HOPE IS A VIBRANT MIX OF red, white and blue as the town celebrates Memorial Day. Everyone is gathered at the park by the lake, with rows of canopies that families set up the night before staking their claim on the prime spots.

Each canopy houses a table with food and drinks to share and games to play. Sloppy jos, kabobs, burgers, brats, hotdogs, pulled pork sandwiches. Cookies, brownies, pies, cupcakes, and so many other desserts dressed up to resemble an American flag with various fruit. Cornhole, golfing greens, horseshoes, badminton, lawn Jenga, water balloons and squirt guns.

Every family has their thing they're known for and continue to do year after year. The Andersons? They make up pounds and pounds of taco meat, buy dozens and dozens of single serve Doritos bags and all the fixings for walking tacos.

Eating a taco salad out of a mini Doritos bag is easily a highlight for many, including myself. Then there are those who ruin the experience and dump it all out onto a paper plate, like my very grumpy, fun-hating boyfriend, which is what he is currently doing, his big body sprawled out in a camping chair with the flimsy paper plate balanced on his lap.

"What?" he asks between bites.

I stir my plastic fork around my Doritos bag, mixing in the taco sauce, before digging out a big bite and shoving it into my mouth. "Why must you ruin the fun of a walking taco?" I ask with a full mouth.

"Not this again, Teddy. It's a fucking taco. Who cares how I eat it?"

"Everyone. Everyone cares." I point my fork at my friend who is lining up to make her own walking taco. "Ry? You care?"

"Pretty sure you can judge a person on the way they eat a walking taco. And Jensen would definitely qualify as psychopath. Sorry, dude, but it's facts." She crunches up the chips in her bag before adding a few scoops of taco meat.

"So you're an expert on psychopath qualifications, huh?" Finn asks as he scoots up next to Rylie in the walking taco line. "Or is it more like a 'takes one to know one' type deal?"

Rylie side-eyes him, a slow grin spreading across her face. "You tell me, Finny. Can you spot a psychopath from a mile away? You know, since it takes one to know one?"

He smirks at her like he's gearing up with a saucy comeback, but it's interrupted by a banging sound behind the table.

"Shit," Vivi curses, quickly bending to pick up the box of Doritos she knocked over. When she stands, there's a pink tint on her cheeks. She rubs the back of her wrist over her forehead, revealing a folded piece of paper in her hand. She fans it over her flushed face.

"What the hell, Viv?" Sutton rounds the table to her stepsister, placing a hand on Vivi's wrist to stop her movements. "What's this?" She points to the paper in Vivi's hand and then her eyes go wide. "Is this another one?"

Vivi stares at her, nodding slowly. When Sutton tries to tear the paper out of her hands, Vivi pulls away abruptly, taking a few steps back. She clutches the paper behind her back, shaking her head.

"Let's read it," Sutton says, inching her way closer to her sister with an outstretched hand, wiggling her fingers. "Come on."

Vivi shakes her head again. "No." The word is whispered.

"Fine, fine," Sutton sings. She makes like she's going to turn away, and right when it looks like Vivi is settling her tense body, Sutton lunges forward and steals the paper out of Vivi's hand. When Vivi tries to grab it back, Sutton dances around and hides behind Kelly, his tall and broad frame blocking her.

Unfolding the paper, Sutton reads aloud, "You're like a burst of sunshine on this fine day." A laugh bubbles out of her as she steps around Kelly. She points the paper at Vivi. "Oh, shit, Viv. These keep getting better and better."