Legasea by Krystalyn Drown

Chapter Two

I pushed myself into a sitting position. The new boy from next door was standing before me. Well, it wasn’t technically next door, but it was the only other house on our stretch of the beach, so even though they lived about four or five blocks away, they were our only neighbors. And complete strangers.

Neither he nor his sister had ever showed up at school, and no one knew much about them other than what groceries they bought at the Pack ‘n Save. We all knew they were fishers because they had a deal with Bill’s Seafood Shack, but they didn’t have a boat or sign at the marina, and they didn’t advertise their business on the bulletin board at my dad’s bait shop. In fact, the only boat they seemed to own was a small rowboat tied to the crumbling pier behind their house. They used it nearly every night, but how they used it to catch such a large amount of fish was anybody’s guess.

In the three weeks since they’d moved in, I’d seen him come and go, but had never gotten a close-up look. Now that I had the opportunity, I couldn’t look away. The moon highlighted each feature perfectly. He had dark, shoulder length hair, tanned skin, and really nice muscles. He wasn’t wearing a shirt, and his bathing suit sat low enough that I could appreciate those lines that well-toned guys get just inside their hips. What he was doing swimming at two a.m. was beyond me, yet here he was, water dripping from his hair, landing on his shoulders and sliding down his … wow.

My eyes must have bugged out, because he plopped down beside me, forcing me to look him in the eye.

“I’m Jamie,” he said. He had the largest brown eyes I’d ever seen, darker and more fathomless than Fee’s. A person could get lost in them.

“I’m, um …” Please don’t let him see me blush. Please don’t let him see me blush. “Aileen.”

“What’s wrong?” He pointed to just under my eye where a tear or two dotted my cheek.

I scrunched my shoulders up and dropped my chin, so my hair covered my face. “Stupid stuff,” I said, because I felt stupid that he’d caught me crying. And because the real answer, “My parents don’t understand me,” seemed trite.

I didn’t hear anything for a while. I thought maybe he’d left, but when I straightened up and tucked my hair behind my ears, he was swishing his feet lazily in the water. The dinoflagellates created a soft blue glow around his ankles. When he noticed me looking, he began carving patterns in the water: bioluminescent spirals and triangles, and something faintly resembling a fish.

I stuck my feet in and joined him, flicking my toes in the water and trying to see how far I could send the spray. Of course, I splashed him while I was doing that, and he returned fire. Pretty soon the two of us were laughing and kicking and soaking each other. It was the lightest I’d felt all night. The cold water seeped into my skin and found my soul. It completed me.

Only after there was nothing left to soak, did we call a truce. Exhausted, we lay back on the rock, our faces turned toward each other as our toes dangled in the water. It was warm for a May evening, but with my wet clothes clinging to me and the cool night wind, a tiny shiver ran through me. I barely felt it though. In fact, I couldn’t stop smiling.

“The water helps, doesn’t it?” said Jamie. “If you’ve had a bad day.”

It always helps. Bad day or not. “Is that why you’re here?”

He grinned. His teeth formed a crooked line between his lips. “Something like that.”

What do you mean? Why were you out tonight? Did you come to meet me or were you really just swimming? “That’s cool.”

He pushed himself to his feet. “It’s pretty late. I should go.”

I sat up too. Jamie … wait … “Okay. I’ll see you around.”