Chasing Forever Down (Great White Surf Saga, #1) [Wattpad Featured Story] | ✔

Chapter 23: Leaving California

The scent of charcoal fills the guest house as Reed fires up the grill out back. I'm ready for next summer for Reed's cooking alone. Strick is quite the housewife, even though he'd kill me and Alston both if he knew we said that behind his back.

Linzi makes more noise than necessary packing her things in the room next to me. I think she's mad, partially at me for not telling her about Vin, and partially because she doesn't want to leave. I just hope she gets it all out of her system before the cross-country drive home with her.

My heart crumbles just a little as I take Zombie Asylum down from the shelf and pack them into my suitcase. I sniffle and blink my eyes a few times to keep from letting the tears fall. I'll do enough of that later on.

"Hey," Linzi says from my doorway. "Do you have anything I can wrap Sofia in? I don't want her to get broken on the drive back."

She holds Sofia up, and the bedroom light catches her just perfectly. Streaks of purple bounce off my walls, and now I can't help letting the tears fall.

"Damn it," I say, sitting back on the bed. My bay window is lonely. "I left Solomon at Colby freaking Taylor's house."

And I hate myself for it.

"We'll get him back," Linzi says. She comes inside the room and sits down next to me. "Any of the guys can get him. Hell, I'll go out there and get him right now. I'm not scared of Colby Taylor. We have leverage on him."

I laugh. Yes, we do. But we're not sinking to his level. I wipe the tears away and find the plastic bags our suncatchers came in and give them to Linzi for Sofia.

 "You know what? I'll be okay. Solomon was the one thing that was constant on the Spence Burks-Colby Taylor search, and I found all my answers. I found everything I needed. Surfer boy needs Solomon's light more than I do now."

"So we're leaving him?" Linzi asks.

"Yeah," I say nodding. I imagine him hanging there, sparkling blue, next to all those jars of paper stars and the drumsticks. He's surrounded by Shark's photography, surfboards, and Dexter.

"He's in good company," I say more to reassure myself than Linzi.

*****  

After dinner, Miles pops open a can of beer and chugs some of it, then raises it in the air.

"Toast!" he yells out. "To my boy, Topher – for his win today and for being the badass surfer that he is."

Topher holds up his hand to stop him. Then he raises his bottle of Ocean Blast Energy. "No, this one is for Shark McAllister, who taught me how to surf. And to my brother Vin, who taught me everything else."

"Hell yeah!" Kale says. He stands up and raises his beer can. "To all of you – for making me a part of your jacked up Hooligan family."

I wait just a second to make sure no one else is going to interrupt before I clink my Dr. Pepper can against Linzi's. Like Kale, I feel so insanely blessed to be here with this jacked up Hooligan family, to be surrounded by people who see the best in each other and don't take a second of their time together for granted.

The party moves outside, but I know the night's winding down. All of my things are packed. There'll be no sleeping in the guest house tonight. I won't be able to sleep period knowing what I'm leaving behind here. I grab Reed's Strickland's Boating hoodie off the couch inside and walk down to the shoreline to watch the waves roll in one last time before the sun officially sets.

"Are you gonna miss it?" Topher hollers out from behind me.

I glance over my shoulder to see him coming toward the shoreline. Miles and Kale are a few feet behind him.