Not my favorite chapter. It's kinda needed for plot progression, though. Kay.

seven

If it wasn’t for the fact that I was sixteen and the two girls on either side of me were sixteen and they both had a dearth of self-esteem issues (except maybe Riley—she was probably in therapy), then I could’ve practically been Hugh Hefner. Because right now, Riley Prescott and Lilah Tov were both in super skimpy (though Riley could claim hers was “classy”) bikinis, on either side of me. Like, they weren’t hanging on top of me (well, Lilah wasn’t), but it was late June and it was hot out and there were two girls with nice bodies by my side and the only problem I saw was that one of them happened to be Riley Prescott. But alas, Lilah didn’t have a clone, so maybe Riley was better than nothing. Or maybe nothing would’ve been better than Riley. Whatever.

           “Will, you seriously need to leave some hotness for the rest of us,” Riley told me with an untimely laugh as she grazed a few fingers over my forearm.

           “I’ll try,” I muttered, forcing a grin in her direction. Apparently, we were all okay now.

           Last night, I came back home from the Greens’ dock right in time for dessert. When I got to my seat, Riley was in hers, waiting for me. She apologized and told me that Charlie explained everything to her, and that she was “totally okay if [I] wanted to take things slow because of our lifelong friendship.” I wasn’t really sure what “everything” Charlie had explained to her, so once it was time for bed and Riley and Grace were safely tucked away on another floor of the house, I snuck into Charlie’s room and asked him. He essentially expressed to me that if I ruined my relationship with Riley, that wouldn’t bode well for our parents (or his sex life with Grace). But so long as I pretended to be interested in Riley, then everything would be okay. Because she was leaving in a few days, and I went to school in an entirely different state than she did, and all I had to do was play pretend. Charlie’s instructions had been very clear: “Pretend that your interested, set her up with a friend of yours, leave her in a ditch—I don’t care. Just don’t ruin this, and try not to break Riley’s heart too badly, okay?” I took a note from John Green and just said, “Okay.”

           So here I was now, lounging around my back lawn with Riley and Lilah, feeling like Hugh Hefner, and thinking that maybe one of my bunnies (Riley, obviously) contracted rabies, because she was acting a little crazy. Like, the second I introduced the two girls to each other (Riley dragged me outside and thankfully I saw Lilah tanning on the Greens’ lawn, so I called her over and yeah), I was a little afraid that Riley was going to run back into the house and stab Lilah. Even to a clueless guy like myself, it was clear that Riley Prescott most certainly did not like Lilah Tov. I wasn’t sure what Lilah’s sentiments were in regards to Riley, but I could only imagine that they weren’t all glowing with positivity. And now I was stuck entertaining Riley and making sure that she didn’t murder Lilah or severely violate my personal space.

           Charlie and Grace went into town today—well, that was what they told my parents and Grace’s parents when they all left for a golf tournament in the town over. In reality, Charlie and Grace were cooped up in Charlie’s room, probably doing a little more than just breaking in his bed. So maybe it was a good thing that I was outside instead of in the house today. Hearing Charlie and Grace go at it for hours wasn’t exactly my idea of a relaxing day.

           “So, Will,” Riley said, squeezing my bicep, “what are we doing?”

           “Well, uh, I thought that we could go on the boat,” I replied, wondering how one properly extracted a bicep from a very determined girl’s grasp.

           “Which one?” questioned the girl.

           “The sailboat?” I said in uncertainty.

           Riley clearly didn’t like that answer, so she came up with an alternative: “What about the cruiser?”

           “I mean, there’s only three of us, and it’s kind of big…”

           “Three?”

           “Yeah. You, Lilah, and me.”

           The younger Prescott sister then removed her hand from my arm so that she could use it to point at Lilah. “She’s coming with?” I didn’t even get a chance to respond before Riley voiced her full complaint: “But, Will! This was supposed to be our special time together!”

           “Riley,” I said in an undertone, “you’re being really rude right now.”

           She just shook her head and heaved out an, “I know, but I can’t help it!”

           “Try?” I begged for all parties involved.

           Her face contorted into a tough scowl, but she reluctantly agreed.

           And then Lilah, who had been exceptionally quiet, pondered, “Can we go canoeing?”

           “I just got my nails redone,” Riley said, displaying her acceptance by actually acknowledging Lilah’s proposal. “There is no way I’m going on a canoe.”

           “Like, you wouldn’t have to paddle,” Lilah continued. “Will and I’d do that.”

           Riley thought about it for a moment and then shook her head slowly. “I want to go on the cruiser.”

           “Sorry, Riley, but, uh, that’s not happening,” I told her. “It’s either the canoe or the sailboat.”

           The last time Riley went boating with me, we took my sailboat out, and she complained the entire time about how many ropes there were and how we weren’t going fast enough (I attributed our speed to the wind, but she didn’t seem to care). We barely even left shore before she already started complaining about how she wanted to get out. Which was why when she grudgingly said, “Fine. We’ll go canoeing,” I wasn’t surprised.

           After that, the three of us headed down to my (it was really owned by my parents, but whatever) dock and got to work. Well, it wasn’t so much the three of us that “got to work,” but rather Lilah and me, for Riley just got her nails redone, thus exempting her from coming in contact with dirt. While Lilah and I heaved the canoe off of some sandy land, Riley sat on the dock and watched. Which was totally fine, because as I knew from years of personal experience, Riley Prescott wasn’t that helpful when it came to physical things. Like, it was better that she was sitting on the dock, because if she had been trying to help, she would’ve complained and then maybe dropped the canoe on my toe. To risk the avoidance of an injury, I was glad that she was seated on the dock.

           Once Lilah and I managed to get the canoe (I wasn’t really sure why we even had a canoe—barely anyone ever used it) safely in the water, we then began our search for the oars. Lilah found one amidst a marshy patch of grass, and I found the other covered by mud and kelp. I washed mine off in the water and then lay it across the top of the canoe. Lilah did the same.

           Following that, I ran over to the shed and extracted three life vests. When I returned to the dock with the safety precautious in hand, both girls stared at me like I was suctioning the fun out of the entire day. But I knew canoes, and I knew that at times they weren’t the most reliable of floatation devices, thus providing a use for the life vests.

           “I am not wearing this, Will,” Riley told me as I dropped the bright orange thing in her lap. She picked it up with the use of two fingers and then flung it on the dock beside her.

           “I’m with her on this one,” Lilah said, holding out the vest that I had given her at an arm’s length away. “I don’t want to wear it.”

           “Do you want to drown?” I asked simply.

           “No,” both girls begrudgingly chorused in unison.

           “Then put on the life vests,” I instructed, pulling my own over my head. I secured the black strap around my waist and then buckled it.

           “But it’s orange, Will!” Riley protested. “And I seriously look so cute in this bikini! You wouldn’t want me to have to cover it up, would you?” She stuck out her chest as if it would change my mind. Like, I wasn’t really sure what the rationale behind that move was. What, would I suddenly remember that she had big boobs and then change my mind about the whole safety thing? Sometimes I just didn’t understand Riley Prescott. Or girls in general, for that matter.

           “Yeah,” Lilah nodded along, “it’s orange, and I look hot in my bikini!”

           Riley just rolled her eyes, probably thinking about the lack of originality in Lilah’s mocking assent and how Lilah couldn’t possibly look as good as Riley in a bikini.

           “Last I heard, orange was the new black,” I said, internally laughing at my all-too-clever reference. Neither of the girls, however, found it funny. So then I was like, “Seriously, just put the vests on.”

           With only one more complaint from Riley, the two girls then unwillingly put on the life vests. And though I didn’t admit it to them, they certainly looked better without the vests on. Orange really wasn’t their color, and I much preferred the lovely sight of their bikinis to life vests and legs. But they would thank me in the long term if one of them did spontaneously decide to jump off of the canoe and then forget to swim or something of the like. Life vests were just a safer bet.

           After establishing that they weren’t to remove their life vests, we all then boarded the canoe. Riley sat in the middle, facing me in the back, and Lilah sat in the front. Thankfully, Lilah had canoed before, so when she grabbed a paddle, she knew exactly what she was doing. The two of us synchronized our strokes so that our paddles hit the water at the same, though on opposite sides of the canoe. Within minutes, we had managed to evade the shoreline, and we were now farther from the docks and their houses. Everything was quiet and nice and going smoothly, but then Riley began to fidget.

           “Riley, you need to stop moving,” I told her.

           “I’m not moving, Will,” she said.

           “Then why is the canoe shaking?” I demanded.

           “Oh, because I’m moving,” Lilah replied casually.

           “Lilah, you should probably stop then,” I said.

           “Where’s the fun in that?”

           And then Lilah Tov dropped her oar in the water. Her eyes connected with mine, and then she averted them over to my oar. I knew exactly what she wanted to do. And I knew how much Riley was going to hate it. But nevertheless, I released my oar and put one hand on the edge of the canoe. Lilah put one of her hands on the same edge, though at the other end. Following that, we began to tip our bodies towards the water and pull the canoe with us. Riley began to shriek because she had no clue what was going on, but Lilah just laughed and laughed and laughed. Then, it happened. The canoe toppled over, upside down, into the water, capturing us along with it.

           Somehow, Riley managed to escape, so it was just Lilah and I under the now overturned canoe. Lilah was still laughing. I smiled.

           “Aren’t you glad you wore a life vest?” I said, the arched ceiling of the metallic boat making my voice reverberate.

           Even though it was dark, I could still see Lilah grin, because of the illumination from the water around us and the sun and all that stuff. But, yeah, she grinned and then began to wade over to me. Even though I knew that it could float, I held up the canoe due to a perfectly rational fear of getting crushed. And then Lilah came face to face with me.

           “I’ve always wanted to kiss someone in a capsized canoe,” she told me, glancing to down to the lower regions of my face.

           My heart stopped running for a second as she leaned in closer to me. And then to make up for its lost time, my heart began pumping on overdrive. Blood rushed to my ears, and my vision blurred as Lilah’s face kept inching nearer and nearer to mine. Then, when I thought she couldn’t get close enough without out lips meeting, she turned her head and kissed my cheek. She freaking kissed my cheek! She was right by my lips, barely a hair’s width away, and I could’ve leaned in and kissed her, but I didn’t. Because I wanted Lilah to have the choice whether or not to kiss me, because I was that type of guy, and evidently, she did, indeed, choose to kiss me. Just not the part of my body that I would’ve liked. We were hidden beneath a canoe in the middle of water, and Lilah Tov kissed my cheek. Honestly, it was the perfect make out spot, but why would we possibly make out when a lingering kiss on the cheek was so much more tantalizing? Christ, now I really wanted to kiss her.

           But of course, I couldn’t kiss Lilah, for she had already ducked under the water and disappeared before I had the chance. Although, even if I had the chance, I probably wouldn’t have kissed her, because, again, I wasn’t much of an initiator. Like, yeah, guys were supposed to make the first move according to gender norms and the rules of chivalry and all that crap, but when it came to kissing, all that went out the window for. Even with my first real girlfriend in eighth grade, I wasn’t the one who kissed her first. She kissed me. I knew that she wanted me to kiss her and I knew that she would’ve let me kiss her and I knew that I should’ve kissed her, but I couldn’t. By her kissing me first, it just wasn’t as scary. Maybe I was scared of rejection. In fact, I was pretty sure that that was it. I didn’t want a girl to turn me down, so I waited for them to kiss me. Well, usually.

           During the year, I happened to attend this snooty, crazy-expensive private school. It was boarding. Basically everyone there was loaded and had connections to the government or Wall Street or both or to the oil industry. Since there was all this money and we were a bunch of horny rich teens with nothing better to do, we often threw dorm parties on the weekends or occasionally on weekdays. I wasn’t a social pariah, so more often than not, I was at these said parties. There was usually some alcohol present, in addition to some nice fancy drugs. But I wasn’t interested in getting intoxicated or high. The vice that I typically gravitated towards was the girls.

           When you were stuck at a boarding school with nothing to do but party, girls became very appealing. Especially when they were so accessible. There were always girls at parties, and there were always girls who were desperate at parties, and thankfully for me, there were always girls who were desperate and wanted to hook up with me at parties. I wasn’t ugly (obviously), and my reputation wasn’t totally in shambles, so I had had my fair share of party hook ups. But because I knew that these hook ups wouldn’t last, I was okay with being the initiator. At parties, it wasn’t my goal to fall in love or find a girlfriend. I just wanted to hook up and maybe go a little further. That sounded pretty awful—going to parties to hook up with girls and all—but I was sixteen and I had really good taste in clothes and books and most of the time I did everything I was told, so whatever. At random parties, I was okay being the kisser, rather than the kissee. But in the real world, I preferred the more submissive role.

           In about seventh grade, Charlie sat me down at our kitchen table one day (he was on break from school) and told me everything I needed to know about girls. Now, this was only the first addition of this speech, for I had heard revised versions of it about three other times. But back then, both Charlie and I thought that everything he explained to me was everything that he needed to explain to me. He went over the whole sex thing and how easy girls who didn’t cry were the ones best to do it with (Charlie was still a virgin at the time, but I still considered him a sex sage). Then he briefly covered the benefits of boobs and butts and how if I got offered to “cup a feel,” the only answer was yes. The last thing Charlie told me about girls was that they wouldn’t make the first move, even if given the opportunity. That was our job, as men, to do. But even as a naïve thirteen-year-old, I thought that Charlie was wrong about that one. And I still did.

           Once I realized that Lilah really had, in fact, ditched me, I, too, held my breath and returned to the world of clear skies and Riley and Lilah. The two girls were floating by each other. Lilah looked fine as she gripped both oars, but Riley looked terrible. She had black smudges beneath her eyes and she was frantically flailing her arms and shouting nonsensical utterances.

           I let out a sigh and then swam over to Riley. When I reached her, she immediately grabbed on to me, and exclaimed, “WILL! I’m drowning! I think you might have to give me CPR!”

           After stablizing her, I began to swim us both over to the almost-sunken canoe. “I don’t know CPR, Riley,” I said, “and you’re still breathing.”

           “Who the hell doesn’t know CPR?” Lilah interjected. “Even I know it!”

           “Yeah, well, no offense, but I don’t really want your lips on mine,” Riley retorted to the other girl. “You just tried to kill me and I’m wet! But if you’re in the mood, Will…”

           “I’m not!” I said, releasing her by the side of the canoe. She grabbed on to the smooth bottom and began to panic once again.

           Lilah swam over to where we were and then helped me turn the canoe back over to its proper position. Riley immediately climbed in, despite the wobbliness, and began to breathe once again. Then Lilah and I boarded back on and grabbed our respective paddles. We began to row back to shore, without even having to articulate the decision aloud. Minus the four-inch pool of water on the bottom of the boat, no one would ever guess that it had just been capsized. It was practically as good as new.

           “So, do either of you want to explain what the heck that was?” Riley demanded, wringing out her drenched hair.

           “It’s called ‘capsizing,’” Lilah said, “and it’s really fun.”           

           “Is it? Because I thought that I was about to die!”

           “But you didn’t!”

           “Because of your life vest!” I interpolated quite fittingly.

           Lilah turned back to me and smirked.

           “Yeah, whatever,” Riley said. “I’m never going canoeing with you guy, like, ever again!” And though neither of us said anything, I was pretty sure that like me, Lilah was absolutely fine with that.