I'd thought the whole 'Berkeley vs Harvard' thing was bad enough, but this?

Lee sulked through the rest of our main course – and, to my astonishment, so did Noah. They both pulled faces and scowled and grumbled under their breath, stabbed at their food and cast the occasional glare at their parents.

They looked so alike in that moment that it was almost funny.

Almost.

Rachel, for her part, tried to keep the mood up. She tried to talk to Lee a few times, and, when that wasn't working, she talked to his parents with an enthusiasm that bordered on mania as she tried to beat past the silence that had settled.

I was still trying to get my head around it all.

Selling the beach house? I hadn't ever thought that would even be an option. It was the beach house. It was where we'd spent pretty much every summer of our lives. Some of my best memories had happened there. It was where Lee and I first swam without floaties! Where I got stung by a jellyfish when I was nine and made Noah give me a piggyback all the way back to the house. Where Lee got his first kiss, with a Latina lifeguard from upstate whose name none of us could remember now.

I glanced over at Noah, whose jaw was clenched. When we'd been growing up and Noah had suddenly got too cool to hang out with us any more, the beach house had been the one place where everything felt like it used to when we were still kids, where he'd hang out with us.

It was where we'd first drunk beer, snuck from a cooler one Fourth of July when we were thirteen – when Noah was starting to become a cool guy at school, breaking all the rules, but not so cool he couldn't include us in his little heist. (Although he had drawn the line at having us tag along to any parties he went to later on that same summer.)

They couldn't just sell. That wasn't how it worked.

Not for a place like the beach house.

It was so much more than just a piece of land, a bungalow with peeling paint and a dodgy pool filter.

My phone rang. A flash of guilt shot through me for not putting it on silent, but, instead of apologizing and shoving the phone back into my purse, I took the excuse to leave the table. 'I'm just gonna take this. I'll be right back.'

I tried not to run away from the sour mood hanging over our table.

It was an unknown number, but I answered anyway. 'Hello?'

'Hi. Is this Miss Evans?' a lady's voice asked curtly.

'Er, yes. Speaking.'

'Miss Evans, this is Donna Washington from the Office of Undergraduate Admissions at Berkeley.'

Oh, crap. Crap, crap, crap!

'Uh . . .'

I grit my teeth, my other hand coming up to clutch my cell phone, too. I cast a quick glance over my shoulder. Everyone was still sitting at the table, well out of earshot . . .

'I've tried to get hold of you several times in the last few weeks.'

My stomach squirmed. I wondered if I was about to puke my overpriced, fancy meal all over the wall in front of me. Gulping, I said, 'I'm sorry, I've . . . I've just been, like, insanely busy . . . You know, graduation, and – and stuff . . .'

Wow, Elle, great answer. It's easy to see how you got into places like Berkeley and Harvard with excuses like that.

'I'm sure you're already aware, if you've received my voicemails and our emails, that this call is to follow up on your decision regarding your attendance at Berkeley, starting in the fall.'

'Well, I . . . I was wondering if maybe – maybe it's possible to have a little extension . . .'

Donna Washington sounded like she was not taking any of my petty, indecisive BS today. Her already-curt tone became even more clipped. 'We've already granted you an extension beyond the usual deliberation period, Miss Evans.'

My hands began to sweat. 'I – I know, and I really appreciate that, but – please – I'm just . . . I just got off the waitlist somewhere else today, and I need the teensiest bit more time. Please?'

'Miss Evans,' Donna Washington interrupted, striking absolute terror in me for a second, 'I need to inform you that you have until Monday to accept your offer. If we do not hear from you by then, we will have no choice but to offer your spot to a waitlisted student.'

She waited for my answer. I was a little surprised; I half expected her to hang up the phone after that last piece.

'I understand,' I told her in a small voice. 'Thank you.'

I stayed there for another minute after hanging up. My breathing was uneven and my palms still sweating. I wiped them on my jeans.

Until Monday. That only gave me three days, including today.

Just a couple of days to make a potentially life- changing decision. And fess up to Lee and Noah. Totally fine. I could absolutely handle that.

. . . Maybe I could flip a coin?

Back at the table, I could see our desserts had arrived. Lee was waving a spoonful of ice cream around, talking agitatedly at his parents – undoubtedly arguing about the beach house again. Beside him, Noah was nodding, pitching in occasionally to back his little brother up.

Shoving my phone into my back pocket, I returned to the others.

'Back me up here, Elle,' Lee said, interrupting himself mid-sentence to get me involved. 'Berkeley isn't even that far from the beach house. It's not even in a different state! Even if we do get summer internships, or whatever, they'd probably be around here somewhere. We could totally still make it to the beach house. Right, Elle?'

'R-right.'

A pang of remorse tugged deep in my stomach.

It lessened slightly when I realized Lee had two sundaes in front of him that he'd been digging into in equal measure. He pushed the strawberry one back in front of me.

'Who was that on the phone?' June asked me instead of replying to Lee.

'Oh, uh, just my dad. You know, the usual. Needs me to babysit Brad.'

'Mom, you can't –'

'Lee, please.' His dad sighed, rubbing a knuckle between his eyes. 'This isn't up for debate. You kids were saying you were thinking about going up to the beach house this weekend, right? How about we all go and start sorting some things out? We've gotta clear everything out, clean the place up . . . Might as well make a start sooner rather than later, huh? Rachel, Elle, we could do with your help too, of course.'

I bristled slightly at being lumped in with Rachel. Like I was just Noah's girlfriend. And not like I was a part of this family and had spent a bunch of summers at the beach house with them, too. Like they hadn't said to me a thousand times, 'It's just as much your home here as it is ours, Elle!' and like I hadn't treated it exactly like that for basically my whole life.

'Happy to help,' Rachel squeaked, sounding like she didn't have a lot of choice.

'Oh, I'm gonna be there,' I heard myself snapping.

June put a hand lightly over mine for a second. 'Fine,' Noah barked.

'But just know,' Lee declared, 'we are not happy about this.'

I glowered down at what he'd left of my dessert.

Yeah, that's not all we're not happy about.

My cell was burning a hole in my pocket. Forget the beach house, I wanted to say. What the hell am I going to do about college?

My gaze slid between the Flynn brothers: Lee, grumbling to Rachel and pouting, looking more hurt than anything else; and Noah, who caught my eye and gave me a crooked smile.

Lee and Berkeley, or Harvard and Noah? I had only three days to decide.

******

There you have it - the first three chapters of the final book in The Kissing Booth series! Thanks for reading and I really hope you've enjoyed it so far. 

The movie is out now, and you can order the book, ebook and audiobook wherever you are in the world through the links in the external link. Or, wherever you like buying books! 

Make sure you're following me on Twitter @Reekles and Instagram @authorbethreekles for behind the scenes content and more book news - there's plenty more in store!