“You and Cam have been spending a lot of time together,” my mother said, looking at me over her newspaper.
“Not really,” I said, even though we had been. At the summer house one day just kind of melted into the next; you didn’t notice time passing. Cam and I had been hanging out for two weeks before I realized it: He was kind of my boyfriend. We’d spent practically every day together. I didn’t know what I’d done before I’d met him. My life must have been really boring.
My mother said, “We miss you around the house.” If Susannah had said it, I’d have been flattered, but from my mother it was just really annoying. It felt like recrimination. And anyway, it wasn’t like they’d been around so much either. They were always off doing things, just the two of them.
“Belly, will you bring this boy of yours to dinner tomorrow night?” Susannah asked me sweetly.
I wanted to say no, but for me, saying no to Susannah was impossible. Especially with her going through a divorce. I couldn’t say no. So instead I said, “Um… maybe…”
“Please, honey? I’d really like to meet him.”
I caved. “All right, I’ll ask. I can’t promise he doesn’t have plans, though.”
Susannah nodded serenely. “As long as you ask.”
Unfortunately for me, Cam didn’t have plans.
Susannah cooked; she made a tofu stir-fry because Cam was a vegetarian. Again, it was something I’d admired about him, but when I saw the look Jeremiah gave me, it made me shrink a little. Jeremiah cooked hamburgers that night—he liked any excuse to use the grill, just like his dad. He asked me if I wanted one too, and I said no even though I did.
Conrad had already eaten and was upstairs playing his guitar. He couldn’t even be bothered to eat with us. He came down to get a bottled water, and he didn’t even say hello to Cam.
“So why don’t you eat meat, Cam?” Jeremiah asked, stuffing half his burger into his mouth.
Cam swallowed his water and said, “I’m morally opposed to eating animals.”
Jeremiah nodded seriously. “But Belly eats meat. You let her kiss you with those lips?” Then he cracked up. Susannah and my mother exchanged a knowing kind of smile.
I could feel my face getting hot, and I could feel how tense Cam was beside me. “Shut up, Jeremiah.”
Cam glanced at my mother and laughed uneasily. “I don’t judge people who choose to eat meat. It’s a personal choice.”
Jeremiah continued, “So you don’t mind when her lips touch dead animal and then they touch your, um, lips?”
Susannah chuckled lightly and said, “Jere, give the guy a break.”
“Yeah, Jere, give the guy a break,” I said, glaring at him. I kicked him under the table, hard. Hard enough to make him flinch.
“No, it’s fine,” Cam said. “I don’t mind at all. In fact—” Then he pulled me to him and kissed me quickly, right in front of everyone. It was only a peck, but it was embarrassing.
“Please don’t kiss Belly at the dinner table,” said Jeremiah, gagging a little for effect. “You’re making me nauseous.”
My mother shook her head at him and said, “Belly’s allowed to kiss.” Then she pointed her fork at Cam. “But that’s it.”
She burst out laughing like it was the funniest thing she’d ever said, and Susannah tried not to smile and told her to hush. I wanted to kill my mother and then myself. “Mom, please. You’re so not funny,” I said. “No more wine for Mom.” I refused to look anywhere near Jeremiah’s direction, or Cam’s, for that matter.
The truth was, Cam and I hadn’t done much else besides kiss. He didn’t seem to be in any big hurry. He was careful with me, sweet—nervous even. It was completely different from the way I’d seen other guys behave with girls. Last summer I caught Jeremiah with a girl on the beach, right outside of the house. They were frantic, like if they hadn’t been wearing clothes, they’d already have been having sex. I gave him hell for it the whole rest of the summer, but he didn’t really care. I wished Cam would care a little more.
“Belly, I’m kidding. You know I’m open to you exploring yourself,” my mother said, taking a long sip of chardonnay.
Jeremiah busted out laughing. I stood up and said, “That’s it. Cam and I are eating our dinner on the porch.” I grabbed my plate and waited for Cam to stand up too.
But he didn’t. “Belly, calm down. Everybody’s just joking around,” he said, loading up his fork with rice and bok choy and shoveling it into his mouth.
“Way to keep her in check, Cam,” Jeremiah said, nodding at him. He really did look kind of impressed.
I sat back down, although it killed me to do it. I hated losing face in front of everyone, but if I did walk out by myself, I knew no one would come after me. I would just be little Belly Button, off pouting again. That was my name when I was being a baby, Belly Button—Steven thought he was such a genius for thinking that one up. “No one keeps me in check, Jeremiah. Least of all Cam Cameron.”
Everyone hooted and hollered then, even Cam, and all of a sudden, it was all very normal, like he really belonged there. I could feel myself start to relax. It was all going to be okay. Great, in fact. Amazing, just like Susannah had promised.
After dinner, Cam and I took a walk on the beach. For me there was—is—nothing better than walking on the beach late at night. It feels like you could walk forever, like the whole night is yours and so is the ocean. When you walk on the beach at night, you can say things you can’t say in real life. In the dark you can feel really close to a person. You can say whatever you want.
“I’m really glad you came,” I told him.
He took my hand and said, “Me too. I’m glad you’re glad.”
“Of course I’m glad.”
I let go of his hand to roll up the bottoms of my jeans, and he said, quietly, “It didn’t seem like you were that glad.”
“Well, I am.” I looked up at him and gave him a quick kiss. “See? This is me, being glad.”
He smiled and we started walking again. “Good. So which one of those guys was your first kiss?”
“I told you that?”
“Yup. You said your first kiss was a boy at the beach when you were thirteen.”
“Oh.” I looked up at his face in the moonlight, and he was still smiling. “Guess.”
Immediately he said, “The older one, Conrad.”
“Why’d you guess him?”
He shrugged. “Just a feeling, the way he looks at you.”
“He hardly looks at me at all,” I told him. “And you’re wrong, Sextus. It was Jeremiah.”
