Page 16 of What August Heard
I watched him go.
Behind me, Callie made a sound that was not quite a word.
I turned around. She was pressing her lips together. Poppy was smiling at the sky.
“Don’t,” I said.
“I didn’t say anything,” Callie said.
“Don’t.”
I turned back to the water.
I am not fine,I thought.
The water was cold and my heart was going too fast and Fletcher Calloway had just pulled me out of the ocean with both hands and looked at me like I was the only thing he could see, and he was going to go back up that beach and sit next to Margaux in her Zimmermann dress and I was going to stand here in the Atlantic Ocean and be completely, totally fine.
I looked up at the beach.
Margaux was watching from her chair. Her sunglasses were on. Her arms were crossed over her chest.
She was looking right at me.
I turned back to the water and waded in a little deeper.
***
Chapter 6
Fletcher
“You can tell a good fish by the gills.”
Dad had been saying this for ten minutes. August was listening like it was the most interesting thing she’d ever heard, her elbows on the kitchen counter, chin in her hands, nodding at exactly the right moments.
“Under the gills,” Dad said, lifting the barramundi so she could see. “You look for bright red. Not dark, not brown. Red. My father taught me that when I was seven years old. We’d go to the market every Saturday morning, just the two of us, and he’d make me check every fish before he’d buy it.”
“That is such a good memory,” August said. “I love that.”
“It’s a disgusting memory,” Margaux said.
We all looked at her.
She was standing near the kitchen island with her wine, the third glass since we’d come in from the beach. She had her free hand pressed flat against her collarbone like she was bracing for impact.
“I’m sorry,” she said, “but I cannot eat that fish if we keep describing what’s under its face. I just can’t. I’ll have the salad.”
“The salad has anchovies,” Callie said.
Margaux looked at the salad bowl.
“I’ll have the bread,” she said.
The kitchen was full and warm. Mom had the grill going on the back counter, the smell of the fish mixing with the herb butter she’d brushed on it. Callie and Poppy were at the far end of the island building what Poppy had announced at four o’clock would be a dessert bar. It had ice cream, four toppings, sprinkles, and a handwritten menu card that Poppy had made herself. Callie was scooping. Poppy was supervising and making changes to the menu card.
August and I were making the salad.
It had happened the way things between us always happened — without either of us arranging it. Mom had handed out tasks and somehow August ended up next to me at the counter with the cutting board and a bowl of cherry tomatoes, and I ended up next to her, and there we were.
