Page 48 of Exchanged

“You look great.” The blue-gray of the material matches his eyes and warms his hair into an August sunset.

He pays for it with his parents’ credit card and pulls it on before we leave the store. We step out onto the street. Instead of returning to the car, we walk down to the lake.

We hit a stretch of beach and follow it until it rounds a curve, and then Blue Harbor is hidden from sight and we are alone with nothing but pine forest and lake. Waves pummel the shore as we walk, whitecaps crashing down on millions of small stones. This has always been my favorite version of Lake Superior. I feel so alive walking next to a force of nature that could swallow me up and never notice. I like that there are still things on this planet that have that kind of power.

We walk in silence for a bit, and I begin to feel awkward. Last Friday night hangs between us like a strange secret we both hold but refuse to mention. I’ve run through what happened countless times: the way his hand clasped my wrist, pulling me toward him, the way his eyes found mine, the way his lips opened. And the way he shut down, closing the possibility of anything further.

“Turns out it doesn’t suck to be outside when you have a real jacket,” Garrett observes, pulling me back to reality.

“Just wait until January.”

He looks at me sideways. “Seriously. I need you to be honest with me: Are we all going to die? Because y’all talk about winter like it’s a six-month-long horror movie.”

Y’all. It’s the first time I’ve heard him use that word since Evan was an asshole about it at the party.

“It’s not that bad.”

“You’re lying.”

“No I’m not.”

He nudges me playfully with his shoulder, hands stuffed in his pockets. “Absolutely. Your eyes did that thing where they narrow, and then your lips…” He stops himself, swallows. Then, “They complain about the weather all the time in Georgia, too. But it’s the heat that’ll get to you.”

“And you like it hot?” I realize the double meaning as soon as the words are out of my mouth, and immediately pray that Lake Superior will take me, that it will sweep me out to sea with a merciful riptide.

“I love it hot.” He gives me a smirk.

“Well, lucky for you, climate change is making most of the United States hotter. They say that by mid-century, some places might be unlivable.” I close my eyes. I consider ending this conversation by walking straight into the lake.

He watches me with a small smile on his face. “You stress about the environment a lot?”

“Doesn’t everyone?”

“No. Not really.”

“But you do, right?” It sounds more like an accusation than a question, and now I’ve become his sustainability manager.

“I don’t get that stressed about most things.”

The waves crash ashore with increasing intensity, and each time they withdraw, they pull thousands of the coastline’s small rocks with them, creating a tumbling percussive cascade. The gray of the water and the gray of the sky feel endless and pressing, like the entirety of winter is bearing down on us from the north.

He lets out a deep breath. “I get it,” he says. “Why you love it here.”

I do love it. I love the cold sky and the dark water and the stark shoreline with an ache that makes the possibility of leaving this place feel like the end of everything I care about.

“I guess the future is out there, though,” I say.

“Because you,” he agrees, “are going to attend a kick-ass music school and become the next John Williams.”

He tells me this with the same certainty he describes his own future, as if aspirations and reality are the same thing to him. He only believes in me this much because he doesn’t understand the world of music, how cutthroat it is, how painful. But no one has ever sounded this confident in my ability to do what I want with my future, so I tell him.

I tell him about Burton-Clark and its amazing composition program, how it’s almost impossible to get in and unimaginably expensive. How, more than anything, I want to write scores for film soundtracks, give wings to the stories crafted by actors and writers and directors. How lately, at night, the music has become unstoppable, and I need to write, need to let it out, even if it’s not polished or original or melodic.

It’s only a dream, but speaking the words—especially to someone who sees dreams as road maps and not impossibilities—makes it tangible, like I could reach out and touch it. As we wander along the beach, he listens, nodding, asking questions, taking me seriously. And when all of these words are out, I can’t take them back, like I’ve set something in motion, like I could speak this possible future into existence. For once, I’m not fixated on the roadblocks or the cost.

When I finish, he looks at me thoughtfully. His cheeks are flushed, and his eyes match the expansive gray of the sky behind him. “Well, when can I hear your music?”

The thought of him listening to something I’ve written is scarier than a panel of faceless admissions counselors at an elite conservatory doing so. “You already have. At Casino Night.”