Nicholas Sparks - The Last Song

“I don’t believe you.”

“They did,” Jonah said. “To protect the art.”

“I’m not talking to you, Jonah!” She turned back to her dad. “Let’s get one thing straight. You’re not going to spend this summer treating me like I’m still a little girl! I’m eighteen years old!”

“You won’t be eighteen until August twentieth,” Jonah said behind her.

“Would you please stay out of this!” She whirled around to face him. “This is between me and Dad.”

Jonah frowned. “But you’re not eighteen yet.”

“That’s not the point!”

“I thought you forgot.”

“I didn’t forget! I’m not stupid.”

“But you said-”

“Would you just shut up for a second?” she said, unable to hide her exasperation. She swiveled her gaze back to her dad, who’d continued to play, never missing a note. “What you did last night was…” She stopped, unable to put all that was going on, all that had happened, into words. “I’m old enough to make my own decisions. Don’t you get that? You gave up the right to tell me what to do when you walked out the door. And would you please listen to me!”

Abruptly, her dad stopped playing.

“I don’t like this little game you’re playing.”

He seemed confused. “What game?”

“This! Playing the piano every minute I’m here! I don’t care how much you want me to play! I’m never going to play the piano again! Especially not for you!”

“Okay.”

She waited for more, but there was nothing.

“That’s it?” she asked. “That’s all you’re going to say?”

Her dad seemed to debate how to answer. “Do you want breakfast? I made some bacon.”

“Bacon?” she demanded. “You made bacon?”

“Uh-oh,” Jonah said.

Her dad glanced at Jonah.

“She’s a vegetarian, Dad,” he explained.

“Really?” he asked.

Jonah answered for her. “For three years. But she’s weird sometimes, so it makes sense.”

Ronnie stared at them in amazement, wondering how the conversation had been hijacked. This wasn’t about bacon, this was about what happened last night. “Let’s get one thing straight,” she said. “If you ever send the police to bring me home again, I won’t just refuse to play the piano. I won’t just go home. I’ll never, ever speak to you again. And if you don’t believe me, try me. I’ve already gone three years without talking to you, and it was the easiest thing I’ve ever done.”

With that, she stomped back to her room. Twenty minutes later, after showering and changing, she was out the door.

***

Her first thought as she trudged through the sand was that she should have worn shorts.

It was already hot, the air thick with humidity. Up and down the beach, people were already lying on towels or playing in the surf. Near the pier, she spotted half a dozen surfers floating on their boards, waiting for the perfect wave.

Above them, at the head of the pier, the festival was no more. The rides had been disassembled and the booths had already been hauled away, leaving behind only scattered garbage and food remnants. Moving on, she wandered through the town’s small business district. None of the stores were open yet, but most were the kind she’d never set foot in anyway-touristy beach shops, a couple of clothing stores that seemed to specialize in skirts and blouses that her mom might wear, and a Burger King and McDonald’s, two places she refused to enter on principle. Add in the hotel and half a dozen upscale restaurants and bars, and that was pretty much it. In the end, the only interesting locales were a surf shop, a music store, and an old-fashioned diner where she could imagine hanging out with friends… if she ever made any.

She headed back to the beach and skipped down the dune, noting that the crowds had multiplied. It was a gorgeous, breezy day; the sky overhead was a deep, cloudless blue. If Kayla had been here, she’d even consider spending the day in the sun, but Kayla wasn’t here and she wasn’t about to put on her suit and go sit by herself. But what else was there to do?

Maybe she should try to get a job. It would give her an excuse to be out of the house most of the day. She hadn’t seen any “Help Wanted” signs in the windows downtown, but someone had to be hiring, right?

“Did you make it home okay? Or did the cop end up making a pass at you?”

Looking behind her, Ronnie saw Blaze squinting up at her from the dune. Lost in thought, she hadn’t even noticed her.

“No, he didn’t make a pass at me.”

“Oh, so you made a pass at him?”

Ronnie crossed her arms. “Are you done?”

Blaze shrugged, her expression mischievous, and Ronnie smiled.

“So what happened after I left? Anything exciting?”

“No. The guys took off and I don’t know where they went. I ended up just crashing at Bower’s Point.”

“You didn’t go home?”

“No.” She got to her feet, brushing the sand from her jeans. “Do you have any money?”

“Why?”

Blaze stood straight. “I haven’t eaten since yesterday morning. I’m kind of hungry.”

Will stood in the well beneath the Ford Explorer in his uniform, watching the oil drain while simultaneously doing his best to ignore Scott, something easier said than done. Scott had been haranguing him about the previous evening on and off since they’d arrived at work that morning.

“See, you were thinking about this all wrong,” Scott continued, trying yet another tack. He retrieved three cans of oil and set them on the shelf beside him. “There’s a difference between hooking up and getting back together.”

“Aren’t we done with this yet?”

“We would be if you had any sense. But from where I stand, it’s obvious you were confused. Ashley doesn’t want to get back together with you.”

“I wasn’t confused,” Will said. He wiped his hands on a towel. “That’s exactly what she was asking.”

“That’s not what Cassie told me.”

Will set aside the towel and reached for his water bottle. His dad’s shop specialized in brake repairs, oil changes, tune-ups, and front-end alignments, and his dad always wanted the place to look as though the floor had been waxed and the place just opened for business. Unfortunately, air-conditioning hadn’t been quite as important to him, and in the summer, the temperature was somewhere between the Mojave and the Sahara. He took a long drink, finishing the bottle before trying to get through to Scott again. Scott was far and away the most stubborn person he’d ever known. The guy could seriously drive him nuts.

“You don’t know Ashley the way I do.” He sighed. “And besides, it’s over and done. I don’t know why you keep talking about it.”

“You mean aside from the fact that Harry didn’t meet Sally last night? Because I’m your friend and I care about you. I want you to enjoy this summer. I want to enjoy this summer. I want to enjoy Cassie.”

“So go out with her, then.”

“If only it was that easy. See, last night I suggested the same thing. But Ashley was so upset that Cassie didn’t want to leave her.”

“I’m really sorry it didn’t work out.”

Scott was dubious. “Yeah, I can tell.”

By that point, the oil had drained. Will grabbed the cans and headed up the steps while Scott stayed below to replace the plug and dump the used oil into the recycling barrel. As Will opened the can and set the funnel, he glanced at Scott below.

“Hey, by the way, did you see the girl who stopped the fight?” he asked. “The one who helped the little boy find his mom?”

It took a moment for the words to register. “You mean the vampire chick in the cartoon shirt?”

“She’s not a vampire.”

“Yeah, I saw her. On the short side, ugly purple streak in her hair, black fingernail polish? You poured your soda over her, remember? She thought you smelled.”

“What?”

“I’m just saying,” he said, reaching for the pan. “You didn’t notice her expression after you slammed into her, but I did. She couldn’t get away from you fast enough. Hence, you probably smelled.”

“She had to buy a new shirt.”

“So?”

Will added the second can. “I don’t know. She just surprised me. And I haven’t seen her around here before.”

“I repeat: So?”

The thing was, Will wasn’t exactly sure why he was thinking about the girl. Particularly considering how little he knew about her. Yeah, she was pretty-he’d noticed that right off, despite the purple hair and dark mascara-but the beach was full of pretty girls. Nor was it the way she’d stopped the fight in its tracks. Instead, he kept coming back to the way she’d treated the little boy who’d fallen. He’d glimpsed a surprising tenderness beneath her rebellious exterior, and it had piqued his curiosity.

She wasn’t like Ashley at all. And it wasn’t that Ashley was a bad person, because she wasn’t. But there was something superficial about Ashley, even if Scott didn’t want to believe it. In Ashley’s world, everyone and everything was put into neat little boxes: popular or not, expensive or cheap, rich or poor, beautiful or ugly. And he’d eventually grown tired of her shallow value judgments and her inability to accept or appreciate anything in between.

But the girl with the purple streak in her hair…

He knew instinctively that she wasn’t that way. He couldn’t be absolutely sure, of course, but he’d bet on it. She didn’t put others into neat little boxes because she didn’t put herself in one, and that struck him as refreshing and different, especially when compared with the girls he’d known at Laney. Especially Ashley.

Though things were busy at the garage, his thoughts kept drifting back to her more often than he expected.

Not all the time. But enough to make him realize that for whatever reason, he definitely wanted to get to know her a little better, and he found himself wondering whether he would see her again.

Blaze led the way to the diner Ronnie had seen on her walk through the business district, and Ronnie had to admit that it did have some charm, particularly if you were fond of the 1950s. There was an old-fashioned counter flanked with stools, the floor was black and white tiles, and cracked red vinyl booths lined the walls. Behind the counter, the menu was written on a chalkboard, and as far as Ronnie could tell, the only change to it in the last thirty years had been the prices.

Blaze ordered a cheeseburger, a chocolate shake, and French fries; Ronnie couldn’t decide and ended up ordering only a Diet Coke. She was hungry, but she wasn’t exactly sure what kind of oil they used in their deep fryer, and neither, it seemed, was anyone else at the diner. Being a vegetarian wasn’t always easy, and there were times when she wanted to give up the whole thing.

Like when her stomach was growling. Like right now.

But she wouldn’t eat here. She couldn’t eat here, not because she was a vegetarian-on-principle kind of person, but because she was vegetarian-because-she-didn’t-want-to-feel-sick kind of person. She didn’t care what other people ate; it was just that whenever she thought about where meat actually came from, she’d imagine a cow standing in a meadow or Babe the pig, and she’d feel herself getting nauseated.

Blaze seemed happy, though. After she placed her order, she leaned back in the booth. “What do you think about the place?” she asked.

“It’s neat. It’s kind of different.”

“I’ve been coming here since I was a kid. My dad used to bring me every Sunday after church for a chocolate shake. They’re the best. They get their ice cream from some tiny place in Georgia, but it’s amazing. You should get one.”

“I’m not hungry.”

“You’re lying,” Blaze said. “I heard your stomach growling, but whatever. It’s your loss. But thanks for this.”

“No big deal.”

Blaze smiled. “So what happened last night? Are you like… famous or something?”

“Why would you ask that?”

“Because of the cop and the way he singled you out. There had to be a reason.”

Ronnie made a face. “I think my dad told him to go find me. He even knew where I lived.”

“Sucks being you.”

When Ronnie laughed, Blaze reached for the saltshaker. After tipping it over, she began sprinkling salt onto the table while using a finger to mold it into a pile.

“What did you think of Marcus?” she asked.

“I didn’t really talk to him. Why?”

Blaze seemed to choose her words carefully. “Marcus never liked me,” she said. “Growing up, I mean. I can’t say that I liked him very much, either. He was always kind of… mean, you know? But then, I don’t know, a couple of years ago, things changed. And when I really needed someone, he was there for me.”

Ronnie watched the salt pile grow. “And?”