Happy Place

WHILE MOST OF the Lobster Fest festivities are on the other side of town, the overflow has wound up here, at the salt-coated picnic tables on the graying Lobster Wharf, where coveralled lobstermen zigzag among the docked boats, the warehouse, and the walk-up stands.

Even after we’ve put in our orders, we’re waiting awhile until a table opens up near the band at the dock’s back corner. We slide onto the benches, and Wyn holds my thigh under the table. I set my hand over the top of his, trying to memorize this feeling.

Baskets of fries and crisp hot dog buns overflowing with fluffy lobster, heavily seasoned onion rings and fried haddock so soft that the plastic forks slice through it like it’s melting butter. Corn on the cob and tragic side salads loaded with red onion and sliced radish, and blueberry lemonade in red plastic diner cups.

“I’m going to go see how much the bar will charge me to add vodka to this,” Kimmy says, starting to rise.

“You might want to hold off on that,” Sabrina says, with a cryptic smile. I look to Parth, who gives a my-lips-are-sealed shrug.

With a delighted yet suspicious gleam in her eye, Kimmy sinks back onto her bench.

Wyn’s mouth drifts across my earlobe. It takes me a second to actually interpret what he’s saying through the barrage of fragmented memories from earlier: “You think she’s Postmatesing magic mushrooms to the table?”

I turn toward him, the ends of our noses almost touching. The globe lights strung overhead make his eyes glitter. “That or she’s taking us straight from here to a space camp zero-gravity chamber,” I say.

His hand creeps higher as he leans in. I turn to hear his whispered reply, but instead his lips meet the skin beneath my ear, a slow, soft kiss that makes me shiver closer.

Sabrina crumples a napkin as she stands. “Who’s ready for the next phase of the night?”

“Space camp, here we come,” I say.

•   •   •

WE FOLLOW THE residential street along the water. Even from here, we can hear the music coming from the festival on the far side of the harbor, along with the wharf band, like the two shores are opposite ends of a dueling piano bar.

Sabrina leads us down the long, skinny footbridge across the water, the sound of Patty Griffin’s “Long Ride Home” cross-fading into “It’s Still Rock and Roll to Me.”

“Where are we going?” Cleo asks.

“To fulfill a long-term goal,” Sabrina calls over her shoulder, picking up the pace. There’s an electricity in the air, a feeling of possibility.

Maybe it’s emanating from Wyn and me. Maybe every time our hands link, or he tugs me into his side or pulls me to a stop and presses me back against the guardrail for a kiss while the others keep walking, we let a little more charge into the air.

“Keep up,” Parth calls back to us.

Wyn brushes his lips against mine once more. “We’ll have time later,” he says.

Not enough, I think with a pang. How can I exorcise all this trapped, combustible love in one day? How can I stockpile pieces of him in the next twenty-four hours and then let him go, like he needs? Like he deserves.

I force myself to nod, and we catch up with the others.

The harbor sits in a basin, the waterfront lined with restaurants and docks, while the rest of the town rises up along curving and crisscrossing streets, wild and verdant gardens spilling over the sidewalk, tiny ferns dotting the lawns of the salt-weathered bed-and-breakfasts.

We make our way up one of these streets, past the dark windows of the Fudge & Taffy Factory and Skippy’s Popcorn, with its hundred different flavors on display behind glass. They’ll be open later for the weekend, but everything is already shuttered tonight.

Past the Warm Cup, we turn up a quiet side street. Easy Lane. It takes me a second to place why it’s familiar: I saw this street mentioned on the itinerary. Tomorrow morning, pre-wedding, Sabrina had scheduled personalized surprises for each of us, and the address for mine was 123 Easy Lane. Which I’d noted, specifically because naming a street Easy Lane instead of Easy Street struck me as a purposefully missed opportunity.

At the end of the first block of Easy Lane, Sabrina turns us down another street. Only two buildings are still aglow: a sprawling hotel and pub called the Hound & Thistle, and a black-trimmed storefront with off-white sans serif letters across its window reading TEMPEST TATTOO.

Sabrina stops and spins back to us, arms thrown out to her sides. “So,” she says, “what do you think?”

“Sab!” Kimmy says, pouncing on her. “You’re getting a tattoo?”

“Close,” she says. “We’re getting tattoos.”

No one reacts, apart from the strained smile Parth flashes and the twitch of Wyn’s fingers against mine. Kimmy’s gaze darts to Cleo, her grin flagging at Cleo’s stunned expression.

“We’ve talked about it forever,” Sabrina goes on, “and this is the perfect time. To commemorate our last trip to the cottage and the last ten years of friendship. Something that will always connect us.”

My stomach sinks, even as my heart feels like a crazed bird fighting its way up through my windpipe.

It’s one thing to accept that I might always be a little bit in love with Wyn Connor. It’s another to put a permanent reminder of that on my body. Before I’ve come close to finding a way out of this, Cleo says, “I don’t think so, Sab.”

You’d think the shocked silence might’ve prepared her for this, but Sabrina looks genuinely flabbergasted. “What do you mean you don’t think so?”

Cleo shrugs. “I don’t think we should get matching tattoos tonight.” Kimmy touches her arm, some unspoken sentiment passing between them.

Sabrina laughs. “Why not?”

“Because I don’t want to,” Cleo says. “And looking around, I’m not sure anyone else does either.”

Sabrina blinks and scans us.

“It’s not that,” I say. “It’s just . . . really sudden.”

“We’ve been talking about this for a decade,” she says.

“And we’ve never decided what it would even be,” Wyn says.

“Who cares what it is?” Sabrina says. “It’s about the bond.”

“Maybe next time,” I suggest. “We can pick a design tonight, and then everyone has some time to get used to it, and then—”

“I’ve already put a deposit down,” she says. “I got the shop to stay open for us.”

Cleo rubs the spot between her brows. “Sab. You should have asked us before you did that. You can’t assume we’ll go along with whatever you want.”

“What the hell does that mean, Cleo,” Sabrina says, hurt splashed across her face.

“She just means this is a big, permanent decision,” I say. “We all need a little time to commit to this kind of thing.”

“That’s not what I mean,” Cleo says calmly. “I meant what I said. That she can’t just decide how things should be between all of us and then bulldoze all of us to get her way.”

“She’s not bulldozing anyone,” Parth says, stepping in toward Sabrina. “She’s doing all of this for you all. This whole trip was for you. All of it.”

“If it’s for us,” Cleo says, “then you’ll respect my decision not to do something I’m uncomfortable with.”

“You have, like, nineteen separate tattoos,” Sabrina says. “What’s so uncomfortable about this one?”

“Can we please drop this?” Cleo says, averting her gaze.

“Sure,” Sabrina says. “I’ll drop it. I’ll drop the fact that one of my best friends keeps canceling plans and the other will barely text me back, and my dad’s selling the only place that’s ever felt anything like home to me, and that no one except me seems to give a fuck that we’re growing apart.”

She turns back toward where we left the car.

“I’ll talk to her,” I tell the others, chasing her down the sidewalk. When I catch up, I reach for her wrist. “Sabrina, wait.”

She tries to keep moving, forcing me to run to keep my hand on her.

“We all care about this friendship,” I say. “It’s just—”

She spins back, eyes damp. “Sudden?”

My heart plummets toward my feet. I don’t understand why she’s so hurt, but it’s obvious she is. Sabrina never cries.

But she’s crying now. Full-fledged tears streaming down her face, and I need to fix this, to make her understand this isn’t about her.

And in this moment, the last moment I have to make a decision, I see no other way.

“It’s not about our friendship,” I say.

“Of course it is,” Sabrina says. “You’re checked out, and Cleo doesn’t want to spend any real—”

“It’s about Wyn,” I say, before this conversation can go any further off the tracks.

She stares at me, dark eyes glassy, hair frizzed with humidity.

“I can’t get a matching tattoo with him, Sabrina. We’re not even together anymore.”

Her voice comes out small, cracking: “But it seemed like you guys were working things out.”

I shake my head, trying to untangle what she’s just said. “What?”

“This week,” she goes on. “It seemed like you were back together.”

Back together?

How could it seem like we were back together . . . to someone who didn’t know we’d broken up?

Unless, of course, she did know.