An Invincible Summer (Wyndham Beach) Read online

  “What do you want to do someday, Nat?” he’d asked her that last night. “After college.”

  “I’m not sure, but I think I might like to teach. Maybe something that would help kids to learn something important.”

  “You mean like special ed? Something like that?”

  “Maybe. How ’bout you? If you weren’t going to be a rock star, what would you do?”

  “Something to do with music. Teach, maybe.” He’d smiled. “So when everything falls through and I come back to Wyndham Beach, dragging my guitar behind me in defeat, maybe we both can teach here.”

  “There’s no way you are going to fail, Chris. You are going to soar like . . .” She’d looked up at the sky, where a star shot across the night in a flash of light. “Like that shooting star. Did you see it? Quick, make a wish, and I will, too.”

  He’d closed his eyes. When he’d opened them, he’d asked, “What did you wish for, Nat? A summer full of Italian lovers?”

  “I wished that your dream would come true. That your band would be what you hoped for.”

  “Aw, Nat, that’s sweet. But you shouldn’t have wasted your wish on me,” he’d teased. “Wish something for yourself.”

  “That is for me. I wish for you to be happy, and that will make me happy. Besides, if you wished that, too, that’s a double wish. Double wishes always come true, so it wasn’t a wasted wish.”

  He’d turned her face to his and stared into her eyes for a long time. Finally, he’d said, “I will never forget you, Nat. And I will always remember this . . .” And then he’d kissed her. One long, slow, perfect kiss, the very one she’d dreamed of all summer, one that had left her wanting more. “I’ll remember, I swear it. No matter where I go, whenever I see a shooting star, I’ll think of you.”

  From time to time over the years, whenever she saw a shooting star, she remembered that night, and she wondered if he remembered, too.

  “Can you believe we’re actually doing this?” Natalie opened her front door when she saw Grace’s car pull up. They hugged quickly before Natalie closed the door behind them. “Going to a rock concert together. And not any concert.”

  “Honestly, I almost thought he wouldn’t come through with all this, but he did.” Grace went straight to the hall mirror and checked her makeup and her hair, which she wore in a very high ponytail, one that matched her sister’s. “Oh God, do we look like the Flynn twins or what?”

  Natalie laughed. They’d both worn jeans, ankle boots, and long silver earrings. They wore the matching T-shirts Chris had sent them, with his face in the center and the date and venue under his likeness.

  “It’s too late to change.” Natalie pointed out the window to the street, where a long white car had stopped. “Let me run in the kitchen and kiss Daisy good night. I was lucky to get her favorite sitter for the night, so she doesn’t care that I’m leaving.”

  “Tell Daisy I’ll see her in the morning,” Grace said as she dashed out the door.

  Natalie hadn’t been exaggerating. Daisy barely lifted her head for a goodbye kiss. The babysitter had brought a bag of finger puppets, and they were busy telling a story.

  Natalie and Grace sat in the back seat of the limo, holding hands and giggling like schoolgirls.

  “Do you have your backstage pass?” Grace asked.

  “Are you kidding?” Natalie laughed. “I’ve been sleeping with it so I wouldn’t lose it.”

  “Me too. I’ve never been backstage after a concert. I read it’s wild.”

  “I don’t know. It’s hard for me to think of Chris as wild,” Natalie said.

  “I can. Remember, I saw him not too long ago. Went drinking with him. The guy’s a stud, Nat. Why he’d be excited about having two of his childhood friends at his concert is beyond me.”

  “What makes you think he’s excited?”

  “I was there when you two were on the phone, talking about it. I saw the look on his face after he passed the phone back to me.” Grace narrowed her eyes. “Are you sure there wasn’t something going on between you and Chris back then?”

  “Nothing really. I mean, we were friends. Close friends for a while.” Natalie shrugged. “I don’t think it would ever have been more than that. Oh, look.” She changed the subject adroitly. “Is that a cooler of drinks for us?” She switched her seat and opened the cooler. “OMG. Champagne!”

  She slid up to the panel separating the passengers from the driver and moved the glass to one side.

  “Excuse me.”

  The driver’s eyes reflected in the rearview mirror. “Miss?”

  “There’s a bottle of champagne back here, and we were wondering . . .”

  “Oh, yes, miss. That’s for you. There are glasses in there, too.” He smiled. “Just please close the panel before you pop the cork.”

  “Will do.” She turned to her sister. “It’s for us. Let’s open it.”

  Grace grabbed the bottle. “You don’t have to tell me twice.”

  The bottle opened and the drinks poured, they toasted each other and their luck in sharing such a fun adventure.

  “When was the last time we went out together to have a good time?” Natalie sank back into the seat and sipped her champagne.

  “Before I was married. Back when we were in college. One of those weekends you were home from Penn State and came down to see me at Delaware.” Grace appeared to be debating whether to pour another drink.

  “Your sorority had some epic parties.”

  “We did.”

  The sound of a horn blowing got their attention. Their driver had cut off another car on Broad Street and was now apologizing for it.

  “Oh, we’re here.” Natalie drained her glass and put it back into the cooler as the limo rounded a corner and crept slowly behind the Wells Fargo Center. “You don’t happen to have a Taser, a torch, fireworks, or brass knuckles on you, do you?”

  “What?” Grace stared at Natalie.

  “How ’bout a box cutter? A drone? Skateboard?”

  “Are you crazy? What are you talking about?”

  Natalie laughed. “Chris sent me a list of all the things that are prohibited at the arena. Those were just a few items on the no-no list.”

  “Good to know. Nope. No contraband.”

  “Ladies, I’ll be stopping by a door up here soon. You’re going to wait until I open your door before you get out, okay?”

  “Sure.” Natalie nodded and grinned at her sister. They were here. After so many years, she’d see her old friend again. Her long-ago wish for him had come true, and she couldn’t be happier.

  They were escorted to their seats—front row center, same location their mother had occupied with her friends some months ago—and soaked up the excitement of the crowd.

  “I love listening to music at home and in the car, but boy, nothing is like being on the floor during a live concert,” Natalie said over the rumble of voices surrounding them.

  There were two opening acts: the first, one Natalie had never heard of; the second, an up-and-coming singer she’d seen on one of the late-night shows. And then the lights went down, pyrotechnics went off on the stage, and Chris appeared, looking so much like the lead singer of a world-famous rock band that Natalie had tears in her eyes. The boy from the small town few people had heard of, who’d had such a huge dream, had made it come true. It really was a Cinderella story. He glanced down into the crowd and winked. She was hoping it was for her, but there were so many screaming women around her she couldn’t be sure. Grace had told her he’d been dating a Brazilian model for months. Natalie looked around but didn’t see anyone who looked like a Brazilian model, but you never knew.

  Still, Natalie smiled when the band began to play all the songs she’d listened to and knew by heart. She sang along with the crowd as it sang along with the band and danced with Grace in the space between their seats and the stage.

  After a long version of “If You See Me,” Chris stood alone at the front of the stage, the microphone in his hand, a
nd motioned for the crowd to quiet down. When finally the cheers and applause faded, he took a few steps closer to the audience.

  “You all know I like to stop about halfway through the show for a little story time. So settle down, boys and girls. This is a story I’ve never told anyone before and may never tell again. But tonight is special, so here goes.” He paused, the crowd in expectant silence. “A long time ago I had a friend. We only saw each other in the summers, but every summer, we’d spend time together. Mostly talking. I was a little older, and I never wanted to take advantage of that, because she was a very special friend. A very special girl.” There were a few hoots from the crowd, and Chris stopped for a moment, smiled. “The last time I saw her, we were sitting on a big rock on the beach down the road from her house, and it was growing dark. The stars were coming out overhead, and it was a perfect night. She was leaving the next day, and we knew we wouldn’t be together there again for a long, long time. But we’re sitting there, and I’m teasing her about something, and we look up and there’s a shooting star going right across the sky, and she said, ‘Make a wish.’ And we did. Turns out we both wished for the same thing, and that wish came true. But I remember, and I wrote this . . .”

  He turned and gestured to the band, and the music began. “We’ve never done this song before in public. It’s called ‘Shooting Star.’”

  “Natalie, he’s talking about you.” Grace elbowed her. “What the hell’s he referring to?”

  Natalie couldn’t respond. She stood stock-still, staring up at the stage, seeing only Chris. He really had remembered. He’d promised he would, and he had. She barely heard the words of the song, but she knew it was about that night, about watching the sky together and sharing their dreams and that one perfect kiss. The rest of the concert went by in a blur, and before they knew it, they were ushered back to the band’s dressing room, where Chris gathered her in a bear hug and kissed her face.

  “You really did remember,” she said when her feet finally touched the ground.

  Chris nodded, but he didn’t let go. “A double wish has to come true.”

  “Hello? Remember me? Grace? The big sister?” Grace waved to Natalie.

  Chris laughed and hugged Grace. “How lucky am I to have both the Flynn girls here? You two are gorgeous. I think I’m in love with you both.”

  Chris introduced them to the other members of his band, several celebrities who’d flown to Philly for the show, and a number of local professional athletes, careful all the while to keep Natalie at his side and Grace in his sight. But before they knew it, Chris had a plane to catch, and the limo driver who’d brought Natalie and Grace arrived to take them home.

  “This summer, right?” Chris had whispered to Natalie when he hugged her goodbye. “You’ll be back this summer?”

  “I’ll be at my mom’s for a while, yes.” She’d leaned back to look into his eyes, and she was seventeen all over again.

  “You let me know when, and I’ll be there. I’ll take time off.” He smiled, and she could see the boy he’d been. The boy who’d grown into this man who still had the same effect on her as he’d had when she was a girl. “You should know, you’ve stayed in my head all these years. I think we need to figure out why.”

  Natalie had nodded, too overcome to tell him he was still in her head as well. But this time when she left, she knew she’d see him again. This time, she wasn’t seventeen, and he was no longer too old for her.

  The last thing he said to her was, “I’ll be in touch.”

  Their driver had pressed an unopened bottle of champagne on them as they were getting out of the limo the night before (“From the boss”), so after Natalie took Daisy to day care in the morning, she and Grace had mimosas along with the omelets Grace made. They relived the night before and laughed at how little it had taken for them to act like teenagers again, singing and dancing in the area between their seats and the stage.

  “It probably looked better on the teens and the girls who were in their early twenties than it did on my thirty-two years, but honestly, I can’t remember the last time I had that much fun,” Grace declared when she’d finished eating.

  “Me either. And the concert was amazing. The band is everything Chris always wanted it to be.”

  “Oh, really? And how would we know that, missy?”

  “You heard him last night. We were good friends that last summer. We talked a lot. Life. Our goals.”

  “Sounded to me like you guys were doing more than talking.”

  “He kissed me one time. That last night.”

  “Must have been a wowzer of a kiss for him to remember it for, what? Ten years?”

  “Twelve, but who’s counting?” Natalie got up and cleared the table. “But to set the record straight, it was a double-wowzer.”

  “Huh. You and Chris Dean.” Grace grinned. “He’d not be a good bet these days, though.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “He’s a player, Nat. He dates A-list celebrities. I see his picture in People with someone different every other week.”

  Natalie shrugged. “It’s not like there’s anything but friendship between us.”

  “You can call it whatever you want, but he not only remembered kissing you, he wrote a freaking song about it.”

  “I think what he remembered was the fact I believed in him back then. And back then, it was probably only me and Emma who did. Remember how his father treated him so badly because Chris didn’t want to go to Harvard and become a banker?”

  “Not really. I wasn’t around that summer at all. I interned at Dad’s office and only came to Wyndham Beach for Memorial Day and Labor Day weekends.”

  “Mr. Dean was just awful. It was like he was embarrassed to have a son who believed he could make a living making music. A couple times that summer, I heard Mom and his mom talking about it, how she—Emma—was stuck between her husband and her son, and it was tearing her apart. I think that’s why Chris decided to take his band on the road, to get out of the house. He was hoping his father would let up on his mother if he was gone, but I don’t think he did.” Natalie paused. “And then a few years later, Mr. Dean had a heart attack and died. Mom said Chris and Emma both blamed themselves, but Mom said he’d had a heart condition for years.”

  Natalie poured herself a second cup of coffee, scooted back to her place on the banquette, positioned a pillow behind her, and settled in.

  “Have you made a decision yet about the house? Keeping it? Selling it?”

  “I’m going to sell it. I don’t want to live there again. It represents a time in my life when I was happy and settled and knew who I was and who Zach was. We were a team there.”

  “I don’t think Zach was much of a team player, Gracie,” Natalie said as tactfully as she could. “I think he played for himself.”

  “You’re right. But back then, it didn’t feel that way. Whatever he was scheming, I never saw it.” She forced a smile. “Love really is blind, kiddo.”

  “If it were me, I could never be happy in that place again.”

  “I sure wasn’t happy there after Zach left. Which is why I started that stupid blog to begin with.”

  “I don’t think the blog was stupid at all. I told you, I think it was a brilliant way to deal with a painful situation.”

  “Thanks. I appreciate that. But yeah. The house is going.” Grace stood.

  “Are you considering staying in Wyndham Beach?”

  “I honestly don’t know. I don’t think I’d mind it, though. There’s something so peaceful and easy about being there. Life is slower than it is in the city. Of course, then I run the risk of being the unemployed, thirty-two-year-old woman living with her mother.”

  “You could get a job,” Natalie suggested.

  “I’m still thinking about what I want to do. But right now I’m going to head out. Thanks for hanging out with me last night and for letting me stay.”

  “You’re always welcome here. Anytime.” Natalie walked her sister to the
front door, where Grace had left her overnight bag. “Next time you need to teach me how to make a killer omelet like the one you made this morning.”

  “Aw, you make me almost sorry for all those times when I was so mean to you when we were kids.” Grace picked up her bag, then turned to hug her sister. “Almost.”

  Natalie laughed. “Stay well, you. Drive safely.”

  She stood in the doorway and watched Grace drive away. When the car disappeared around the corner, Natalie closed the door and went into the kitchen to clean up from breakfast. Then she carried in her laptop and set it on the table. She checked email—so few since school ended for the semester. One student who wanted to argue his grade, another who thanked her for helping him improve his listening and reading skills. One from Glenn Patton, asking if she’d like to go with him to the Mann Center on Sunday afternoon for a concert. And one from Joe Miller, her would-be half brother. She clicked on his email and began to read.

  Natalie,

  Well, I haven’t heard back from you, so I’m assuming you have decided not to be in contact with me. I understand, and it’s okay. I do have something exciting to share with you, though, before I disappear from your life (unless you change your mind someday). I have been in contact with my birth father. I spoke with him over the weekend. We will be getting together sometime soon, and I am beyond happy. Nervous, but happy. I hope you’re happy for me. He told me I have not one, not two, but three younger sisters! Mind blown!

  I’m still hopeful that one day things might work out that I could meet you, too. A guy can’t have too many sisters.

  “Wait, what?”

  Confused, Natalie read the email again. “That’s impossible. Dad’s been gone for two years.”

  And then she noticed the PS several lines below Joe’s name.

  By the way, the genealogical site has identified several second and third cousins. Do you know a Polly Wakefield Drummond? Or a Claire Lloyd Anderson?

  Natalie slumped back against the pillows.

  “Holy shit.”