That Summer by Jennifer Weiner (read more books .txt) 📕

answered with a self-deprecating gesture that encompassed his blue polo shirt and khakis.

“Okay, but that’s just your clothes. What do you think about? What music do you like? What do you want to do after high school?”

He inhaled, shoulders rising, then shook his head. “I always thought I wanted to get into a good college, and play lacrosse, and go to law school, like my father. But I never thought about it much.”

“How about when you were little?” she asked. “Did you want to be a fireman? Or a vet? A ballet dancer?”

He ate a few French fries and said, with a smile of surpassing sweetness, “I wanted to be a taxi driver.”

“Really!” said Beatrice.

When he nodded, a tuft of hair bounced against his forehead. She wondered what it would be like to touch it, how it would feel between her fingers. “We went to New York once. I don’t even remember where we were going, but we were late, and my dad said he’d give the guy a twenty-dollar tip if he could get us where we were going in under ten minutes. And this cabdriver, he just…” Cade was smiling, eyes bright, lost in the memory. “It was like being on a rocket ship, the way the guy drove. He made every light. He’d use every lane, moving around the slower cars. It was like…” He paused, waving his fork again, looking for a word. “Like a dance,” he said. His smile faded. “I told my dad that’s what I wanted to do, and he said, ‘Oh, you want to be a race car driver,’ and I said, no, I wanted to drive a taxi, in New York.” He looked down at his plate unhappily. “That was not what my dad wanted to hear.” He picked up another wedge of his sandwich, devouring it in three quick bites. Beatrice nibbled a slice of pear. She thought he’d ask what she wanted to do with her life, and she’d tell him how she wanted to go to school for art or drama if she went at all, and live in New York, and make things with her hands. She’d tell him that if her Etsy store was earning enough, she’d just do that full-time, living at home, if she had to, until she had enough money saved to move to New York City.

Instead, Cade said, “Did you really get kicked out of boarding school? I mean, I know you said that’s what happened.”

“Do you think I was lying?”

“No!” He lowered his voice. “I’m just wondering if it happened how you said it did.” He was looking at her carefully, brows knitted, eyes intent.

Beatrice nodded. “I had a friend. She’d hooked up with this guy a few times. One night he showed up at our dorm. She didn’t want him there. She didn’t want anything to do with him. But he wouldn’t leave her alone. He wouldn’t take no for an answer.”

“And the school? The dean, or whatever? They didn’t believe her?”

“She wouldn’t tell.” Beatrice could still remember how Tricia had cried, whispering, No one’s going to believe me, because I slept with him before. Beatrice and a few other girls in the dorm had tried to convince her that people would listen, that she should tell, but Tricia couldn’t be persuaded. She had stayed in bed for the rest of the weekend, crying. On Monday morning in chapel, Colin, the guy who’d done it, sat right beside her, even putting his arm around her. He’d had the nerve to look perplexed, then disappointed, when she stood up and walked away.

“He kept bothering her,” Beatrice said. “After it happened, when she was crying and telling him to leave. He just acted like there was nothing wrong.”

“Do you think maybe he was… I don’t know, confused?” Cade asked.

Beatrice glared at him. “Do you think ‘no’ means something else in New Hampshire?”

Cade shook his head. “It sounds like he was getting mixed messages.”

Beatrice huffed out a sigh. “Look, just because a girl agrees to something once doesn’t mean she’s signed, like, a permanent permission slip. That isn’t how it works. We’re allowed to change our minds.”

Cade reached across the table and took her hand. “Hey,” he said. “Don’t be mad at me. I’m just trying to understand.” His hand was warm; his eyes were locked on her face. She wished that there wasn’t a table between them; that she was on his side of the bench and could lean against him. She bet he smelled good, and wondered if, at some point soon, she’d have a chance to find out.

21 Diana

Diana had come to dinner on Friday night, just like they’d planned, on a night when Hal had stayed in town, having his monthly dinner with the partners. Diana had arrived with wine and chocolates. She’d admired Daisy’s home, unerringly zeroing in on the kitchen, and the fireplace and the skylight as the most beautiful parts of the room, and had praised Beatrice’s jewelry, a beetle with brilliant green wings that hung in a glass pendant that dangled from her neck. “Where did you find it?” Diana had asked, and Beatrice had explained that she did all her shopping on Etsy, that she never gave money to corporations if she could help it, but instead supported her fellow creators, the same way they supported her. Daisy had worried about how her daughter would behave, but Beatrice had seemed impressed with Diana, actually volunteering information about school, and her crafts, and the kids she’d met in class.

Over the past four weeks, Daisy and Diana had gotten in the habit of cooking on Tuesdays, at Diana’s apartment, and meeting, on Friday afternoons, for a walk along Forbidden Drive, one of Daisy’s favorite places in the city, a spot she’d been eager to show off for her new friend. She’d offered to meet Diana after work, even if it meant fighting rush-hour traffic, but Diana explained that