Chapter 5

It was June now and my mom is to come and spend the remainder of the summer with us on a full-time basis. I was excited to have her back because she and I were due to go to an art festival in another beach town over. Mom and I had started buying jewelry for each other and for what that we thought suited each other the best. Mom normally didn't wear jewelry, but recently I had noticed her wearing a necklace that used to be Susannah's so I was capitalizing on that.

Conrad joined me in the living room as I drank my coffee and waited for the weatherman to forecast the weather for today and the weekend.

"Hey Belly, what time did your mom say she would be here?" he asked joining me with his own coffee.

"She should be here in the next hour. She texted me early this morning that she was coming down." I said rubbing down his bed hair. He smiled over at me. I could see the steam from his coffee floating out of his white mug.

"You two are going to that art fair today right?" he asked, sipping at his coffee. It must have burnt his tongue because he made a face.

"Yes, you are welcome to come with us." I said grinning at him. I knew he wouldn't want to though.

He looked over at me pained.

"No thank you." He said shaking his head.

"And why not?" I asked turning towards him to get onto his case.

"Because that is what you women do. Us men go out and surf and build fires." He said, and I knew he was joking from his tone.

"Yeah, don't joke like that in front of mom. She would have your head." I said turning the volume up on the TV when the frantic looking weatherman came into view.

"Sunny skies today with some clouds rolling in late tonight, and a chance of rain this weekend. Might keep some of you beach-goers inside for the first time this season." The man said opening an umbrella to make the effect.

"I hope he gets some bad luck for opening up that umbrella in-studio." I said annoyed at him and his forecast.

Conrad turned to me mock-offended on behalf of the weatherman. "Isabel Conklin, you are not a nice young woman." Conrad said tisking me with just the sound and no fingers.

"You know that he is obnoxious." I said crossing my arms.

"He is just trying to entertain the people, Belly." Conrad said trying to stay serious.

"No, not even old people would enjoy that. They would be offended by his tackiness."

"Ha, you are probably right." He said putting his mug down on the coffee table and holding me close.

"Are you sure you don't want to come with us?" I asked smelling his hair. His head rested on my chest.

"I don't know. How long are you going to be gone?" he asked.

"I don't know. Why do you ask?" I asked him with a smile.

"Because I don't know if I want to be away from you for too long." He said turning to smile up at me. He still didn't realize how much more obsessed I was with him than he was with me, and to hear those words come from his mouth still felt like a dream. A dream I was reluctant to wake up from.

I leaned down to kiss him softly and he returned the kiss with fervor.

"Well, well, well, look what is happening in here Laurel." I heard my best friend Taylor's voice from the doorway. Her voice as coy as ever. She stood in the opening of the living room in her short shorts and a woven tank top. Her sunglasses were perched on top of her head and her hair was cut into a cute bob. It had been such a long time since I had seen her.

"What?" Mom asked coming in to see me and Conrad snuggling on the couch. Our faces were still close together from our kiss.

"Taylor!" I said screaming into Conrad's face. Conrad lifted his head off of me so that I could get up to greet my friend that I had not seen in forever. He acted like his ears were bleeding, the jerk.

I ran over to her and gave her a hug. "What are you doing here?" I asked. And I touched her new hair and she smiled with appreciation.

"I ran into your mom in town yesterday and she said you were here for the summer and she invited me. I hope it is okay?" she asked.

I balked, "Of course it is! Tay, I am so happy to see you."

She finally hugged me back. It made me feel bad that she was so worried about my reaction. It had been a long time since she had last come to stay at the summer house, the time when it didn't end so well. When she finished off the summer making out with my brother. I still shriveled over the grossness of the idea of them together.

"Hey Conrad." Taylor said winking at him. He just gave her a lazy wave.

"So are you guys, like, finally together now?" She asked Conrad directly.

"That is up to Belly." Conrad said standing up and smiling down at me.

I was embarrassed to say the least so I only smiled. He smiled too.

Taylor squinted her eyes at him giving him a perplexed and unsure look. "Just as long as this is serious Conrad." Taylor lectured him. She looked smug, seeming satisfied with her defensiveness over me, and turning back to me.

"Belly you look like a total babe, you're tan already!" She said putting her arm next to mind for emphasis.

"Laur, do you need help with bags?" Conrad asked.

"Yes please." Mom said.

"Mine too, Con." Taylor added winking again treated him like a bell-boy at a fancy hotel. If only she had a fifty propped between two manicured fingers waving them over her head like in a thirties movie.

He just nodded with a smile.

"So you need to tell me what has been going on Belly." Taylor said dragging me over to the couch for a pow-wow.

"What do you mean?" I asked.

"I mean like what is going on with you and Conrad? Like when did you start hanging out with him again?" She asked. Her blue eyes piercing with curiosity and wonder.

"He starting writing me letters when I left for Spain and we just kept in touch that way. And of course coming back here helps with the hanging out with him part." I said the last part a little as if it were obvious, but it only made her nudge my shoulder with hers. And just like that, she and I were two teenagers giggling and talking about boys.

"He wrote you handwritten letters or typed letters? Because there really is a difference Belly." Taylor said adjusting her sunglasses on top of her head.

"Handwritten ones." I corrected her.

"Oh my God, Belly that is so romantic, no wonder you took him back so easily. How is Jere taking it?" She asked.

"Jere is okay. He wasn't at first, but I think he now realizes that he can't do anything to change what me and Conrad do." I said and hearing myself say, what me and Conrad do, had given me chill bumps.

"True, I can't believe this Belly. This is major. I am happy for you. Just as long as he is nice." She added the last part to be her protective self.

"He has been great, I promise." I said squeezing her hand.

"So are you excited about the art festival?" I asked her.

"Of course, but let's get back in time so that I can catch up with you in the tanning department."

"Sure." I said beaming. My best friend was here at the summer house. This was going to be an amazing summer.

There was one summer when I was seven, before I had liked any boys, and more specifically Conrad; that Susannah, mom and us kids went to the very same art festival. Susannah wanted to buy me a dream catcher that had sea shells strung through it with wind chimes at the bottom. Mom said I didn't need it because there was nowhere that I could hang it and enjoy it.

"Yeah I can mom. I can hang it in my window at the beach house. With one of those suction cup things that can stick to the window. Like the thermometer daddy has on the back kitchen window at home." I said whining and explaining like seven-year-olds do.

"Come on Laur, it would be perfect for her!" Susannah said turning back to make sure she could still see Jeremiah. He used to have to walked around on baby leashes because he would walk off without anybody knowing. This was the first summer the kid-leash didn't come with us. Conrad and Steven would make fun of him and so Susannah let him off the leash under the condition that if he went off on his own, that she would make him wear it as punishment.

Even that day he was pushing his luck. Conrad must have heard me whining because he came up to investigate. This made the other boys come around to see too. This was the age that we all pointed out when the other was getting in trouble, and my whining was always a good sign of that.

"Belly is whining, I bet she is in so much trouble." Steven said making an ugly face to patronize me.

"I am not! I am not Steven!" I said stomping my foot and glaring over at him.

"Steven mind your own business. Belly is just talking to me." Mom said in her calm way.

"No, I heard her whining voice." Steven said grinning at me.

I stuck my tongue out at him and turned to mom.

"But mom, that wind chime-dreamcatcher was made for me, even Susannah said so." I said

"Whiner, Whiner!" Steven chanted and Jeremiah chimed in, like any youngest boy would.

I ended up not getting the wind chime or anything that day because I punched Steven in the nose.

"Belly?" Conrad said poking me in the arm as we walked hand in hand through the art festival.

"Sorry, I was just thinking." I said smiling at him.

"About what?" He asked as a little girl with face paint ran in between us and under our held hands. We had to lift them to prevent from clothes-lining her. I giggled at her. She looked like a little fairy princess.

"I was thinking about when we came here with our moms ages ago." I said.

"Oh the day you punched Steven in the go-nats?" he asked.

"No I punched him in the nose." I corrected him.

"No, trust me it was the nats. You got in so much trouble. You were grounded from going down to the beach for two whole days until your mom got tired of you whining so she let you go." Conrad said laughing at me.

"Geez. I remember him deserving it though." I said laughing.

Conrad laughed and shook his head.

"What was he making fun of you for again, that provoked your wrath?" he asked.

"It was because your mom wanted to buy me a dream-catcher and mom wouldn't let me have it so I was negotiating with her. I guess I was whining a little bit." I said smiling.

"Ha! You whining? Never." Conrad said throwing his head back and really laughing.

"Yeah well, I got my way a lot didn't I?" I said. He stopped and pulled me to him.

"Of course you did." He said pulling me to him and kissing me in the middle of a graveled path in between tented stands.

"Ew!" A little boy passing by said. His face was painted like a tiger.

"Steven!" The little boy's mom scolded him.

Me and Conrad looked at each other and busted out laughing.

Conrad then looked around as if he had an idea.

"What?" I asked.

"I know it has been a long time, but do you want to see if we can find you a dream catcher?" Conrad asked. I mean my mom wanted to get you one, so you need one." Conrad said pulling me with him.

He was a man on a mission. We walked up and down isles and isles of booths with paintings with jewelry and other cool knic-knacks.

We passed mom and Taylor in a booth with peculiar lamps and other things, but he pulled me along before I could say hello.

Finally, he found what he was looking for and I bumped into him before I could stop. The lady was familiar, because she was the very same one that ran this booth fourteen years ago. There were bigger dreamcatcher-wind chimes than she had made before, but then my eyes set on a smaller one with beautiful crystal shells as the chimes. Conrad saw where my eyes went and spoke to the lady.

"Hello, beautiful pieces you have here. How much for that one?" Conrad asked pointing to the one I was eyeing.

"It will be thirty dollars." The little lady said smiling at me as if she remembered me. Surely not.

The thought was a little embarrassing.

Conrad dug into his back pocket and pulled out two twenties and handed them to the lady. I moved forward to protest, but he wouldn't have it.

"No, let me get this for you, for my mom." He said raising his hand to brush my cheek softly. I shivered under his touch and nodded.

The little lady gave him a ten back and smiled over at me.

"Enjoy it." She said zipping up her bank bag and stuffing it back under the lawn chair she was sitting on, sitting on the bag itself.

As soon as we were out of view I held it out in front of me beaming.

"Con, I love it." I said touching the real shells in the yarn and touching the crystal shells that acted as the chimes.

This one was even better than the one Susannah wanted to get me.

"I feel like I remember that day now. You were so mad at your mom on the car ride home. I remember her saying to you, "Good girls get presents, not bad girls who punch their brother's privates." He started laughing at seven-year-old me's misfortune, but it was wonderful that he remembered. He remembered everything.

"Yeah, yeah well like I said earlier, he deserved it." I said trying to sound smug.

We reunited with mom and Taylor and I showed them what Conrad had gotten for me.

"Isn't that the same thing Beck wanted to get you a long time ago?" Mom asked not skipping a step.

"Sure is." I said smiling at her. Mom just laughed.

"You got it after all." She said with her eyes glittering with tears.

"After Beck died I felt guilty for not letting you have everything she wanted to give you for you to remember her by." My mom said standing tall to try and compose herself.

"Mom would have spoiled Belly rotten, and you know it." Conrad said to make my mom feel better.

"She surely would have." Mom agreed.

Back at the house Taylor was down by the pool talking to her boyfriend on her cell phone. Her voice carrying up to my bedroom window where I could hear her asking him what he had done today.

Conrad was helping me hang my gift in the window like I had planned to so long ago. He was standing behind me and I could feel the warmth coming off of his chest as he fiddled with the suction cup sticky we had stopped at a hardware store to buy on our way home.

Once he hung it to his satisfaction he wrapped his arms around my waist and pulled me into his chest further.

"It looks like it was made to go there." He said into my ear. It made me tickle, so I giggled.

"It really does." I agreed turning around to face him,

"You are something else, Conrad Fisher." I said putting my arms around his neck.

He kept his hands on my waist.

"Well I could just about say the same thing about you Belly Conklin." He said swaying us. The wind chimes finally playing their song in the breeze.

"Thank you for today." I said and kissed him on the cheek.

He pulled me closer to him.

"Thank you for every day you have given me this summer." He said pulling back so he could see my face.

"Even the awkward days when you were doing a terrible job avoiding me to pacify Jere." He said laughing at me.

"Hey, I played it pretty cool – at least I think so." I said swatting at his chest.

He caught my feeble weapons with his hands and brought them to his mouth to kiss them.

"Would it scare you for me to tell you how much I love you?" He asked. Hiding his mouth behind my hands in his.

"Of course not." I said. "I love you too Conrad." I said with my heart rate rising to an unhealthy level.

"I mean… because Belly, I love you so, so much. You are everything." He said pulling me to him again. His eyes soft and such a deep blue.

"You are everything." I whispered as we closed the little remaining distance and kissed. He was gentle, yet strong and his slow movements did something to my body that nobody else had ever been able to do. It set me on fire. I could only be on fire for him, and only him. I found it unimaginable that either of us had ever belonged to anybody else.

"Belly?" He said between kisses.

"Yes?" I breathed. Unable to do anything other than want to kiss him more. It was a treasure and a luxury.

"I can love you how you deserve now. We can do this. I will come and see you every chance I can get this year. I will make this work." He said pulling me back to him and we kissed for who knows how long.

I grabbed the back of his head to pull him gently back by his hair and whispering into his lips. "Wewill make this work." I whispered emphatically.

That afternoon all of us stayed on the beach until the sunset. Me, mom, Taylor, Steven, and Conrad spent the afternoon on the beach. It was carefree and effortless. We had brought down the old CD player with an antenna down to the beach and played the local radio station that played a mixed genre of music with a low enough volume to maintain easy conversation.

Conrad and Steven had been tossing a football. Steven tried to teach Taylor how to throw a spiral, although, I already knew that she knew how to because a lot of boys had used that to flirt with her in the past. It was funny though that Steven thought he was such a player. He loved the attention. Maybe his confidence is how he scored Katie.

I was sitting on a beach lounger next to mom just at the edge of the water to wear the upcoming tide rushed up and drown my feet. Beach sand was the best pedicure.

"We should throw a party." Steven said to Conrad.

"The last time we threw a party here Belly acted like a crazy person." Conrad said throwing the football back in Steven's direction.

"Hey!" I hollered.

"Old women don't condone beach house parties, nor do they attend them." Mom said flipping through a catalog for stationary.

"C'mon mom you aren't that old." Steven said running over to her to squat near her chair and pinch her shoulder. I sniffed the air like I smelled something stinky, so he flicked my shoulder.

"I am going to a conference next weekend so you guys can throw it then. Just don't break the house." Mom said with a straight face that made me chuckle.

"Awesome. Con! Did you hear that?" Steven asked hopping up.

"Yeah I heard." Conrad said with sarcasm in his voice.

In the quiet evening we heard a car coming down our road. It was impossible not to hear the roar of the engine of Jeremiah's new car.

"Oh, Jeremiah is back." Mom said getting up and folding her chair.

"I will head up to greet him. What are you kids wanting for dinner tonight?" My mom asked.

"I thought maybe I would grill for us tonight." Conrad said and then added, "You are here to enjoy yourself Laur.

Mom smiled and patted his shoulder as she trekked up the dry sand towards the house.

"A doctor and a chef?" I asked standing up to go and flirt with my man. He appreciated the effort because he blushed and closed the distance between us with two quick strides.

"You like that?" He asked.

"Oh yeah." I nodded and gave him a sardonic smile.

Creedence Clearwater Revival's "Have You Ever Seen The Rain?" came on the radio and I shouted at Steven to turn it up. He didn't, but Taylor did. She started dancing snapping her perfect little fingers and bobbing her head. Conrad swung me around so quickly it made me laugh and he moved with me in a sweet little dance, thank goodness he led because he knew I had two left feet or knew that I didn't normally dance without a lead.

He had a way of looking at me that made me feel singular. It made me feel safe and at one with myself. It was a peaceful feeling. The thing that I loved the most was that the butterflies still wracked around in my belly just by his proximity, so when he looked at me I felt hammeringly alive. That is something that not everyone can say about their significant other.

We danced through the whole song and Steven thought he was funny to make the comment that we would all see the rain this weekend and all of us would be stuck inside-bored and staring at each other, but we ignored him. He thought he was so funny.

"Didn't think to invite us to the party?" Jeremiah asked with humor in his voice.

"That isn't until next weekend." Steven said wiggling his eyebrows.

As he approached with Melanie trailing behind him we noticed he brought a box of beers with him and Melanie carried a six pack of Mike's hard lemonade for us girls.

"Then we will bring the party down to the beach." Jeremiah said raising the box over his head.

"Cool." Conrad said with me still in his arms. Jeremiah didn't act strange or flinch when he saw us, it was like he had prepared himself for it. I was glad he was making an effort too. Maybe Melanie had encouraged Jere's relationship with Conrad like I suggested.

"Yeah." Jeremiah said to Conrad as he dropped the box and opened it and tossed his big brother a beer.

That night we all enjoyed time outside. We all swam in the pool, while Conrad grilled burgers and hot dogs. We played chicken and Steven refused to be on my team, so when it was up to me using Jere as a partner I passed and suggested Melanie have a go at it. Conrad was the only boy who I would team up with in chicken.

Jeremiah didn't seem offended and he encouraged Melanie to hop up on his shoulders.

"Get up here babe." He said patting his shoulders. She leaped and climbed up him like a little athletic monkey.

Conrad was not only the chef, but the DJ and he played music for us to chill to. There was nothing that good music could not do to make everyone get along. It was hard not to when the music set a great mood.

I hopped out of the pool, which seemed like a warm hot tub compared to the damp air that the incoming storm had conjured. I froze as I shuffled over to my towel and wrapped myself up in it. It was nothing compared to how cold I knew it was going to be when I went into the air conditioned kitchen to get my Kool-Aid.

As I began wrapping myself into the oversized towel I had been using all day I caught Conrad checking me out in my bikini. I wrapped myself up and looked at him with an accusatory glare and walked over to him because I was drawn to him AND because the grill had to be warm from how Conrad looked a little sweaty slaving over it.

"Like what you see?" I ask him.

"Of course I do." He said not flinching.

"Me too." I said stepping against him. He cherishing my cold skin and me cherishing his warm and dry tank top and sexy muscles that filled it.

That night dinner was fun. It was the first relaxed night, and to think Jeremiah and Melanie were here and they were really fun and pleasant. Taylor and Melanie exchanged blond girl secrets and chatted about how pretty each of them thought the other was. They talked about how unfair it was that they hadn't met at school this past year.

The boys bantered about sports and they teased Conrad for how he belonged in a kitchen. Conrad laughed and shook his head as he took sips of his beer. I could tell how happy he was to have his brother and Steven there with him like old times. He caught me staring at him from the other end of the table where I sat with the girls. He at one end, and me at the other of the rectangle outdoor table.

I winked at him, and he smiled because he knew I was telling him that I told him so, about Jeremiah.

Mom sat in the middle of the table taking inn all of the conversation and then excused herself as the boys had just piled on their second helping of burgers. It had to be hard to be the only adult. I am sure all of us young people were making her miss how young her best friend use to made her feel. I watched her disappear through the sliding glass door. I looked over at Steven who took the time to notice too. I gave it a moment and when she didn't come back out I went to find her.

As I began to open the sliding glass door, my hand wrapping around the handle I heard my mom giggling through the screened window that someone must have opened sometime that day.

"I miss you." Mom said like a little school girl.

"I will see you next weekend." She said after a few seconds.

"Oh yeah the kids are having a blast and everyone is getting along well, which you know I was worried wouldn't happen." Mom said.

As I listened to this side of the conversation I turned back around and walked back over to the table. Steven was back to doing his own thing. No longer worrying over mom since he thought I would handle it. Jeremiah and Conrad both looked over at me as I sat back down. I just shrugged and excused myself to the pool. Who cares that I would get a stomach cramp from swimming with a full stomach. I think my mom had a secret boyfriend, and the fact that it was a secret made me uncomfortable.

It made me more uncomfortable than it should.

If he was a secret, then what the hell was wrong with him?

*THANK YOU FOR READING* THANK YOU FOR THE FOLLOWS AND REVIEWS THAT I HAVE GOTTEN SO FAR. I AM READING THEM! THANK YOU FOR THE KIND WORDS.

~I will update every week so check back then for more of the story! XOXO SheSwann~