Free The Lies About Truth by Courtney C. Stevens Page B

his collar to his hairline, giving himself a short break from the sun. Or a short break from me.
    I leaned back in my chair and stared off toward the pier. Maybe he did the same. Maybe he teared up. Maybe he thoughtabout his plans for the evening.
    “Well, I’ve got to go—”
    “Check on the renters,” I finished, without turning toward him.
    He tapped his clipboard and stood up. When he was four feet away, he turned around and came back.
    “Two things.”
    I knew before he put up two fingers that my straight shooter was back in town.
    “One, I don’t care about your damn mailbox. And two, I didn’t.”
    “Didn’t what? Put something in the mailbox?”
    He shook his head at me, as if he couldn’t believe I didn’t understand the reference.
    “I haven’t jumped off the bridge with anyone but you.”
    He walked away.
    “Gray.”
    He kept walking.
    I raised my voice. “Gray.”
    Either the wind ate my words, or he didn’t care. I wouldn’t chase him. Not into the horde of people. And I didn’t want to. Chasing someone was a lovers’ game.

CHAPTER THIRTEEN
    Two hours later, I’d thrown away all the rubber bands, had a pile of discarded clothes on my bed, and hadn’t settled on a hairstyle that covered Idaho or Nameless. I even made Sonia, Max, and Mom sit in the van for ten minutes before I coaxed myself to join them.
    “Sorry for the delay,” I said, taking the empty shotgun seat.
    “It’s no problem,” Sonia said dismissively. She was busy riding Max’s ass about his shopping list.
    “Mom, I didn’t make a list.”
    “How do you know what you need if you don’t have a list?”
    “I have a you,” he said, rolling his eyes at me in the rearview mirror.
    Mom didn’t ask me about my list. Smart lady.
    According to Sonia, Max’s clothes were ratty. I thoughtthey had character; she thought they were overdue for a trip to Goodwill.
    My mind didn’t make a list or worry about Max’s. It was busy as a waterwheel, turning over and over the question of whether Gray had or hadn’t put the envelopes in the mailbox. Nearly everything he’d said had been cryptic and inconclusive. But that was a product of us these days, and not necessarily related to the anonymous mailings.
    When traffic on the Destin Bridge came to a standstill, I stared out the window, daydreaming. Crab Island, a shallow place in the bay where boaters liked to float and party, lay to my left. To my right, the east and west jetties stretched toward each other like two index fingers. I loved the bridge, and this view reminded me of bridge-jumping. And skinny-dipping.
    And who in holy hell was sending those envelopes?
    If it wasn’t Gray, it had to be Gina or Max.
    Both were strong possibilities.
    Gina had been trying hard to reconcile for months.
    Max was a quiet fixer.
    Either of them, if they’d found some way to access Big’s belly, were inventive enough to have done this. Max was in El Salvador when I got the first letter, so that put Gina higher on my list, but . . . I’d written all of the thoughts before he left, and his dad was home the day I got the first letter. One walk to the mailbox across the street and George McCall could have put an envelope in there for Max. Easy-peasy. He’d even saidat dinner that Max had wanted to surprise me. They’d winked at their secrets.
    Whether it was Gina, Gray, or Max, there was no point in spending the day frustrated. Shopping was bad enough. The needle in my brain scratched obediently to the next track, and my eyes drifted toward the spot on the bridge where Gray and I had held hands, said a prayer we wouldn’t die, and jumped.
    Forty feet.
    We kept our hands together until just before we hit the water, and then we slapped them to our sides, staying as pencil-straight as we could.
    He yelled like a happy hooligan. I watched the surface rush up on us. We fell forever.
    We remembered to do what the soldier told us. “Blow bubbles,” he’d said. “’Cause once you hit the water,