Free Last Summer by Hailey Abbott Page B

carriage ride to find him sitting on the floor, sketching her.
    You’re just so beautiful , he’d told her.
    Kelsi opened the card that came with the drawing. It was short and sweet:
    I WISH YOU WERE HERE .
    And suddenly Kelsi knew that everything really was fine. Distance was only miles. Everything else was in her head. She had to figure out how to be okay with what she knew to be true: They were in love. This was just temporary.
    Deep in her heart, she believed it.
    “Finish your lunch,” she told Ella. “I want to go swimming.”

9
    The crowd at Ahoy Bar and Grill in town was jumping, as it was every single night of every single summer. Beth stopped on her way back from the bathroom to take a look around the place. She loved that no matter what else might be going on in her life, Ahoy would always have the same rowdy groups spilling out of their booths, shoved in around the bar, and eventually making their moves across the dance floor. It was frantic and loud, and made her feel right at home.
    Beth smiled to herself. She’d dressed up a bit, having taken Ella’s scathing remarks about her clothes to heart. Of course, her version of “dressed up” just meant a green tank top with tiny little spaghetti straps and a built-in bra.She figured Ella, who liked to re-create outfits from Lucky spreads, still would not approve, but Beth liked the change.
    Beth made her way through a cluster of dancing girls, and saw George’s familiar head in the booth ahead of her.
    Friends could be hard, it was true, but she’d decided a little while after the beach incident that no matter what, she still wanted to try. It didn’t seem right that someone who’d meant so much to her could just disappear from her life. George wasn’t just an ex, the way girls like Ella had exes in the dozens, interchangeable from one another. He was so much more than just that, for better or worse. He was Beth’s childhood, in a lot of ways.
    And so what if they occasionally behaved like an old married couple? They had a history.
    This was what Beth told her cousins each time someone pointed out that the hang-out-with-the-ex thing sounded like a disaster in the making.
    She was eighty-seven percent sure of it herself.
    Beth went to slide into the booth across from George, but stopped short at the sight of the female figure already there.
    Already there, and laughing merrily at something George had said. It was strange, but Beth could see how he sort of expanded under this other girl’s laughter, like a plant under a stream of water. It made her feel sad for him, and for her, too, that they didn’t laugh that freely anymore.
    But then she shook the feeling off, because George was turning toward her.
    “Hey!” he said. “This is Larissa. She fell into our booth.”
    “It’s true,” the girl said, grinning up at Beth. “There was a crowd situation and I fell right in.”
    “But that’s not the cool part,” George continued quickly. “The cool part is that Larissa’s going to Carnegie Mellon in the fall!”
    “That’s great!” Beth said enthusiastically, although she wasn’t sure why.
    George rolled his eyes. “My friend Beth is slow on the uptake,” he told Larissa. He looked back at Beth as she slid into the booth. “Carnegie Mellon is in Pittsburgh. Pitt is in Pittsburgh. We’re going to be in the same city!”
    “Have you ever been to Pittsburgh?” Larissa asked George.
    “Only for the weekend when I took a tour,” George said. “But I’m psyched to explore it. I’ve spent my entire life in suburban Massachusetts.”
    “How cool is that Cathedral of Learning?” Larissa asked.
    “Pretty cool,” George said, looking over at Beth. “It’s this huge tower in Pittsburgh.”
    “Wow,” Beth murmured. She was feeling somewhat less at home than she had a few moments before, because she knew absolutely nothing about Pittsburgh. Except the fact that George was going there. And now, Larissa.
    “I’m really excited,”