laugh. God, he’s beautiful when he laughs.
We get out of the car and start to stroll down the wet street, stopping at a few places along the way as I break out my camera and get a few interesting shots of locals in their everyday life with tourists.
By the time we sit down to eat outside at a little restaurant, the clouds have moved off and the sun is shining again. The blacktop glistens with leftover moisture. I hear a constant dripping to my left, where water steadily falls from a roof into a little puddle. Voices hum all around, and there are sounds of the shuffling of shoes and the snapping of rubber against bare heels and the rolling of tiny wheels on baby strollers.
“Other than the obvious,” I say across from Luke at a small round table, “why did you move to Hawaii?” I take another bite of my food.
Luke swallows a mouthful down and then drags a napkin across his mouth.
“Seth would be to blame for that,” he says with a smirk. “I met him years ago when I came here on vacation. Been best friends ever since.” He takes another bite, holding his head over his plate in case any of it misses his mouth.
“Is he from here?” I take a quick sip of my soda.
Luke nods with food in his mouth and then he swallows. “Yeah, Seth is a local, like Alicia and Braedon.”
I pause, taking another sip, reluctant to ask my next question, but decide to anyway.
“Not to be nosy,” I speak up, trying not to be obvious as well, “but does Kendra also live with you and Seth?” God, I hope not.
He shakes his head rapidly. “Definitely not,” he says, and I quietly breathe a sigh of relief. “She used to when she and Landon were together, but after China …” He pauses briefly, almost inconspicuously, but I still make note of it. “She got a place of her own with a friend not far from Seth’s and my house.” He laughs under his breath. “She’s a good friend, but I lived with her long enough when she was with Landon. Too long. She drives me nuts sometimes. We get along a lot better now that we’re not under the same roof.”
Well, that’s a relief.
I take another bite, but offer no comment.
After lunch, Luke takes me to some other places around town, where I buy a few small souvenirs for my parents, which I tuck away inside my big purse. But it’s when I notice that I’m literally the only girl walking around this place in a long dress that I regret not having packed a pair of shorts and a top, and I decide to buy a new outfit.
“There’s nothing wrong with your dress,” Luke tries to convince me. “It’s a summery dress—not like you just left church in it, or anything.” He grins, looking me over once. “And besides, it’s sexy on you.”
I blush hard—all that’s missing are my shoulders drawn up around my cheeks.
“Well, thank you,” I say all fancy-like, stepping past Luke holding the door open for me and into a shop that sells all things cute and touristy. “But I’ll feel less out of place if I’m in shorts and flip-flops like everybody else.”
The glass door closes behind Luke, the jingling of a bell fixed to the top, sounding around us. There are surfboards and surf-this and surf-that just about everywhere in this tiny place. Surfboards are mounted on the walls and hanging from the ceiling. Surf accessories are placed here and there, leaving little room for the more normal summertime stuff, which is what I need. Migrating to a small T-shirt rack, I sift through them in search of my size.
“How about this?” I hear Luke say from behind.
An ugly button-up Hawaiian shirt with a loud flowered print dangles from a hanger on the end of his finger.
I wrinkle my nose at him. “Seriously?” Then I lean in closer and whisper, “I think that’s for old men.”
Luke laughs under his breath—because he totally knew that—and places the hanger back on the metal rack behind him.
“Tryin’ to make me look like a tourist?” I accuse in jest and go back to sifting through the shirts on a more fashionable rack. “Might as well find me a muumuu and drape a lei around my neck, too.”
He points and says, “I think the muumuus are on the back wall, but I, uh, wouldn’t go that far.” He almost looks scared.
Shaking