Summer Forever

00.

00.

We sat in the sand, the summer heat a thick cloud around us.

Beside me, Everett laid against my shoulder, slick with salt and water, peppered with sand. His head was heavy on me, his lips brushing my skin each time he laughed, and I had an inkling he was doing it on purpose at this point.

The waves barely rippled, almost too still beneath the yellow moon. The ocean lapped the shore, sea foam biting the sand where we'd scribbled our names—Everett and Isla, an impermanent mark to claim our beach. Our island.

Midnight was approaching and I'd be leaving soon.

Fire tinted our grim faces orange and every laugh sounded hollow and haunting, a ghost of what we used to be.

Austin sat across from me, his skin burnt and red, sand sticking to the bottom of his legs. He threw a joke that half the group failed to catch. Sky shot him a look, running a hand over her newly shaved head.

She acted like she was excited to graduate, to leave Shellside Bay, but I knew from the way she stared at the ocean that she'd miss it here. We all would.

Connor leaned against River, his smile not quite reaching his eyes. His laughs, usually so carefree and easy, sounded dull to my ears.

River didn't try to hide it. He frowned openly, his fingers forming a fist in the sand, centimetres from Connor's. He tapped the ground for a moment, two hard thuds, as if making a decision before lifting his beer to his lips and taking another long swig that I knew he'd be feeling in the morning. He tossed the can beside the growing pile of drained alcohol next to the Nauti Buoy.

The Bennetts' boat had been dragged onshore at sunrise—flipped on its side at some point in the afternoon. Our shirts and surfboards leaned against it, drying quickly beneath the scorching Australian sun before being taken out to sea again, and again. Burning the memory of the waves into our skin.

The day had gone quickly, the glow of the sunset eating the afternoon and blending into the evening. Clouds lined with pink taunted us, reminding us that the day had to end, until the light had seeped from the sky and the ocean turned into an inky blue.

Everett leaned into me, his hair brushing my arm, as if sensing my thoughts. I looked down to find his dark eyes looking up at me, his fingers squeezing my own.

"You okay?" he muttered, his voice low beneath the crackle of the fire and groan of the waves.

I nodded, my curls flying loose with the movement, thick with salt and sand. "I just don't want it to end."

He frowned, his eyes reflecting mine, and he shifted, sitting upright. In the same movement, he released my hand, wrapping his arm around me and pulling me close. Our skin was hot together, the sand scraping where we touched, but I leaned closer, nonetheless.

"We'll get through it," he said lowly. "We've done it once before."

I nodded again, trying to convince myself that he was right.

We'd done it once before. Our lives were worlds apart, and we managed. We called. We texted. He visited.

Except it couldn't be summer forever.

Tomorrow, I'd be in Sydney. 

In a few more days, Everett would be gone.

And I'd have no one.

In the dark, the waves rushed at the shore, biting at the sand. And although I couldn't see it, I knew it was dragging our names out to sea, washing our mark off the island.

And it would be like we were never there in the first place.