The Beach House (a The Kissing Booth novella)

10: The Beach House

Whooo, Christmas is coming up soon! :) As are the Watty Awards! Who's excited? I am. I'm also kind of nervous. As you may be able to tell. And I do have to ask you all (because I know you're all lovely and fab people) to please keep supporting The Kissing Booth when the Watty Award like, officially begin, and whatnot. Please :')

Sorry this is late... I was out last night and when I got in I was too tired to upload, in all honesty.

Alrighty! So here's the next chapter, and I think it may be a little short, but at least it's an upload for you guys, right? :) Hope you enjoy it! xx

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Chapter 10

Slamming the mostly empty glass of the virgin cocktail I’d ordered back on the bar counter, I ran my fingertip around the glass, drawing abstract patterns in the condensation on it.

            Alright, so maybe the guy had been a little on the flirty side, with his hand on my arm. But checking if I was okay just meant he was a nice human being. And maybe it had looked a bit strange to Noah that I hadn’t stood up straight away – but that didn’t mean he had a right to be mad at me like that.

            He was my boyfriend. He was allowed to be jealous, and he was allowed to be mad if a guy tried to flirt with me – but not mad at me.

            Yes, but this is Noah, the annoyingly rational voice in my head tried reasoning with me. He’s crude and impulsive and he gets mad easily, it’s what he’s always been like. Did you really expect him to morph into some perfect, all-around-nice guy just because you guys are dating now?

            I sighed again, running a hand back through my damp hair. It felt crusty with seawater, and I could feel it had started to curl.

            This was not how I’d pictured my last day at the beach house with both Flynn brothers to be.

            We were supposed to mess around, to go body-boarding and swimming, and play volleyball and laugh at how bad I was, to eat way too many ice creams and pig out at the Saturday lunch buffet at the little restaurant near the bar on the beach. We were supposed to build a giant sandcastle, to bury whoever fell asleep first up to their neck in sand, to pig out again at the barbecue their dad would cook in the evening, and to stay up really late playing silly games and cards.

            What wasn’t supposed to happen was me having a huge argument with Noah.

            Plus, to top it all off, my leg was really starting to ache where the volleyball had hit me.

            The stool beside mine scraped out and I looked up from my glass as someone sat down. But it still surprised me to see it was Noah.

            “Hey,” he said quietly, mumbling.

            “Hey,” I responded in pretty much the same way. I went back to looking at my glass and the condensation running down it.

            “Listen, about before…” he started. He paused, almost like he was expecting me to cut in and say, ‘Forget about it, it’s all in the past. Let’s just move on.’

            When I didn’t say anything, he carried on. “I’m sorry I was such a jerk. Alright? It was just – you know, you were practically all over this guy – and I know you didn’t mean it,” he added hastily, before I even opened my mouth, “but think about it from where I was standing. I was right there, and my girlfriend’s lying across some other guy who starts flirting with her, and you were blushing like – I don’t know, like his flirting was working.”