The Beach House (a The Kissing Booth novella)

15: The Beach House

Late, yes. Last chapter, yes. I'm sorry - on both occasions!

Quite seriously though, thanks to all of you for the support on The Kissing Booth (please remember to vote for it in the Watty Awards - Most Popular as well as Teen Fiction!) and for all your support on this novella too. There still won't be a sequel, so this really is where I end these characters' stories!

I will be writing something new - it may not be on Wattpad for a while but I will put something up when I have something written :) You know me - it'll be more teen fiction. Probably romance. Humour, too, if you think I can write humour ;)

Anyway. Here is the last chapter of The Beach House. Enjoy :) xx

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Chapter 15

“You kids got in pretty late,” Lee’s mom said as we all sat out by the pool eating French toast for breakfast. The sky was overcast, and we’d listened to the weather report on the radio that morning – they said there was ‘heavy rain due sometime later today’. We figured the pool was the best option, in case it started raining too badly.

            Plus, June didn’t want us going in the sea and drowning if there was a storm.

            In response to her statement now though, Lee grunted something that I think was, “Sorry,” through a mouthful, and I just shrugged.

            “So? How was it?”

            “Pretty good,” I said, shooting her a smile as I poured myself more OJ. “There was a bunch of really cool people we hung out with.”

            “Anything interesting happen?”

            My eyes flitted to Lee, and my hand stilled with the glass of orange juice almost to my lips. He’d looked at me too. Almost as soon as we made eye contact, we looked away and carried on having breakfast.

            “No,” Lee said, then swallowed. “Nothing much.”

            “Oh,” June said doubtfully, like she wasn’t sure if ‘nothing much’ had really happened, or if something had happened. She probably thought something had happened; she was just trying to decide how bad that something was, and whether it was worth pressing us to tell her more.

            Clearly, she thought she didn’t want to know, or it wasn’t worth knowing, since she said, “Anyone for more toast? I don’t know about you kids, but I’m starving!”

            “Sure,” we said simultaneously, “thanks.”

            Once she was back in the kitchen, and the clatter of her cooking French toast was loud enough for her not to overhear, Lee leaned over to me and said, “Do you think she guessed something’s up?”

            I just raised my eyebrows and gave him a look.

            “Yeah, I thought so too.” He scrunched up his mouth a little, wrinkling his nose, before chugging down some OJ.

            Last night, we hadn’t really said much about the kiss.

            Even though Noah’s room was empty, Lee and I still shared. We weren’t going to have separate rooms just because we could; it wouldn’t have felt right. But we’d both changed, and we’d both gone to bed, and we’d led in the dark. I hadn’t been able to get back to sleep for almost an hour, and I knew that Lee had been awake all that time, too. But we hadn’t said much. The occasional “Are you still awake?” was about the extent of conversation.