Last Summer

02. Myles

Typically, Liam had a good couple of minutes before he said something completely idiotic because he couldn't think straight around any girl:

"I saw your Instagram story of you at the game last weekend," an hour after meeting her for the first time. That girl walked away.

Ten minutes into their conversation when she tried to use the bathroom, desperate, "Where are you going?" That girl never came back.

Texting her repeated, What're you doing?'s after he finally got her number. That girl ghosted him.

"I'd love to meet your parents," after the one date he'd been on all year. That girl laughed in his face.

At least he had a good sense of humor about it.
It was simultaneously hilarious and sad, but he was my best friend.

"We all can't perfect the art of not caring," he teased. "I'd love to see what happens when you actually try since everything falls in your lap anyway. You could cure cancer."

I laughed noncommittally and changed the subject. "Do you want the tour or not?"

"Want," he confirmed and hopped up. "Get off your ass, Myles. I've got a date with Mother Nature."

"Liam," I said, shaking my head, "let's try for girls your own age before you graduate to MILFs."

He stopped short and chuckled under his breath. "I don't ever want to see your internet search history."

"Clown erotica. It's a riot."

Liam's smile faded slowly as he tried to decide if I was joking or not.

"What's not to like?" I added. "Those oversized shoes turn me on."

"You're joking."

"No," I deadpanned, pushing him out the back door before he could decode normal social cues.

It was always cooler in the mountains. My favorite was when you stood in the cool, open air and the sunshine hit you as it broke through the trees.

It was too damn hot everywhere except there, and I always seemed to feel ten degrees warmer than anyone else.

Camp Wilde Woode was the perfect temperature though. The mix between the altitude and the rain every afternoon made it smell different. There should be a name for it because it was so distinct.

Liam and I walked slowly down our driveway. It was so steep you had to lean your body weight back and make sure you had a good grip with the soles of your shoes or you'd slip and fall on your ass.

The first time I drove up it when I was sixteen, I panicked trying to accelerate and almost rolled back off of the twenty-foot drop on the other side.

I laughed at my mom's horror stricken face. She'd gone pale, and for a moment, I had too. But I was able to joke myself out of my shock, act like I'd done it on purpose just to scare the shit out of her.

From our driveway, you could go either left or right.

Left took you past the ropes courses, through the treehouse camp site, and around the lake. You could end up right back at my house if you followed the lake trail all the way around and back through the camp gate.

To the right, maybe the equivalent of two city blocks down the road, the tennis courts sat high up on a hill.

I pointed out the wooden stairs that led up past three cabins. "Don't step off the path or Janet will chew you out."

Being the only male at a female camp came with rules. A long list of rules, and I'd pushed the envelope of every one of them.

Liam nodded. "What else?"