“Avery! Over here!”
I turned my head to look behind me and found Louis’ face inches from my own. Before I could scream, he pushed me overboard. I watched his laughing face recede before I shut my eyes upon impact, letting the cool water rush over my head.
“Fuck you, Louis!” I screamed once I broke the surface, looking up at him doubled over laughing on the deck of the yacht. I had been planning to jump in on my own, to surprise Harry while he horsed around with Niall in the water. I splashed my way over to the ladder, but a shadow passed over me. I looked up to see Liam diving over me, and then I felt a tug at my ankle, drawing me away from the boat.
“No fair!” I yelled once Liam’s head popped out of the water, shaking the salty water from his eyes. “Two against one!”
“I’ll save you, Avery!” Zayn’s voice reached my ears from the sundeck, where he’d been lying earlier, soaking up the sun. His head appeared over the side, followed by a life saver ring on a rope. The ring plopped into the water a good twenty feet away from me, followed by the other end of the rope. I looked up to see Zayn’s eyebrows furrowed in confusion, before he realized his mistake. His mouth formed a small ‘oh’ of surprise.
My abs were starting to hurt from laughing. I grabbed the rope and swam tiredly to the ladder, pulling myself back onto the bow deck. Louis, seeing me approach, grinned mischievously and dove off the deck, no doubt to escape my wrath. I grabbed my towel and laid it down on the deck, the cloth shielding my skin from the scalding deck. I straightened my bandeau top and laid down, marginally grateful that Louis had pushed me in, because the water cooled me off significantly.
Zayn’s head appeared in my field of vision as he stood up, climbed carefully down the ladder and sat next to me on the deck, handing me a Corona. I accepted it hesitantly. “Make sure I only have one, okay?”
He grinned and watched me struggle to twist the cap off before taking pity on me and unscrewing it with a flick of his wrist. “I don’t think we’ll have any problems if you can’t even open one,” he said, his eyes gleaming.
“Shut up,” I said, taking a sip and making a face. Not a very pleasant taste.
Zayn laughed again. “You don’t have to drink it if you don’t want to.”
I stared at the amber liquid, rolling the bottle around with my wrist. “I want to have drunk it, but I don’t want to drink it.”
I couldn’t believe I’d been intimidated by Zayn when I first saw him. Something about how physically different he was, which was shallow, ignorant, and stupid of me. He was sweet and funny. They all were, now that I knew them so well. This was their third day with us, and they were leaving tomorrow. Harry had wheedled another free afternoon for the two of us, and we’d taken the Armadillo out into the ocean with the boys. I knew Zayn was nervous on the open water, so I vowed to myself to stay on the boat as much as possible so he’d have company.
I turned my head to watch Harry in the water. He was slowly swimming towards Liam. who was completely unsuspecting, relaxing on a large inflatable raft shaped like a killer whale. Harry ducked under the water and disappeared from my view, until he surfaced underneath Liam’s raft and tipped it over, Liam’s arms and legs flailing in surprise as he hit the water. I grinned.
“I hope he never did that to you.”
I turned back to Zayn, smiling. “Never. He wasn’t quite as…rambunctious with me as he is with y’all.”
Zayn opened his mouth. “Y’all,” he repeated in a mocking tone. “Y’alllllll.”
“Shut up,” I told him again with a roll of my eyes. I whacked him on the shoulder to express my irritation.
Niall appeared on the deck, dripping wet, holding another raft. “Come on, Zayn! A little water won’t hurt!” Louis appeared from the other side of the cabin, and I detected another mischievous glint in his eye.
So did Zayn apparently. “Oh no you don’t,” he said, scooting backward, away from the pair. But there was nowhere to go. I ducked out of the way as Niall and Louis each grabbed one of Zayn’s tanned arms and jumped off the boat. I leaned overboard to check that he was okay, and saw Liam’s killer whale raft hit him in the head. He clung to it and began paddling back to the ladder.
Liam sat down next to me, taking a long sip of my Corona. “Can’t believe we’ll be gone tomorrow,” he said, handing me back the half-empty bottle with a smirk.
“It looks like you’ve never been apart,” I said. I gestured to Harry, who was now with Louis and Niall doing everything possible to prevent Zayn from reaching the ladder.
“Yeah,” Liam said with a small laugh, watching the quartet. “Hey Avery, can I ask a favor?”
I looked at him in mild surprise. “Sure, Liam.”
“Come here.” He stood up and crossed the deck to enter the cabin. I followed him, curious, and found him digging through his bag. He pulled out his iPhone.
“There’s an app our management had developed for us, so the five of us can communicate to each other easily. Less chance of being hacked,” he explained. “The media is ridiculous about trying to access our shit. Anyway, they don’t want Harry to have his mobile back yet, but I want you to get the app so you can chat with us if you need anything.”
I was flattered and embarrassed at the same time. If he was telling the truth, Liam was trusting me with something huge. But, I didn’t have any way of downloading an app with my dumb phone.
“I don’t have a smart phone,” I said, flustered. “I’m sorry, Liam. Can you just give me your phone number instead?”
Liam was surprised. “Really? Okay. Wow. I had no idea there were still Americans without smart phones!”
“Yeah, well, don’t rub it in,” I said bitterly.
He laughed. “No, I didn’t mean it like that. Here, yeah, I’ll give you my number, and the rest of the boys, too.”
We exchanged numbers quickly. I smiled to myself, wondering if I should show Katie my new contact list when I saw her in a few weeks.
“I want you to call us if anything happens. It was murder those first few weeks, not really knowing anything. Then Lawrence came and we felt a bit better, but still, I’d hate to be kept in the dark again.”
I nodded. “I promise I’ll update you if anything changes.”
He nodded, taking my phone out of my hands and setting it on my bag. “Good. I think Harry just called for you.”
“What? I didn’t hear anything. HEY!”
Liam lifted me by my hips, carried me back onto the deck, and tossed me overboard.
***
The boys woke with Harry and I at five, staggering into their clothes in a zombie-like trance. Their boat left at six so they could make it back to civilization in time to make their next concert. It was lucky their schedule had a few breaks worked in; they only had to move concerts by a few hours in order to accommodate their visit.
I could sense a melancholy in Harry and the other boys as we waited for the fishing boat to return to Holyoke to pick them up. They had perked up with the help of coffee, but there was a strain in the air that everyone felt. It was almost a relief when we heard the low drone of the motor announcing the boat’s imminent arrival.
“It was nice to have met you,” I offered as the boat approached.
“We’ll see each other again!” Louis said, but I could detect the false cheeriness in his normally peppy voice. He pulled me into a hug. His long arms were slender and warm and I did want to see them all again, but I simply couldn’t see One Direction in my future beyond this summer.
Zayn was next, kissing me on the cheek, cocking his eyebrows playfully. “Good to meet you, Avery.”
Then Niall hugged me, his pale blue eyes squinting with his smile. “Thanks for putting up with us wankers,” he said, making me return his smile with my own.
Liam embraced me last, his voice low in my ear. “Remember to call if something’s wrong,” he said before straightening back up. I nodded and stood back as the boat docked. The boys each embraced Harry one last time, and then they were gone.
My phone beeped as we stood on the dock, watching the boat recede into the distance. Six o’clock.
“Come on, Harry, we should go,” I said, taking his head. He waited one more second, gazing at the boat before turning his head to look at the ground. “Work will keep us busy,” I said.
He nodded, agreeing silently with me. Tomorrow, Wednesday, would be another moving day, so we would have plenty to do starting to clean up the island in preparation for the next week’s guests. Not to mention we were finally going to make our weekend trip to Atlanta on Friday, I remembered, realizing I had to call Katie and tell her our plans.
I felt Harry’s hand in my own and I squeezed it gently. “Do you wish you were leaving with them?” I asked. The drone of the motor was now out of earshot.
Harry hesitated, then shook his head. “I was talking with Louis about it. He said the concerts are as crazy as ever, even without me. I’m not ready to get back into that frame of mind.”
I nodded. The selfish part of me was grateful that he’d chosen to stay with me.
“What did you think of them?” Harry asked, now smiling slightly as we approached the office.
I grinned. “They’re insane.”
“Go on. I want to know your impressions.”
“Okay, well, Louis is hilarious, and so vibrant. Niall is…Irish I guess. He swears so much, but he means well. Zayn is so funny, and he’s also really sweet. So is Liam. He seemed really…grounded.” I looked up at him cautiously. “I could see why he was the one to call you out, back in May.”
Harry nodded, now holding the door open for me as we entered the store. “Yeah, he’s a good lad.”
Brokaw was waiting for us at the counter. “Hurry up, you two,” he said, his voice hard. “Two shower heads broke this morning, it’s trash day, and Marsh Manor complained about the state of their windows.”
I sighed. Our mini vacation was over now, at least until we managed to escape on Friday. But that meant we had to throw ourselves into our work, being on extra good behavior so Brokaw couldn’t take away our weekend. Harry and I completed our jobs as quickly as possible and without complaint during the next few days.
To my surprise, a package came for me on Wednesday, after I checked in the newest rush of guests. There was no return address and I opened it eagerly, hoping for an apologetic care package from my parents or Katie.
Instead, it was a brand new iPhone, already programmed with One Directions’ contact information and the special app Liam had told me about.
When I turned it on, a text popped up, addressed from Liam Payne:
Just in case.