D. MacHale - SYLO

“Impressive,” I said.

“I’m telling you, Tuck,” Quinn said. “That shows confidence, intelligence, and creativity.”

“Or it just shows that she can tie a knot.”

Quinn shook his head in disappointment. “Look beyond the superficial, my narrow-minded friend. There’s so much to be learned from the minutia of human behavior. Now, go talk to her.”

“What? Why?”

“You’ve been wanting to ask her out for months. But you haven’t. Why? Because she’s intimidating and you think you’ve got nothing interesting to talk about. But that’s not the case anymore, is it? Now you can tell her all about unexplained celestial phenomena.”

I felt panic rising. “No! I mean, who said I wanted to ask her out?”

“Be serious,” he said impatiently. “Whenever she’s around, you get all quiet and start this hypnotic staring thing. It’s kind of creepy, to be honest.”

“Maybe I think she’s a freak.”

“And maybe you’ve got to start taking some risks. Nothing ventured, and all that.”

“I don’t want to ask her out.”

“You don’t want to get shot down. There’s a difference.”

He killed his iced tea, tossed the can to me, and stood up.

“Where are you going?” I asked.

“To prove my theory,” he said and headed for the truck.

I couldn’t be sure what theory he was talking about, he spewed so many, but before I could stop him, Quinn marched right up to Tori and started talking fast. I couldn’t hear what he was saying but he kept waving his arms for emphasis while she occasionally glanced across the street—at me.

Uh-oh. I sat up straight, suddenly self-conscious. But Tori didn’t seem particularly amused or even interested. To be honest, I did think she was—what’s the word?—different. But in a good way. I didn’t go for the giggly girls who always seemed to be hatching plots against one another. Tori couldn’t be bothered with that kind of drama. Question was, what sort of drama did interest her? I kind of wanted to know, but Quinn was right. She intimidated me.

Thankfully, a guy who I figured was Tori’s father came out of Lesser’s and that broke her away from Quinn. The two got into their truck and drove off, leaving a cloud of exhaust.

Quinn watched them for a second, then strode back toward me wearing a smug smile.

“See?” he announced with pride. “I was one hundred percent correct.”

“About what?”

“She’s not only astute but incredibly intelligent.”

“How did you get that? She didn’t say a word.”

“She didn’t have to. Her look said it all.”

“What look?”

“The look she gave me when I told her you think she’s hot. She wants nothing to do with you, by the way.”

“What!” I shouted, horrified.

“No, this is good. Most girls would have giggled and blushed but she didn’t even blink. That shows self-confidence. I’m telling you, son, it’s all in the knots.”

I threw his crumpled can at him, bouncing it off his chest.

“I’ll put a knot in your head!” I shouted.

Quinn laughed and backed off. “I was just proving a point! Now you don’t have to suffer the rejection of getting shot down. You owe me.”

He turned to run and I was right after him, more embarrassed than angry. I never knew what Quinn would do next, though that’s one of the reasons I liked him. He pushed people’s buttons just to see their reaction. I was used to it, even when it was at my expense, which was often. It’s what made Quinn Quinn.

We went back to work at the Blackbird Inn. It was a huge old Victorian mansion that had once belonged to some sea captain but had long since been converted into a hotel for people who liked to pretend they were vacationing in another era. It was one of Dad’s biggest accounts because of its huge lawn and dozens of flower beds. Our job that day was to mow the expansive lawn. It was grueling work but I always took pride in how good it all looked when we were done—which would have been a lot sooner if the two of us hadn’t been moving like zombies. It’s tough doing manual labor on two hours of sleep.

“I can’t believe you haven’t asked me yet,” Quinn said as he dumped a tarp full of grass clippings into a wheelbarrow.

“Asked you what?”

“About Marty. Don’t you want to know why he died? The autopsy, remember?”

“I was trying to forget. What happened?”

“I can’t tell you.”

I whacked him on the back of the head with the handle of my rake.

“You’re such an a-hole,” I said.

“I’m not! It’s unethical to discuss medical cases.”

“Then why did you bring it up?”

“Because I can’t tell you what happened.” He lowered his voice and added conspiratorially, “But it isn’t unethical to tell you what didn’t happen.”

I stared at him for a long moment, then whacked him on the back of the head again. “Cut the riddles,” I commanded.

Quinn looked around to see if anybody was listening, then continued softly. “The autopsy turned up zip.”

“Define zip ,” I demanded. “There had to be something. I mean, the guy died.”

“There wasn’t. He didn’t have any heart problems; there was nothing wrong with his brain; there weren’t any drugs in his system or disease or abnormality of any kind. The guy just stopped living.”

That was disturbing news. I had hoped to hear that Marty had a previously undetected heart condition or rare genetic defect or anything else that would explain why the most athletic guy in school had suddenly become the most dead guy in school. A rare medical condition would have meant his problem was a tragic but understandable fluke. Having no explanation meant the same thing could happen to anybody.

“Tucker!” called a sweet voice.

Olivia Kinsey was waving to us from the porch of the hotel. On a table next to her was a pitcher of lemonade and some glasses. On her body was a tiny red bikini.

“That looks great,” Quinn said longingly. “The lemonade looks pretty good too.”

We dragged our sorry selves over as she poured some icy-cold drinks.

“You guys look like you could use a break,” she said sweetly. “It is so hot.”

“Really,” Quinn agreed while giving me a sideways look. “Really, really hot.” He wasn’t talking about the weather.

Olivia was from New York City and had been spending the summer on Pemberwick with her mother. It was her first time on the island. All season I volunteered to work at the Blackbird because, well, Olivia was there. That’s how we met. I was weeding the garden one day and—bang. She appeared like somebody out of a magazine ad for ridiculous hotness. Dad figured out my motives pretty quick and warned me about getting involved with an off-islander who I might never see again. We were actually having that conversation one day when Olivia returned from the beach in the aforementioned bikini. Dad took one look at her and said, “Uh…never mind.”

Dad was cool.

Olivia was really out of her big-city element on Pemberwick, so I volunteered to show her around the island. Come to think of it, she came right out and asked me. I wasn’t about to refuse. We went to a lot of movies. She loved movies. Didn’t matter what it was. I also introduced her to most of the people who ran the shops in Arbortown. For somebody who came from the city, she seemed overly interested in how our simple island worked, which was cool, I guess. She had blonde hair that was cut short like a guy’s, but there was nothing else remotely guy-like about her. I never put a move on her, either. Not that I didn’t think about it, but she was way out of my league. She was older than me by a couple of years and went to some uppity prep school in New York and hung out with future captains of industry. I went to a public school on a remote island and hung out with future captains of lobster boats. There wasn’t a whole lot of future for that kind of relationship but it was fun to dream.