Sara Shepard - Never Have I Ever

Ethan waggled his brows. “Take ’em off. I don’t mind.”

Emma mock-glared at him, but shed her pajama bottoms, grateful she was wearing opaque, black cotton boy shorts underneath. Tiptoeing to the edge, she lowered her body into the pool, the cool water slipping over her skin inch by inch. She pushed off from the wall and did a couple of breaststroke pulls underwater. Her camisole billowed out beneath her like an inflated parachute. When she came up for air, Ethan had stopped in the center of the pool. The golden lights reflected off his cheekbones, showing off his slicked-back hair, angular face, and broad, golden shoulders. Ethan caught her eye and smiled back, but Emma quickly looked away. She didn’t want him to think she was staring.

“This was a good idea,” Emma said, twisting around to float on her back.

“Told you.” Ethan paddled toward the diving board. “I have a confession to make,” he said a moment later, his strong arms cutting the water. “I’m a serial pool crasher. When I was younger, I used to sneak into my neighbor’s pool all the time.”

“Well, I’m a pool-crashing virgin,” Emma said, hoping the night was dark enough that Ethan couldn’t see her blushing at the word virgin .

“I always wanted my own pool.” Ethan reached up and grabbed both sides of the diving board. “My parents never went for it. My mom thought I’d be one of those kids on the news who drowned.”

It occurred to Emma how little she knew about Ethan’s life. “What are your parents like?”

Ethan shrugged. “They’re . . . well, my mom’s a chronic worrier. And my dad’s . . . absent.”

“He’s gone?” Maybe the two of them had something in common.

Air slowly escaped Ethan’s lips. “Not exactly. He just travels a lot. His work means everything to him. He got an apartment in San Diego that’s close to his company’s main office, and he’s there more than he’s home. He probably likes being away from us.”

“You shouldn’t joke about that.”

One of Ethan’s shoulders rose. It looked like he was going to say something more, but then he shook his head forcefully as if to erase the thoughts and dropped from the diving board. “Did you have a pool when you were growing up, Emma?”

Emma laughed, kicking her legs faster as she tread water. “A foster kid with a pool? I was lucky if I had a clean bathtub. But I hung out at public pools a lot. When I was younger, a social worker got me into free swimming lessons.”

“That’s nice.”

“I guess.” It would’ve been nicer if Becky had taught her to swim. Or if one of her foster moms had bothered to come and watch her lessons. Emma used to look to the bleachers when she was in the water, thinking she might see someone for her there, but she was always disappointed. Eventually, she stopped looking altogether.

“Do you have a favorite pool game from when you were growing up?” Ethan asked.

Emma thought for a moment. “I guess Marco Polo.” They used to play it at the end of swimming lessons.

“Wanna play?” Ethan asked.

Emma giggled, but Ethan’s face was serious. “Uh, sure,” she said. “ Quietly. ” She shut her eyes, spun around in the water a few times, and whispered, “Marco!”

“Polo!” Ethan answered back, his voice low. Emma drifted toward his voice, sticking her arms straight in front of her.

Ethan snickered. “You look like the undead.”

Emma laughed, but it felt wrong somehow. What if Sutton’s body was floating somewhere just like hers was right now?

An image of cold, dark water raced through my mind. Waves lapped a body wrapped in soaked clothing. I couldn’t get close enough to make out the figure lying facedown on the riverbed. Could it have been me lying there, left for dead?

Emma halfheartedly swam toward Ethan’s voice, trying to shake off the feeling of dread that had bloomed in her stomach. Her hands swiped air.

“I’m the Marco Polo master,” Ethan teased. It sounded like he was now in the shallow end. “So did being a foster kid suck?”

Emma cleared her throat. “Pretty much,” she said, squeezing her eyes tighter. “But since I’m eighteen, I guess it’s over. Marco!”

“Polo,” Ethan answered, now sounding on Emma’s left. “It’s also over because you’re here , living Sutton’s life. And once we figure this out, you can go back to being Emma again.”

Emma swished her fingers through the cool water, considering this. It was hard not to think about what might happen to her after Sutton’s murder was solved— if it was solved. She wanted more than anything to stay here, to get to know the Mercers as herself , but what if they kicked her out once they discovered she’d been impersonating their dead daughter?

Ethan broke the silence. “I don’t know how you got through years of foster care and turned out so . . . normal. I’m not sure I would.”

“Well, I kind of disappeared into my own head.” Emma skimmed through the water, focused on the sound of Ethan’s low voice. “Made up a world of my own.”

“Meaning . . . ?”

“I kept journals and wrote stories. And I created a newspaper.”

“Really?”

Emma nodded, her eyes still closed. “It was sort of . . . the Daily Emma . I would take pictures and write down stuff that happened to me as if it were a top story on the front page. You know, ‘Girl Cooks Yet Another Lentil Loaf for Hippie Foster Parents.’ Or ‘Foster Sister Breaks Emma Paxton’s Prized Possession Just ’Cause She Feels Like It.’ It helped me cope. I still compose headlines in my head, sometimes.”

“How come?”

Emma wiped water from her face. “I guess it makes me feel . . . significant. Like I’m good enough to be a headline on a front page—even if it’s my own made-up newspaper.”

“I went into my own little world, too,” Ethan confessed. “I used to get picked on all the time when I was younger.”

“ You were picked on?” Emma wanted to open her eyes and stare at him. “Why?”

“Why does anyone ever get picked on?” Ethan’s voice cracked. “It was just something that happened. Except instead of writing newspapers, I drew mazes. First, they were pretty basic, but eventually I made them more and more complicated until even I couldn’t solve them. I would get lost in those mazes. I imagined that they were a garden labyrinth I could disappear into forever.”

Suddenly, she felt fluttering kicks underwater. She thrust her hand out, touched skin, and opened her eyes. Ethan was wedged in the corner near the built-in hot tub.

Before Emma knew what she was doing, she touched a little shaving cut on Ethan’s chin. “Does it hurt?”

Ethan blushed. “Nah.” Then he grabbed her waist and pulled her closer. Their legs collided and Emma felt the friction between their skin. She stared at Ethan’s dewy lips, the droplets of water on his eyelashes, the smattering of freckles scattered across his shoulders.

Crickets chirped. The mesquite trees sighed in the wind. Just as Ethan leaned closer, Sutton’s necklace caught the moonlight and sent a glimmer across the surface of the pool.

The water suddenly felt like ice on Emma’s skin. This was all happening too fast. “Um . . .” she muttered, turning and swimming away.

Ethan twisted awkwardly, too, wiping water from his face.

“ Ugh! ” I screamed at them. Talk about frustrating!

Emma moved to the ladder. “We should probably get out.”

“Yeah.” Ethan pushed out of the pool. He looked at the flower beds and the cone-shaped bird feeder that hung from a birch tree—anywhere but at Emma.

They stood wet and shivering and almost naked on the deck. Emma wished she could think of something to dispel the tension, but her mind felt blank and waterlogged.