Page 7 of The Summer You Were Mine

“Gram called me to ask me if it was improper to have an odd number of men and women in the bridal party. She said Simone wanted Cris to be one of the groomsmen even though they would be outnumbering the bridesmaids. Wait, why are you worried? I’m sure he’s showing up to the wedding with Sister Springboards or whatever.

(Damian! Two steamers in the ladies’ lounge. I know you remembered, thank you!)”

“Oh no . I’m one of the bridesmaids! But that might be good if he brings her, right? What did you tell Gram?” Even she couldn’t deny that her voice had gone up two octaves into the shrill panic range.

“I told her she’s eighty-two and she can come down the aisle with ten drag queens and a marching band if she wants to.”

“I’d like to see that,” she said.

“Me too. Anyway, look, you’re getting way ahead of yourself.

You do this every time, El. Whenever there’s a catastrophe, you add an explosion.

If there is a hurricane, you add a blizzard.

Can you just deal with one thing at a time?

And isn’t therapy your job? We can switch, you know.

You can swing right over here to panic-pick the onion fragments out of four hundred fifty cups of ceviche because of a late-breaking allium intolerance. ”

“Nope. I’m good. You won’t hear another peep out of me. But Benny, do me a favor, will you? We talk every day, but can you please text me back when I text you?”

“Are you implying that I am lax in my responses?” he asked.

“I mean the last text reply I got from you was ‘You pick, Mom and Dad never like my Christmas gifts anyway.’”

“And?”

“And it’s the end of June.”

“Well, they were not as thrilled about the cashmere pajamas as I’d hoped.

But fine. I’ll be better. I just prefer talking.

And I don’t mean to be flippant, but come on, El.

When it comes right down to it, Cris is an old friend.

Just see it as that, okay? You don’t have to get all Jane Austen about this.

You kissed once, you had a little misunderstanding.

I’ve had more relationship angst with the guy who makes the Negronis at Dante’s in the West Village. ”

“That guy is very, very unpredictable with the vermouth quantities.”

“Tell me about it. (Damian! Damian! Awards on the front table!)”

“To be clear, I am not interested in Cris. Or being dramatic. Or making any more explosions. I want to get through this, enjoy the wedding, then figure out what I am doing. Calmly.”

“It would be so amazing if I could believe even one of the words you just said.”

“Benny, I—”

“(Damian, Damian!) El, I gotta go. My assistant is going to kill me today. Call me when you get there, okay? Love you!”

Ellie tossed the phone onto the bed, where it was instantly buried under piles of rolled-up pajamas and balled-up socks.

Cris was an old friend, sure. It was true that their families had been close since long before either of them were around.

Part of a dynasty of professional water polo players, Ellie’s dad, Giorgio, and Cris’s dad, Alessandro, had been best friends since their heads were big enough to put swim caps on.

Gio and Ale stuck together through junior national championships, nationals, and even up until the World Athletic Games in ’84 and ’88.

When her dad was offered a position to coach at Bucknell University in 1989, he took it, promising to come home every summer.

Ale stayed in Italy, married Cinzia, and had the three boys.

Cris had turned ten and the twins, four, when they moved to California so that Ale could take the job as head coach at Stanford.

Their dads stayed best friends despite their cross-country rivalry, and still the summer vacations continued.

Spending July and sometimes August at the beach club in Chiavari was the rule every summer until the year that Alessandro’s skin didn’t seem to tan so much as turn an odd yellow.

The yellow turned out to be jaundice, and he was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer in September.

Ale died in February. Ellie would never forget the summer after.

Cinzia made Cris go visit his grandfather, thinking it would be good for them both.

Cris showed up seven inches taller, with a broken heart as big as the moon.

Ellie remembered the way Graziella leaned into her ear as they watched Simone pull him in for a hug and said, “ Aveva davvero bisogno. ” Though it was impossible to tell which of them needed it more.

Without the other Conte men horsing around, Cris was too quiet, too tame.

All he did was swim back and forth across the breakwater for hours at a time.

Most of their crew of friends from the beach club knew what had happened but none dared to bring it up.

At first, Ellie stayed close to him in case he wanted to talk.

He never talked about his dad, but he did talk—about things like how awesome the movie The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo was or why the Red Hot Chili Peppers’s new stuff was nowhere near as good as their old stuff.

He didn’t need to say much. They understood each other in the way that only another kid who had one foot in America and one foot there in Italy could.

Something had changed in her, and a feeling had started to bloom that was way beyond sympathy.

Ellie took another look at her closet and had a moment of packer’s remorse.

Did she want to add or subtract anything?

She’d already turned her suitcase into a bento box of summer dresses, shorts, and swimsuits.

What else did she need? What outfit did one wear in front of a man who had smashed one’s heart into bits?

No matter, she thought as she shut the lid of the suitcase and pulled at the zipper.

Not one outfit was placed into that suitcase for any reason other than her own satisfaction and that wasn’t going to change now.

Her phone lit up with a text. Omar. He’d sent her a link along with a message that said, Don’t panic.

We can fix this. Have a great trip! She clicked the link, which brought her to an article on the ESPN website titled “NINE TIMES ELLIE BELTRAMI WAS CONDESCENDING TO AN ATHLETE.” She threw the phone under a stack of rejected T-shirts and headed to the microkitchen to clean out her refrigerator.

The only thing worse than a bad trip was a bad trip followed by coming home to a fridge full of rotten food.

The next time she opened this door, it would all be behind her, she thought, tossing a dried-out clementine and a curled-up bunch of mint into the trash.

The realization gave her a little boost, though it was quickly shot through with guilt from inadvertently wishing for her grandmother’s wedding to be over.

She shoved her worries to the side, spraying the shelves with disinfectant.

If only it were as easy to clean up her own mess.