“Hi, Nick, it’s me,” Michelle said into the phone. “I’m OK…Yeah, I had fun last night too…” She bit her lip, blushing. “Aw, you’re so sweet.”
“Make it snappy,” I grumbled. I was in a good mood, but I didn’t want to listen to Nick and Michelle for the next 20 minutes when all I wanted to do was go out and see the island. It was Thursday morning. We were gonna have what we were calling a “whatever” day, a day to just drive around the island and see the sights. But it seemed Michelle couldn’t get out the door without hearing Nick’s voice first.
“Anyway, Natalie and I are just gonna drive around the island today and waste gas,” Michelle continued. “…Sure, you can come.”
I shot her a Look. “Michelle!”
She covered the mouthpiece with her hand. “What?”
“What are you doing?”
“Hold on.” She turned back to the phone. “Hey, Nick, Natalie wants to know if you can call Brian and see if he wants to come too…OK, I’ll be waiting. Bye.” She hung up and turned to me, smiling innocently. “You were saying?”
“Why the hell did you do that?” I practically shouted.
“What, do you not want to see Brian all of a sudden?” she teased.
“Well, yeah, but…”
“Then what’s your problem?”
“It’s one thing to see him casually as a friend, but getting set up? That’s something different.”
“I’m not setting you two up. My boyfriend is coming to see me, and he’s bringing his best friend, who happens to be a friend of yours. So it all works out in the end.”
My jaw dropped. “Your boyfriend?! When did this happen?” Just then, the phone rang, and I reached over and picked it up. “You’re gonna explain this to me later, sis. Hello?” I said into the phone.
“Natalie?” Brian said eagerly on the other end.
I smiled, happy to hear his voice. “That’s my name, don’t wear it out. So what’s going on?”
“I’m coming with y’all.”
“Oh, that’s cool. Meet us down in the lobby in…well, Michelle and I are good to go. Are you?”
“Pretty much.”
“OK, then, ten minutes.”
“OK. See ya then.” He hung up after that.
I hung up the phone with this light, airy feeling in my stomach. I was happy that I was going to see Brian again, but at the same time I felt kinda nervous. I had no idea what today had in store for me.
“Ugh! What is it with guys never being on time?” Michelle complained as we stood in the lobby exactly fourteen minutes later.
“They run on Guy Standard Time,” I joked. “Besides, they aren’t that late.”
“Yeah, well, if they don’t show up soon….Hey, Nick.”
All of a sudden, I could just feel someone about to sneak up behind me. I probably knew who it was, too, but I didn’t say anything because I’d probably sound paranoid.
“Boo,” said a familiar voice in my ear. I would have been startled if it hadn’t been who I knew it was.
“Brian, you realize I’m not the least bit scared,” I deadpanned as I turned to face him.
“Dammit!” he grumbled, pretending to be upset. “Oh well. I’ll get you later.”
I smiled and nodded. “Sure you will. Anyway, glad you could make it.”
“Glad I could, too,” he replied, grinning at me. Boy, between those amazing blue eyes of his -- I could get lost looking into them – and that smile, I could feel my knees going weak. If this was what my day was going to be like, I didn’t know what I was going to do with myself.
“OK, are we ready to go or what?” Nick said impatiently from where he stood behind both of us. He was carrying a big backpack containing God knows what. Hopefully nothing illegal, since this car was in my name. “Before we get old…”
“Ugh! I swear to God, you’re such a little boy!” I retorted, even though I knew he was actually a few months older than me. “The valet-parking guy’s not back yet. I wish he’d get here with the car already.”
Just then, our car pulled up, and the valet got out and handed me the keys.
“It’s a miracle!” Brian gasped melodramatically as I gave the valet a $5 bill.
“Nope, just good service,” the valet said, winking at us.
I smiled at the guy, but after he walked away, I made a face. “Ugh!”
Michelle grabbed for the keys. “Let me drive.”
I held them out of her reach. “Not on your life. You’re…oh, what did your friend Stephanie call you?” I pretended to be deep in thought. “Oh yeah, a sporadic driver.”
“My God,” Michelle grumbled. “Hit one parking meter and pay for it the rest of your life.”
“What?!” Nick and Brian exclaimed in unison.
“What? I didn’t say nothing,” Michelle said innocently. She opened the passenger-side door and fairly dove into the car. “Shotgun!”
After half an hour of driving, mostly through really nice rich neighborhoods (they must have been thrilled to hear us peel through there with the top down, blaring Jay-Z), we pulled off for the first time at a scenic overlook about half a mile from a beautiful state beach park. (AUTHOR’S NOTE: this place is real, and I have the pictures to prove it, just wait till I fix my scanner)
“OK, why are we stopping here? The beach is down there,” Michelle pointed out as Brian pulled the car to a stop and we all piled out.
“Because Kev said he found this place yesterday and he told me I should check it out, that’s why,” Brian said in a way-too-patient voice. “You want me to put the top up?” he asked me.
I shrugged. “Do what you want, but if the car gets stolen, you’re paying for it.”
Brian waved the keys in front of my face. “I still have these, remember?”
I grabbed them out of his hand and stuck my tongue out at him. “I’m driving next, thank you very much,” I told him gleefully.
“No, you aren’t.” He grabbed my hand with the keys in it and tried to wrestle them away from me.
“Knock it off, you big dumb freak!” I laughed, smacking him in the shoulder with one hand while I held the keys behind my back with the other and he tried to reach around me and get them. I put both hands behind my back, trying to keep the keys, but he grabbed both my wrists in one hand and started tickling me with the other hand.
“Say uncle!” he teased me, tickling my stomach.
“Uncle! Now…stop!” I managed through tears of laughter, dropping the keys. Brian instantly let go of me and picked up the keys, grinning triumphantly.
“Told ya I’d get you,” he informed me, twirling the key ring around on his finger and shoving the keys in his pocket.
“Fellas, how much you wanna bet those two are gonna hook up by the end of this trip?” I heard Nick say loudly. I turned around to see who he was talking to. To my horror, I saw him standing there with a camcorder. He had the whole tickling fight on film.
“Ya know, you could have told me you were filming me so I could have told you which is my best side,” I joked, trying to play off the fact that I was suddenly very embarassed.
“Did you at least ask D before you stole his camera?” Brian said dryly.
“Maybe,” Nick said casually. “He said get stuff that we wanted to remember about this trip. I don’t know about you, but here’s something I want to remember about this trip.” He turned the camera on Michelle.
“Aw, you’re so sweet,” Michelle told him, blushing.
“Excuse me,” Brian said, pushing past me, walking toward the stone wall of the overlook and leaning over the edge, pretending to throw up. “Whoa! Come check this out, guys. Now I know why Kev told me to come here.”
“What is it?” I wondered out loud, walking over to the wall. When I got there, I saw water spraying up out of the rocks that jutted up out of the ocean.
“Cool!” I exclaimed as I hoisted myself up onto the wall and sat with my legs swinging over the side. “Those things have a name, I know they do. Blowholes. This one’s like, one of the only ones in the world. I read about it in one of the tour books, but I figured it was, like, on the other side of the island.” I paused. “I’m saying ‘like’ a lot, aren’t I?”
“Yeah, but you’re a California girl, so…”
“So what?” I said defensively, turning around to face him. “We’re not all bad, you know. And people from San Francisco aren’t Valley Girls. Michelle’s a Valley Girl.”
“I wasn’t going to say anything bad about you. I never met a girl from San Francisco I didn’t like.” He paused, looking out at the ocean for a moment, before adding, “Then again, you might be the only girl from San Francisco that I’ve met and actually gotten to know well.”
I stared at him in amazement. “Really?”
He nodded. “Yeah,” he said seriously.
“Hey guys!” Michelle said cheerfully as she and Nick walked over, interrupting Brian’s and my talk. She peered over the side. “Wow, that’s cool.” She reached into her purse and pulled out a little disposable camera, which she used to take a few pictures of the blowhole.
“Frick, you OK?” Nick asked Brian. “It’s like…” He seemed to notice me sitting there for the first time, and the fact that I probably had a look of shock on my face, and he grinned wickedly. “Oh. I get it.”
“You get what?” Brian and I said almost in unison.
Nick shook his head. “Never mind.”