The bonfire on Cousins Beach was smaller that year. Not because there were fewer people—Taylor had dragged her new boyfriend, and Steven had brought a girl from UVA who laughed too loudly at everything. No, it was smaller because the heart of it had split in two.

She stepped up to the railing, leaving a foot of space between them. The salt wind lifted her hair. She’d stopped straightening it this summer. She’d stopped a lot of things.

He stopped. Swallowed.

“You’re missing the show,” she said.

Because that’s what you did at Cousins Beach. You showed up. You stayed. And you tried not to drown in the space between what you wanted and what you couldn’t have.