Made For Us, page 7
“The joys of being eight,” I say and get up, walking out of the water and to one of the daybeds. I spot Gabriella sitting down with Erika, Franny, and Vivienne so I make my way over there.
“What did I miss?” I ask, grabbing a towel and wrapping it around my waist before looking around for a chair to drag over. I sit down in the shade, looking at Gabriella lounging on the daybed. Her camera is right next to her in her hand.
“I got a couple of candid shots of you guys building a sandcastle.” She tells me, looking out toward the water. “I got a couple of good shots of Xavier tossing Penelope into the water also.” She looks back at me as I lie down next to her. “We are having the welcome barbecue on the beach in two hours,” Gabriella informs me.
“What time is it?” I ask them.
Erika presses the button on her phone before turning to me. “Five thirty.”
“Oh my gosh, I just said I wanted to take a nap,” I huff, knowing there isn’t going to be enough time to nap.
“No rest for the wicked,” Franny teases me as she looks over at Wilson, who is sitting on the sand with their daughter. “I need a snack.” She gets up and puts her hand on her belly, which is starting to show. She announced at the beginning of the playoffs she couldn’t drink because she was expecting.
“A food snack,” Gabriella asks, “or his dick as a snack?”
“You are so crass,” Franny chastises her, then turns. “Mom, can you watch the baby for me? I need Wilson to help me with something.”
We burst out laughing as I get up and turn to Gabriella. “I’m going back to relax before dinner.”
“Well, playing in the sand can make one tired,” she taunts, and I just glare at her and then look at Erika, who rolls her lips.
“I know nothing. I see nothing.” She puts up her hand.
“I remember a while back, a certain couple hooking up on our family vacation one year.” I point at her, and she laughs as she gets up.
“Best vacation of my life,” she swears to me and then turns to call my cousin. “Cooper,” he calls him, and he springs out of his chair, coming over to her. “Will you come in the water with me?”
“Anything for you,” he says, grabbing her hand and walking with her into the water. I watch how he gets into the water, and she hugs him before placing her head on his shoulder. I take a second to look at Tristan, as I see him chatting with Xavier while Penelope plays close by. What I wouldn’t give to have just one kiss from him. What I wouldn’t give to have the love that any of my relatives have.
I turn away and walk back, rinsing my feet off as soon as I leave the beach. I walk into the room and head straight to the shower, washing off the sunscreen before I unpack my luggage. I walk out of my room, still wrapped in the towel, to grab a bottle of water and hear the shower coming from Gabriella’s room.
I grab a white strapless bra with a white silky tank top that falls just under my boobs. I grab my long, blue flowy pants that fall straight to my ankles. The minute I walk, my legs poke out of the peekaboo slit that goes all the way up to the top of my thigh. I slip on a pair of black flip-flops before walking back into the bathroom to do something with my hair. I comb it and then shake it out, letting the air dry. I don’t even bother putting on makeup because my face has a nice tan color.
Gabriella and I walk out of our rooms at the same time and laugh because we are wearing the same thing. “I’m not changing.” She laughs at me.
“It’ll be fun. Think we can mess with people?” I tell her, “Take off the ring.” I point at the gold and silver ring she wears on her index finger. “Fluff your hair a bit more.” I walk over to her and touch up her hair a bit. We both raise our hands and touch each other’s noses. “Boop,” we say at the same time, turning and walking out of the door. The lights from the edge of the pathway make it very bright.
I take two steps when I turn and see Penelope coming out of her room with Tristan behind her. She wears pink shorts with a white shirt, and her hair is in a French braid. I smile as I watch Tristan walk behind her with his head down. He’s wearing light orange shorts and a short-sleeved white button-down shirt. My stomach literally flips over as I see him run his hand through his hair. My mouth waters when I think of how it must feel to have his hair under my fingers. I wonder if it feels as silky as it looks. Gabriella stops walking as she looks over also. “Great timing,” she mumbles, and Penelope looks up.
“Look.” She turns around, showing us her back. “Dad did a French braid.”
“Oh, jealous,” Gabriella replies, and Tristan looks up at the same time that my eyes find his, and I quickly look back at Penelope.
“Hey, you two,” Tristan greets us. “Nice outfits.”
Gabriella laughs, and Penelope looks at her and then at me. “But can you tell us apart?” Gabriella asks, and he just smirks.
“You’re Gabriella.” He points at her. “And you’re Abigail.” We just look at him with our mouths hanging open.
“How in the H E double hockey sticks did you know?” I question him, and he just shrugs.
“It’s easy,” he just states. “What time is dinner?” He looks at his black Apple Watch on his wrist.
“Now,” Gabriella says, turning to walk down the path while I walk next to Penelope, who slips her hand in mine.
No one really says anything. When we walk on the beach, picnic tables are set up everywhere, with about two hundred tiki lights all over the place, so it looks very bright. “Hey, you guys,” my father says to us and looks at our outfits. “How are my girls?”
I whisper, “He doesn’t know who is who.” Tristan just looks over at me.
“I know who is who,” my father defends, putting his hands on his hips, “but I’m not going to tell you. Go grab a plate and eat.” He points at the long tables set up on the far right with silver platters on them and chefs standing behind them.
“Nice save, Daddy-o,” I say, kissing his cheek. “Nice save.”
“My dad knows who is who,” Penelope tells him and then walks toward the tables with a chuckling Tristan behind her.
I just roll my lips as Gabriella folds her arms over her chest. “It wasn’t even a question; he knew right away.” She then looks at me. “I wonder how that could be.”
“I’m getting food.” I ignore her, trying not to even think about that question. Even though the whole time I was walking here I asked myself the same one. How did he know? How could he know?
I grab myself a plate of food. My head still going around in circles, I don’t even notice when Penelope sits next to me, and Tristan sits next to her. I’m saved when Xavier and Vivienne join the table, so I don’t really have to talk.
I look over as I see them setting up a bonfire in the middle of the beach off to the side. “What is that?” Penelope asks, and I look over and see the fire starting and they are preparing a small table beside it.
“Smores.” I smile as I tell her and her eyes light up.
“Dad, can we get smores?” she asks, and he just nods at her. “Can we go?” She looks at me, asking me, and I get up and hold my hand out to her.
We make our way over as the kids all come running. I help a couple of the kids put their marshmallow on the long metal rods they provided. “Remember when we did this with sticks?” Dylan says from beside me, and we all laugh.
“One year, I think I ate a piece of stick,” Michael remembers. “We didn’t get the fancy stuff. We had to go grab a stick somewhere.”
I can’t help but laugh as Penelope comes running to me, and I see her marshmallow is still burning. “Help!” she shouts as Tristan walks over with his hands in his pockets. I blow out the marshmallow as she laughs, clapping her hands.
“Here you go,” Tristan says as he holds a graham cracker with a piece of chocolate on it. I watch Penelope and Tristan do the smores, and she takes a bite of it, then turns to hand it to me so I can taste it.
I grab it from her and bite a piece, but the marshmallow strings out all around me. I move my hand to break the strings, but the wind blows, and I feel some fly onto my face. Penelope laughs at me, and Tristan just smiles at me as he leans in, raising his hand. I hold my breath as I watch his thumb come up and touch my cheek. “You’ve got a piece,” he says, and my whole body lights up. My heart feels like it’s going to explode in my chest. “Right here,” he adds as he takes the marshmallow off my face, and then he puts his thumb into his mouth, licking off the piece on my face.
“Thanks,” I mumble to him. “I’m going to go wash my hands.” I make an excuse and walk away from him. My cheek feels on fire as I walk away from the beach and toward my villa. I close the door behind me and only then do I let out the deep breath I was holding. “What in the fuck was that?”
CHAPTER TEN
TRISTAN
What did you just do? I ask myself after I lick the marshmallow from my thumb and I watch her thank me. She quickly rushes off and I feel like I’m going to throw up as I watch her walk away, knowing it’s because she got creeped out by my gesture. I sit on the sand trying to calm myself down.
“Are you ready for tomorrow?” Xavier sits next to me.
“What is going on tomorrow?” I look over at him as I watch Penelope go off with Parker to play hide-and-seek.
“Fishing trip,” he informs me, and I just look at him, shocked. “Did you not read the itinerary?”
“There is an itinerary?” I ask, shaking my head. “I just thought it was a beach vacation.”
“Have you met Max and Matthew?” He laughs. “Go big or go home.”
I sit on the beach, waiting for Abigail to come back, but thirty minutes later, I know I have to get Penelope into bed when she comes over and is rubbing her eyes. “Daddy,” she whines, sitting in my lap as I wrap my arms around her and kiss her head. “I’m tired.”
“Let’s go to bed,” I tell her, and she gets up, holding out her hand for me. I nod at Xavier as we walk back to our villa. I make Penelope wash off her feet, and by the time I tuck her in, she’s already sleeping. I walk out of her bedroom and grab a bottle of water before I slide open the back door and walk out onto the back deck. I hear the water hitting the stairs as I walk over to the railing. I open the bottle and drink some before leaning on the railing with my arms. My eyes go to the side where I saw her this afternoon, wondering if she’s in there, wondering if I should knock on the door and try to tell her… I stop right there. What exactly do you want to tell her? I ask myself. My head now mocking my questions with their own. Do you want to tell her you’re madly in love with her? Do you want to tell her that the past six years all you’ve thought about besides Penelope has been her? Do you want to tell her you dream of her at night? Do you want to tell her that all you want is one night with her, knowing it’s a bald-faced lie. I look over and see a soft light coming out of their villa. Pushing off the railing, I walk back inside and to my bed.
Falling fast asleep, I only wake when Penelope slides into bed with me. “Dad,” she whispers, “it’s eight o’clock, and I’m hungry.”
I turn around and wrap my arm around her waist. “Snuggle with me,” I mumble as I bury my face in her neck, her hair falling over my face. “Did you take out your braid?” I ask her, and she nods. “We are going fishing today,” I inform her, and she shrugs
“You can make me a fishtail braid?” Penelope asks so effortlessly. When she turned five and started school, she asked me to braid her hair one day, and I had no idea how. She looked so sad it broke me, so I hired someone to come and teach me. She got me fake hair on a mannequin head, and every single night, I would practice, even on the road. While the guys were playing Call Of Duty, I was perfecting how to braid.
“Do you want to order some room service?” I ask her, and she just nods her head. “Pick up the phone and order me eggs and some bacon.” I slip out of bed, keeping my back to her. There is only so much explaining I can do about my dick. When she was four and saw it, she thought it was an elephant. Then last year, she waited for me to get out of bed, and I did, but I still had my morning hard-on. She wanted to know if I brought a toy to bed. “Press zero.”
“I know that,” she huffs at me, pressing zero, and I hear her. “Good morning,” she says. I laugh, closing the door. She sounds so grown-up sometimes. I slip on some basketball shorts before walking out and seeing her sitting on the bed on her iPad. “They said twenty minutes.”
“Okay.” I walk to the window and throw open the shades and see the sun in the sky. I walk over to my phone, finding there is a text from Matthew
Meeting in the lobby at 10 a.m. sharp.
See you then.
I walk out to the living room to the mini fridge, grabbing a bottle of water, when there is a knock on the door. I open it, and there are two carts. “What did you order?”
“The woman asked if I wanted one of everything,” she explains, coming out of the bedroom, her iPad in her hand. “I said ‘okay, but my dad wants bacon and eggs.’” I shake my head because how do I reason with that logic?
The man wheels in the first cart and then the second, taking off the domes, and I see there really is everything. There are two types of pancakes, regular and blueberry. There are scrambled eggs and an omelet. There is also bacon, ham, and even sausage. The huge platter of fruit will most likely be the first thing Penelope eats. I look at her when the man leaves. “Do you want me to make you a plate?”
“Nope.” She walks over, just grabbing the platter of fruit and a fork. “I’m good. We can have a picnic.” I laugh that she is using my words against me. She really needs to stop remembering everything I’ve said.
As we sit and eat, I turn on the television, flipping to the news as we finish up. Surprisingly there isn’t much left after we finish. “Go change,” I tell her, and she gets up and skips to her room while I clean up the plates and push the carts into the hallway. I’m in my bathroom when she comes back in and yells she’s done. I open the door and see her there in her bathing suit. “You need a cover-up and bring me some sunscreen; I’ll do it now before we get on the boat.” It takes her less than a minute to come back into the room wearing a pair of shorts and a tank top with the sunscreen in one hand and her hairbrush in the other. I do her hair first as she looks in the mirror. “We are going fishing today,” I remind her, and she lights up because she loves to fish. “How about we just stay the two of us today?” I focus on her hair. “Let everyone else relax.” And by everyone, I mean Abigail. I don’t say the words out loud, but I hope I don’t have to.
“Okay,” she agrees, and I wonder if she understands what I’m saying. I finish her fishtail braid, then apply sunscreen on her face and arms, and she does her own legs. I grab my backpack, throwing in more sunscreen, her iPad, and a change of clothes for her, just in case. When we walk out of the room, the carts are gone.
Penelope holds my hand, and when we get to the lobby, there are already two buses waiting for us and it looks like everyone is here. “Morning,” I say to Matthew, who is standing beside Max each with a clipboard.
“Right on time,” Max relays, writing something on the board in front of him before turning to Matthew. “Can you keep up with me, please?” He points at the board. “No wonder we are always late. You are supposed to check them off.”
“What is going on?” I ask of them as they check off names.
“We are taking control of the people,” Matthew states, “so we don’t leave with anyone missing.”
“I wish,” Gabriella mumbles, walking past us. She wears a huge straw hat, a black bikini top, a wraparound black skirt, and strappy high heels. “Gabriella is here.” She walks to the bus and gets in.
“Ignore her.” I hear Abigail from behind me. “Someone drank too much with Christopher and Matty on the beach.”
“She’s wearing heels,” Matthew observes, and I roll my lips.
“We are going fishing,” Max says, shaking his head.
“She put on a sequined dress this morning, so you are all welcome,” Abigail shares, looking at Penelope. “Love your hair.”
“Dad did it,” she affirms. I wait for her to look at me, and when she does, it’s like everything in me feels complete. She’s wearing a white bikini top, a white wraparound skirt, and flip-flops. Her hair is piled on her head. “It’s a fishtail braid.”
“That’s very cool.” She smiles at her. “You are one step closer to becoming a mermaid.” She winks at her before she looks at her uncles. “Abigail is present,” she announces before walking into the bus Gabriella just walked onto. I grab Penelope’s hand and go to the opposite bus, just to make sure that I give her space.
It doesn’t take long before the buses leave and an even a shorter time before we get to the marina, where four catamarans are waiting for us. “Two are for fishing, and two are for swimming.” I hear someone say and walk toward the boat that is fishing.
Five guys are waiting to help us set up. Penelope and I sit next to each other with the fishing poles in front of us. There is one seat left on our side, and before I can say anything, Penelope gasps, “Abigail, are you fishing?”
I close my eyes and curse everyone in the universe and even out of the universe. “Yes,” she confirms, looking around, and even she is trying to get away from us.
“Come sit with us,” Penelope invites, and I don’t know if she is guilted into it, but she comes over and drops into the seat next to me. Cooper comes onto the boat with Emma, Mia, and Parker. “Dad, can I go say hi?” she asks, and I nod at her as she goes, leaving me and Abigail alone.
I rub my hands on my shorts because they are so sweaty with nerves. “So you fish?” I say.
“Yes,” she confirms, “when we were younger, we used to go up to Canada where Uncle Max has a place, and we used to fish all the time.”
“Sounds like fun,” I reply, and as of right now, I would like the boat to tip over to shut me up. Neither of us says anything as we sit side by side so awkwardly.
