ELEVEN

I went to a small elementary school. That’s where I met Natalie. It was only a few blocks from my house and it was small enough that there was only one teacher per grade. Your clique was the grade you were in. In elementary school, no one cared about money because we were too young to really know better.

Junior high and high school were different. They were much larger campuses, and by that age, money defined your clique. Unless you were exceptionally pretty. Or, in Zackary Henderson’s case, famous on YouTube. He wasn’t rich, but his social media status landed him in the rich crowd. Followers are considered a more valuable currency than cash to a lot of people my age.

I came from the worst part of town and everyone knew it. The kids in my neighborhood who were just as poor as me slowly began to dwindle. A lot of them followed in the same sad footsteps as their parents, turning to drugs. I never felt part of that crowd because I did whatever I could to be the exact opposite of my mother and the people like her.

It didn’t matter at school, though. Natalie was my only friend until I joined the volleyball team as a freshman. A few of the girls on the team accepted me, especially after I became the best one on the team, but most of them resented me. They still treated me like I was less than them. And it wasn’t necessarily typical bullying. No name-calling, or being shoved around in the hallways. I think I might have been too intimidating to some of them to be bullied.

I would have fought back and they knew it.

It was more that I was avoided. Ignored. I was never included in anything. I’m sure a lot of that had to do with the fact that I was one of the few in my school who had no cell phone, no laptop, no home phone. No means of connecting outside of school hours, and that can be socially detrimental for anyone these days. Or maybe that’s just my way of excusing being excluded for the better part of six years.

It’s hard not to grow bitter when you spend so much time alone. It’s especially hard not to grow bitter at class systems and people with money, because the richer they were, the more it seemed I didn’t exist to them.

Which is why being here on this beach with the type of people I’m sure I would have been invisible to in high school is hard for me. I want to believe Sara would have treated me the same as she does now had I known her in high school. The more I get to know her, the less I see her as someone who would be intentionally shitty to anyone.

And Samson. How did he treat the underdogs?

Not everyone who had money was an asshole in my high school, but enough of them were that I think I might have just lumped them all together. Part of me wonders if things would have been different if I would have tried harder. Opened up more. Would I have been accepted?

Maybe the only reason I wasn’t accepted is because I didn’t want to be. It was easier to stay to myself. I had Natalie when I needed her, but she had a cell phone and other friends that kept her busy, so we weren’t inseparable. I can’t even say we were best friends.

I just know that I never did things like this. I never hung out in groups with people. When I was old enough to get a job, I worked as much as I possibly could. So bonfires and cookouts and spending time with people my own age is foreign to me. I’m trying to find a way to be at ease in this crowd, but it’s going to take time. I’ve spent a lot of years becoming the person I am. It’s hard to change who you are in a span of a few days.

There are about eight people around the campfire, but none of them are Samson. He came down and grabbed a burger, but then went back to his house after he ate. The only two I know are Sara and Marcos, but they’re sitting across from me, the fire separating us. I don’t think they know the other people here all that well, either. I heard Marcos ask one of the guys where he’s from.

This must be a beach thing. Hanging out with random people you barely know. Strangers gathering around a fire, asking one another superficial questions until they’re drunk enough to pretend they’ve known each other their whole lives.

I think Sara can tell I’m folding in on myself. She walks over and sits down next to me. Pepper Jack Cheese is lying in the sand next to my chair. Sara looks down at the dog and scratches him on the head.

“Where’d you find this thing?”

“He followed me home earlier.”

“Have you named him yet?”

“Pepper Jack Cheese.”

She looks at me. “Seriously?”

I shrug.

“I kinda like it. We should give him a bath later. We have an outdoor shower on the stilt level.”

“You think your mom would let me keep him?”

“Not in the house, but we could make him a spot outside. She probably won’t even notice, honestly. They’re barely here.”

I’ve noticed that. They both get home late and tend to go to bed soon after. They leave early in the morning. “Why are they gone so much?”

“They both work in Houston. Traffic is terrible, so they eat dinner together in the city on weeknights so they don’t have to fight it. But they take off Fridays during the summer, so they both have three-day weekends.”

“Why do they even bother driving here Monday through Thursday? Isn’t their main house in Houston?”

“My mother would worry about me too much. She’s not as strict as she used to be because I’m almost twenty, but she still wants to know I’m home in bed every night. And she loves the ocean. I think she sleeps better here.”

“Does anyone live in your beach house when it isn’t summer?”

“No, we use it as a rental. We come here for holidays, or a weekend getaway every now and then.” She stops petting Pepper Jack Cheese and looks at me. “Where are you staying when you start classes in August? Are you moving back in with your mother?”

My stomach turns at that question. They all still think I’m going to some community college back in Kentucky. Not to mention I still haven’t told anyone about my mother.

“No. I’ll be—”

Marcos appears and pulls Sara out of her chair before I can finish my sentence. He swoops her up and she squeals and wraps her arms around his neck as he runs her out toward the water. Pepper Jack Cheese stands up and barks because of the commotion.

“It’s okay,” I say, putting my hand on his head. “Lie down.”

He resumes his position in the sand. I stare up at Samson’s house, wondering what he’s doing. Does he have a girl with him? That would explain why he isn’t out here socializing.

I don’t like being out here alone now that Sara and Marcos are in the water. I don’t know any of these other people and they’re really starting to get rowdy. I think I’m the only one not drinking.

I stand up and go for a walk to get away from the group before any of them decide to play spin the bottle or something else just as horrifying. Pepper Jack Cheese follows me.

I’m really starting to like this dog. His loyalty is nice, but his name is way too long. I might just call him P.J.

There’s an abandoned sandcastle a few yards away from the group that’s half destroyed. P.J. runs over to it and starts sniffing around it. I sit down next to the sand castle and start rebuilding one of the walls.

Life is weird. One day you’re staring at your dead mother and a few days later you’re building a sandcastle on the beach by yourself in the dark with a dog named after a cheese.