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.

“Jeremiah just pretended to fall into the fire. On purpose. For a girl.”

Not yet, anyway. End of scene.

Conrad looked at her then. Really looked. The kind of look that used to make her stomach drop—back when she was fifteen and he was untouchable. He wasn’t untouchable anymore. He was just… sad. In a way that had nothing to do with her.

Belly watched the flames from the edge of the dune, a red plastic cup dangling from her fingers. She wasn’t drinking. She was counting.

This is the summer , Belly thought, where every choice is a wound.