The Seacrest by Aaron Lazar Read Free Book Online Page A

trotted, Libby glided atop her, barely bouncing, absorbing the movement with her hips, legs, and back.
    “It’s nice out here,” I said. “Better than digging holes in the sun.”
    She shot me a wry smile. “Told you.”
    We rode along the shore for another mile, and had almost reached the end of her property when I stopped and stared. There it was. My parents’ house on the hill, just visible from our vantage point. Its white paint glistened in the sun.
     I felt the blood drain from my face. I hadn’t been back to the farm since the fire, ten years ago. When I went to town, I purposefully avoided any roads that would take me near it. I hadn’t even seen the house since then, and was surprised to see it completely rebuilt to match the old one. I had heard an entire wing burned to the ground. We’d all been rushed to the hospital when the fire was still spreading.
    Now it stood just like my childhood memories had captured it.
    “You have to go back, you know.” She looked at me with stern eyes.
    I met her gaze. “No, I don’t.”
    “It’s yours now.”
    “Not yet. I haven’t signed the papers.”
    “When will you?”
    “I’m supposed to meet with Sawyer tomorrow, at nine.”
    “Are you going?” She toyed with one pigtail.
    “I'm not sure.” I looked up again, feeling such conflicting emotions about the place that I didn’t know which way was up. Pain. Trauma. Nostalgia. Joy. It had, after all, been the place I spent my happy childhood, before I lost them all.
    “You need to face your past, Finn.”
    I bristled. “What the hell for?”
    “It’s what adults do.”
    I stared at her. “Really? You’re going there?”
    “You can’t just blow it off. It’s your house now. Your farm. Your parents’ legacy to you.” She moved closer. “Your parents would want you to take it over, make it successful again. Bring back the blueberries. Get the business going.” She frowned. “If you don’t, it all will have been for nothing.”
    I chewed on my lip. Feelings of outrage bubbled inside me. How dare she tell me what to do? She had no idea… Well, maybe she did. She did lose her husband.
    “Well?”
    I shook my head. “No way. I’m not going back.”
    She snorted, surprising Dippy, who scuttled sideways even in the heat of the day. Re-gathering her reins, she practically spat the words at me. “You’re a coward. You were back then, and you are now. You hide out on our grounds, living a small life, not using your God-given talent.” Her face twisted for a moment with what seemed unusual sentiment. I wondered what was behind it.
    “What? You mean my art?”
    “Hell, yes.” She pulled her horse around and faced the house on the hill. “You have a chance to go for it now. You’d be wealthy. You could paint up there.” She pointed to the house. “You could follow your dreams.”
    I felt myself pull away. “How do you know about my dreams? And how dare you call me a coward?” I moved my horse closer to her. “You don’t know me.”
    Her lips tightened and her eyes narrowed. “Yes I do,” she said. “You’re a moron.”
    With that, she urged her mare into a gallop and left me sitting on Popeye with a dropped jaw.
    A moron?
    I let out a long sigh and cantered after her.
    Crap, I thought. Maybe she was right.
     

Chapter 12
    July 11, 1997
    6:55 P.M.
     
    Sassy didn’t make it for two nights in a row. I waited for an hour-and-a-half the first night, three hours the next. Each evening I sat on the jetty, fidgeting in the warm evening air, listening to the cries of the gulls. I’d imagined our kiss, that deep, sweet, tongue-flicking experience that had shot me to the moon and back.
    I’d never admit it to Jax, and I was barely able to admit it to myself. But it was my first real kiss, and I figured—or hoped—it was hers, too.
    Sure, there had been little pecks on the cheek or near the lips. My babysitter—who I had a monstrous crush on—would kiss me beside the mouth and I’d