The Summer I Turned Pretty by Jenny Han Read Free Book Online Page B

that every time I came back from the summer house, she had to win me over again. She had to make me want to be there, in my real life with school and school boys and school friends. She'd try to pair me up with the cutest friend of the guy she was obsessed with at the time. I'd go along with it, and maybe we'd go to the movies or to the Waffle House, but I'd never really be there, not completely. Those boys didn't compare to Conrad or Jeremiah, so what was the point?
    Taylor was always the pretty one, the one the boys
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    looked at for that extra beat. I was the funny one, the one who made the boys laugh. I thought that by bringing her I'd be proving that I was a pretty one too. See? See, I'm like her; we are the same. But we weren't, and everybody knew it. I thought that bringing Taylor would guarantee me an invitation to the boys' late-night walks on the boardwalk and their nights on the beach in sleeping bags. I thought it would open up my whole social world that summer, that I would finally, finally be in the thick of things.
    I was right about that part at least.
    Taylor had been begging me to bring her for forever. I'd resisted her, saying it'd be too crowded, but she was very persuasive. It was my own fault. I'd bragged about the boys too much. And deep down, I did want her there. She was my best friend, after all. She hated that we didn't share everything--every moment, every experience. When she joined the Spanish club, she insisted I join too, even though I didn't take Spanish. "For when we go to Cabo after graduation," she said. I wanted to go to the Galapagos Islands for graduation, that was my dream. I wanted to see a blue-footed booby. My dad said he'd take me too. I didn't tell Taylor, though. She wouldn't like it.
    My mother and I picked Taylor up at the airport. She walked off the plane in a pair of short shorts and a tank top I'd never seen before. Hugging her, I tried not to sound jealous when I said, "When'd you get that?"
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    "My mom took me shopping for beach stuff right before I left," she said, handing me one of her duffel bags. "Cute, right?"
    "Yeah, cute." Her bag was heavy. I wondered if she'd forgotten she was only staying a week.
    "She feels bad she and Daddy are getting a divorce so she's buying me all kinds of stuff," Taylor continued, rolling her eyes. "We even got mani-pedis together. Look!" Taylor lifted up her right hand. Her nails were painted a raspberry color, and they were long and square.
    "Are those real?"
    "Yeah! Duh. I don't wear fake, Belly." "But I thought you had to keep your nails short for violin."
    "Oh, that. Mommy finally let me quit violin. Divorce guilt," she said knowingly. "You know how it is."
    Taylor was the only girl I knew our age who still called her mother Mommy. She was the only one who could get away with it too.
    The boys came to attention right away. Right away they looked at her, checked out her smallish B-cups and her blond hair. It's a Miracle Bra, I wanted to tell them. That's half a bottle of Sun-In. Her hair isn't usually that yellow. Not that they would've cared either way.
    My brother, on the other hand, barely looked up from the TV. Taylor irritated him, always had. I wondered if he'd already warned Conrad and Jeremiah about her.
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    "Hi, Ste-ven," she said in a singsong voice. "Hey," he mumbled.
    Taylor looked at me and crossed her eyes. Grump , she mouthed, emphasis on the p.
    I laughed. "Taylor, this is Conrad and Jeremiah. Steven you know." I was curious about who she'd pick, who she'd think was cuter, funnier. Better.
    "Hey," she said, sizing them up, and right away I could tell Conrad was the one. And I was glad. Because I knew that Conrad would never, ever go for her.
    "Hey," they said.
    Then Conrad turned back to the TV just like I knew he would. Jeremiah treated her to one of his lopsided smiles and said, "So you're Belly's friend, huh? We thought she didn't have any friends."
    I waited for him to grin at me to show he was just joking, but he