Hope, Levy, Marc [good summer reads TXT] 📗

He told her to meet him at the campus entrance in front of the Vassar Street subway. Hope tried to explain she was running behind schedule with her work, but Josh told her he’d be there in ten minutes and hung up.

“Okay . . .” She flung her phone onto the bed.

Standing in front of the mirror, she did her hair, pulled on a sweater, changed her mind, shrugged on a different one. She rearranged her hair again, slipped her phone into her bag, and left the building.

She waited for the cars to stop at the red light and scanned the street for Josh, before spotting the Camaro double-parked a few feet away from the intersection.

“What’s going on?” Hope asked, worried, as she slid into the passenger seat.

“We need to talk, so I’m inviting you to dinner. And this time it’s on me. What are you in the mood for?”

Hope wondered what on earth Josh was thinking. She wished she could pull down the sun-visor mirror to check how she looked.

“Well?”

“I can pick anything I want?”

“As long as it’s within my budget.”

“How about oysters at the seaside? Take me to Nantucket.”

“That’s a ninety-minute drive and over two hours on the ferry. Can’t you think of anything closer?”

“No,” she said. She was enjoying making him work for it. “Okay, I’ll let you off the hook for the oysters. We can go to Nantucket and get pizza. The money we save can go to gas.”

Josh looked at her. He turned the key in the ignition and set off down the street.

“We need to head south.” Hope frowned as they left town. “So why are you taking us north?”

“Salem is forty-five minutes away. They have oysters and seaside too.”

“Okay, let’s do Salem. Let’s embrace our inner witches. What did you want to talk to me about?”

“Witchcraft, in a way. I’ll tell you more when we get to where we’re going.”

Josh nudged a cassette into the player and cranked up the volume.

As Simon and Garfunkel filled the air, Josh and Hope exchanged a glance. It was funny how Luke’s musical taste came straight from another era, just like the car. Hope played “Mrs. Robinson” on loop, singing at the top of her lungs, while Josh felt grateful they weren’t driving all the way to Nantucket after all.

Before long, Salem was rising up on the horizon. Josh knew a fish restaurant at the small harbor in the historic old town. In truth, it was the only part of town worth a visit, and Hope had said she was craving seafood and the fresh sea breeze, not a sightseeing tour. He parked the car, and they walked together toward the restaurant.

Inside, Josh charmed the waitress into seating them by the window.

“How many are we allowed?” Hope asked as she scanned the menu.

“As many as you want.”

“I mean, how many until your card is declined?”

“Twelve.”

Hope’s gaze came to rest on a small fish tank where three lobsters crawled, their claws bound by rubber bands.

“Wait,” she said, snatching the menu from him. “I have another idea. Forget the oysters.”

“Aren’t they the whole reason we came here?”

“No. The reason we came here is you had something important to tell me.”

Hope reached for the server’s arm, leading him over to the fish tank and pointing out the smallest of the three lobsters. She asked him to bring it to her in a plastic bag as Josh watched on in silence.

“Don’t you want us to cook it first?” The server frowned. Salem attracted the crazies, it had to be said, but this was something else.

“No, I want it as it is. And the check too.”

Josh paid and followed Hope out the door. She had scooped up her lobster and was rushing to the harbor, where a few sailboats fluttered in the breeze, bobbing on the still waters.

She lay belly-down on the quay and ducked the bag into the sea, filling it with water before pulling it back out and standing. “Over there,” she exclaimed, glancing around her. “The headland. It’s perfect.”

“Hope, what exactly are you doing?”

But Hope didn’t reply. She turned on her heel and began striding away, the leaking bag dripping water behind her as she went.

Ten minutes later, she stopped at the end of the jetty, breathless. She extracted the lobster from the bag and asked Josh to hold it firmly. As gently as she could, she freed its claws from their ties and gazed deep into the creature’s eyes.

“You’re going to meet the lobster of your dreams, buddy,” she murmured. “And when you guys have lots of little baby lobsters together, you’re going to teach them never to get caught in a lobster pot. And they’ll listen, because you lived to tell the tale. You’ll live to a hundred, and you’ll tell them how a human called Hope saved your life.”

She turned to Josh and asked him to throw it as far into the sea as he could, watching as it sailed through the air before plunging into the Atlantic.

“You’re insane,” Josh said as bubbles frothed and dissipated on the surface of the water.

“Coming from you, I’ll take that as a compliment. I couldn’t help the oysters. It was game over for them; they were already open.”

“I hope the Chosen One survives and makes it out to the ocean. I don’t know how long he spent trapped in that tank, but his head must be spinning.”

“I’m pretty sure he’ll pull through. He looked like a survivor.”

“If you say so!” Josh laughed. “So, what are we going to eat?”

“Can you afford a sandwich?”

They began walking down the beach, Hope pulling off her shoes to feel the wet sand between her toes. After a few minutes, she turned to him.

“What did you need to tell me that was so urgent?”

Josh sighed, stopping in his tracks. “Honestly? I needed to talk to you before Luke had the chance.”

“Why? And about what?”

“Who pays for your studies, Hope?”

Her fantasy of Josh bringing her out here on a romantic seaside date was crumbling, slowly washing away with