September Girls
And when I turned around, I saw one of the girls from the restaurant standing behind me. Not Kristle, not the girl at the gift shop, but the girl who had been smoking out front when we’d walked in. She was just standing there, right behind me, not doing anything, just smiling and looking me up and down.
    She was prettier up close than she’d looked earlier. Her eyes were green with gold rings around the pupils, and her nose was large and aquiline—the kind of nose most of the girls I went to school with would probably have been begging to have replaced. It made her more beautiful. Her breasts were just as unavoidable as before, and her hair was cascading down her back in clumped, luxuriously greasy tangles. Her shorts were unbuttoned and folded down at the waistband, revealing a half inch of her smooth, sharp hip bones.
    “Hi,” I said. I wondered if it was a southern thing not to speak unless you were spoken to.
    “Hey,” she said. She reached into the waistband of her cutoffs and pulled out a package of cigarettes. “Do you have a light?” she asked, placing a cigarette between her full and glossy lips. She had the same accent that Kristle had. It was soft and fluid and could have been French or Scottish or South African or anything really.
    “No,” I said. “Sorry.”
    “I think I have one anyway,” she said, and, without hesitation, pulled a hot-pink Bic from her pocket. She lit up and took a deep drag. “Do you want one?” she asked.
    “No thanks,” I said.
    She looked me in the eyes and smiled. “What’s your name?” she asked.
    “Sam,” I said.
    “Hey, Sam,” she said. “I’m DeeDee.”
    “Hey, DeeDee,” I said.
    She raised her eyebrows. “You’re cute.” She blew a puff of smoke into my face. “See you soon, I’m sure,” she said as she turned and walked away. “Thanks for the light.”

UNCORRECTED E-PROOF—NOT FOR SALE
HarperCollins Publishers
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    YOU
    We have always known you. Before we even saw you, we knew you. We have known you every time. We will know you the next time.
    You have been many things and many people. You have always been the same.
    We wait for you every summer. We wait to see who you will appear as this time. The line of your shoulders, the arc of your smile. The things that you find funny and the things that trouble you. We are always surprised.
    We are always surprised, but one thing is always the same. There is one thing we can count on. You will always leave us. You will always, always break our hearts.
    Or is it just the other way around?

UNCORRECTED E-PROOF—NOT FOR SALE
HarperCollins Publishers
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    FOUR
    AFTER A FEW days there was no question at all. The girls had taken notice. Everywhere I went, they smiled at me. They stared. They swiveled their hips a little more when I walked near, pushed their boobs up a little higher. Their hair was always tossing, tossing, tossing; their eyes sparked and pulsed like flakes of mica at the bottom of a creek.
    It made me nervous.
    It’s not that I minded the attention. I was as flattered and turned on as any person would be to have insanely hot girls staring at him wherever he went. I’d be sitting alone on the beach, putting on sunblock or walking to the store or whatever, and suddenly there would be this electricity in the air, and I’d look up and see a girl, unflinching, hair blowing behind her like in a music video, just staring, maybe with the hint of a smile, or, if not, with that fake-o insouciant pucker that people learn from watching television. They were always staring, always smiling, always daring me to make my move. They never came near me, though, and never said anything. They were waiting for me.
    I don’t really like dares, even implied ones. I think if someone wants something from you they should ask directly. Anything else is just passive aggression.
    So I did
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