Read Online If You're Lucky by Yvonne Prinz - Free Book Online Page A

he?”
    She didn’t say anything for a few seconds and then she turned to me.
    â€œIt’s not like you’re thinking. I needed to talk to him.”
    â€œAbout what?”
    â€œAbout Lucky.”
    â€œYou can talk to
me
about Lucky.”
    She let out an exasperated sigh. “I know,” she said, and then she seemed to remember that I’d lost Lucky too. “I know I can. I’m sorry. You’ve been great.”
    We drove along in silence for a minute.
    When I thought about Fin with Sonia, I was envious. Were my trips to the beach with Fin about getting to Sonia? I’d made it very clear that I was interested in him, but not much had happened. Why had he been so tender with me? And what about the champagne trick? Wasn’t that just for me? Plus, he’d shared so much about himself with me. I’d thought about little else but him since that night.
    The day before, there had been an e-mail in my inbox from another friend of Lucky’s, a guy named Jesse, back in Australia. I remembered Lucky mentioning him. In the e-mail, Jesse said that he and Lucky had been “the best of mates” even though Lucky hadn’t been in “Oz” long. He said he couldn’t afford to fly out for the party but that they had their own Aussie-style memorial on the beach for Lucky with a bonfire and lots of singing and playing Lucky’s favorite songs. He wanted to tell me and my mom and dad how sorry he was and that Lucky was a hell of a nice guy. He said Lucky could “carve” like no other surfer out there and that was a tough thing for an Aussie to admit, being that Lucky was American. He also said that it still “boggles the mind” that Lucky, of all the surfers he knew, could die like that. There was no one who knew water better than Lucky, he said. I wrote back and thanked him. And though I’m not sure why, I asked him if he knew a friend of Lucky’s named Fin. I already knew the answer to that question but I couldn’t resist finding out more about him.
    Sonia slowed the car down and steered it inland toward Bodega and now we were driving along redwood-lined roads. The light was quickly disappearing behind us. The fields on either side of the road turned to forest and the approaching twilight swallowed us up. Sonya slid her sunglasses onto the top of her head. It was a rare fogless evening. Normally by this hour, an inky-gray mist would be unfurling itself like a fist slowly opening, creeping further and further inland, but not tonight.
    I looked up at the sky through the windshield and broke the silence. “There’s going to be a billion stars out tonight.”
    Sonia looked up too. “At least a billion.” She smiled at me. She wanted us to be okay. I did too.
    The dirt parking lot was jammed with cars. This area is rife with musicians and music people and tiny clubs and cafés. I’d never been to this club before but Sonia told me that she came here lots of times with Lucky. It was one of their favorite spots.
    We sat down at one of the last open tables, to the left of the stage. The people sitting at other tables were your usual mix of year-round, off-the-grid, coastal dwellers; pretty girls who looked high, wearing no makeup and out-of-date dresses from India, the kind you buy in stores that smell of incense. The men were ruddy cheeked with messy beards and the children had dirty faces and looked too young to be up this late. We ordered from a hippie girl in a ruffled peasant blouse and a long skirt. I was dying to get a real drink but I ordered iced tea. I didn’t want to risk her asking for ID and embarrassing me. Sonia ordered a beer.
    â€œIt’s nice here, isn’t it?” she said, looking around. She waved at someone she knew across the room.
    â€œUh-huh.” I felt a rush of anxiety like I always do when I’m in a crowded room. I took some deep breaths, in through my nose, out through my mouth.