Read Online That Summer by Sarah Dessen - Free Book Online Page B

nodded. “But after the wedding, once things have calmed down, maybe you three can take a trip together. To the beach or something. My treat.” He smiled at me. “You’d really like her if you just gave her a chance, honey.”
    “I do like her,” I said, now feeling guilty. Suddenly I was mad at Ashley for squirming out of dinner and leaving me to make peace with Lorna through our father.
    “Hey, Mac McPhail!” some big voice said behind me, and a huge guy clapped his hand down on my father’s shoulder. “I haven’t seen you in a million years, you sly dog! How are ya?”
    My father stood up and shook the man’s hand, grinning, and then gestured to me. “This is my daughter Haven. Haven, this is the craziest son of a bitch you’ll ever meet, Tony Trezzora. He was the biggest linebacker they ever had over there at your high school.”
    I smiled, wondering how many crazy sons of bitches my father actually knew. It was how he introduced just about everyone that dropped by. I went back to my pasta as Tony Trezzora sat to join us, his big knees rattling the table so I had to steady my water glass with my hand. I was studying the size of Tony Trezzora’s neck when someone was suddenly right beside me with one of those huge pepper grinders, wielding it like a magic wand right over my food.
    “Pepper, madam?”
    “Oh, no,” I said, “I’m fine.”
    “You look like you need some. Trust me.” Two twists and a small shower of pepper fell over my food. I looked up at the person holding the grinder and almost fell out of my chair. It was Sumner.
    “Hey,” I said as he whipped another grinder out of his pocket, this one full of some white substance.
    “Cheese?” he asked.
    “No,” I said. “I can’t believe—”
    Twist, twist, and I had cheese. He was grinning at me the whole time. “You like cheese, Haven. I remember that about you.”
    “What are you doing here?” I asked him. The last time I’d seen him was at the supermarket a few weeks after Ashley broke up with him. He’d been working in produce bagging kiwis and had trouble meeting my eyes even as he joked with me.
    “I’m the pepper-and-cheese man.” He twisted the grinder again, just for good measure, then slipped it back into his apron pocket like a gunslinger after a shootout. “I’m also authorized to fill your water glass, if you so desire.”
    “No, thanks,” I said, still staring up at him while he puttered around our table, removing empty plates and at the ready with the pepper and cheese grinders, while my father traded stats with Tony Trezzora and didn’t even notice him.
    “How’s your mom?” He glanced around at the other tables, keeping an eye out.
    I was so flabbergasted at seeing him, just popping up out of nowhere with cheese for my pasta. I said, “How long have you been in town?”
    “Just a few weeks.” He stepped out of the way as a short girl carrying a huge tray on her shoulder staggered by, barely clearing a fern that was balanced on a ledge beside us. “I’m still in school up in Connecticut, but I’m thinking about taking some time off. I’m not sure.”
    “Really,” I said, as he started to back away, off to cheese another table. “You should—”
    He waved, doing some weird hand signal that I couldn’t interpret, pantomime in retreat. I realized I was about to tell him he should call Ashley, and thought maybe it was best that he’d been walking away and hadn’t heard. She could barely handle answering the phone now, much less any major blasts from her past.
    I sat and watched Sumner work his way around the restaurant, wielding his cheese and pepper mills like a professional, laughing and joking at table after table, while my father stayed lost in sports talk with the giant next to me. I kept wishing I’d said something more important, something striking, in the short conversation I’d had with the only boyfriend of Aslsley’s I’d ever really liked.
    Later, when I’d finished my food, I went