Read Online The Reason I Stay by Patty Maximini - Free Book Online Page B

all the water games we have, Ariel is the one I like the most. It consists of basically making up mermaid stories, diving through waves with our ankles crossed as if they were fishtails, and letting our hair flow over the water. It’s quite relaxing, and on a warm day like today, the cold water is most welcome.
    The monkey—A.K.A. Kodee—is today’s Ariel. As the princess, she got to pick the plot of the game. She’s rescued the prince from the evil sea witch, and in return he’ll take her to a ball, which means that as her sisters, Bras and I must show interest and help her get ready.
    After one hour of fluffing Kodee’s hair over the waves, and discussing if her seashells are pretty, I’m chilling in the water and keeping my eyes on them while they dive repeatedly, when Kodee yells that the prince has arrived and is talking to the king. Bras claps her hands and yelps, and before I can even turn around towards the beach to see what is going on, the two girls are running to the shore, and I’m running after them.
    I’m so worried their sloppy running will put them face first in the sand that it takes a while for me to see that the prince who’s talking to the king isn’t a figment of Kodee’s imagination. He is in fact a real man with shaggy blond hair, wearing dark blue swimming shorts and a white tee. He’s also sitting on my towel talking to Larry, Jill and Tanie, and not a prince at all.
    In the words of Tanie . . . forking bell!
    I can’t help but wonder what his deal is. Why does he keep showing up? Yesterday, when I told him off, I felt the weight of his nastiness during our first encounter lift from my shoulders. We’d gotten even, I drank his outrageous tip dry, and he was forever out of my life. Life was good again. However, now he is here, and getting all cozy with the people I consider family. This is not fair.
    I want to turn around, go back to the ocean and swim away until I reach South America, but then I see Kodee’s face light up with a smile that almost reaches her ears as she greets him by folding her tiny, wet arms around his neck to give him a hug. A hug. That may not seem like much, but although Kodee is nice and friendly to most people, she’s not the kind of kid to take up to strangers enough to hug them. In fact, the only people she actually hugs out of will are me, and my beach companions for the day. Everyone else, including her paternal grandparents and her own father, only get hugs when they demand them, which makes her reaction to him kind of crazy.
    I trudge out of the water and reach them, just in time to see her speed talking again.
    “I’m so happy you came. I was starting to think you weren’t gonna sleep here twice. And that would suck, and not only for you. It’d suck for me, because I forgot the play before I got to tell Bras. But now, you can show it to us, and it will be so much fun.”
    She closes her eyes in one of her blurting-out-dizziness episodes, and opens her arms to her sides to try to steady herself.
    “Dizzy again?” Much to my surprise, his chuckling voice overlaps mine, asking Kodee the same question.
    I make the mistake of looking at him at the same time that his head slowly turns to look at me. Everything seems to be happening in slow motion as our eyes meet. The smile on his face vanishes. He appears to be just as speechless and uncomfortable with the whole situation as I am, but that doesn’t keep him from checking out my barely covered, wet body.
    I almost clear my throat when his gaze lingers a bit too long on my pierced navel, tattooed right arm and magenta bikini-covered chest. When his eyes meet mine again, I have a raised brow waiting for him. He replies to it with a slight curl of his lips.
    “Mathew,” Kodee calls in a demanding tone that makes both of us look at her. She’s eyeing us with unblinking eyes, a raised brow and a crooked smile. “Do you know my godmother, Lexie?”
    I don’t let him answer. With a steady gaze focused on