“Avril. Cole.” Willa is crouched down in front of the bench where we’re sitting. “Let’s take five,” she says. “Get some air.”

“Yeah,” Cole says. “Okay.” And he gets up and moves toward the door. I start to follow him, but Willa grabs my hand.

“Avril,” she says. “Wait.” Her voice is low and gentle. Barely a whisper. “I told you before that Cole gets lost sometimes. Trapped inside his own head.” I nod. “He has dark thoughts. And he gets confused. Do you know what I mean?”

“Maybe,” I say. “I don’t—”

“Has he told you that the sea wants him?” I freeze, because to answer that feels like a betrayal to Cole. But I don’t want to lie to Willa. “Has he told you the sea wants you?” She waits, but I don’t answer, and Willa sighs. It’s a long, sad sound. “All those stories—” She stops and thinks for a moment before she goes on. “The sea has always been Cole’s own darkness, Avril. I’ve tried to save him. We’ve all tried to save him.” She reaches out to touch my hair. “And I know you’re trying, too. But if you can’t save him, don’t let him pull you under.” Her hand is on my cheek. “Cole is my son, and I love him. But Nicole would want me to look out for you.”

“There are things I’m remembering,” I tell her. And the part about Brody is on the very tip of my tongue. But I can’t make it come out.

“Memories are funny things,” Willa says, and she frowns. “They seem so concrete. So real. But they can be slippery.” She lets her hand fall back to her side. “It’s almost impossible to know if you can trust them, isn’t it?”

I nod. But it’s almost impossible to know if you can trust anything at Whisper Cove. Nothing here is exactly what it seems to be.

I remember what Cole said the first time I kissed him. How nothing here is real. It’s all theatre, he told me.

Smoke and mirrors.

After rehearsal, Cole and I gather up with Lex and Jude and Val under the lights outside the barn.

“One week left,” Jude tells us. “A week from tonight, it’s all over.” He’s leaning against the railing with Lex, and they are so tangled up in each other. I’m expecting Lex to say something about how sad that makes him, but he doesn’t. He just smiles.

“Nothing we started here ends next week,” Lex says, and he leans in to give Jude a long, deep kiss. “This summer is just the beginning for all of us.”