“I’m okay with that. We have the rest of our lives to take it slow.”

“I meant to the beach.”

“I didn’t. But it works for that, too.”

So that was exactly what we did. We skidded into our place just as the judge began counting down ten, nine, eight …

I ached to talk to Levi about everything that had gone wrong, but now we were at five, four, three … There was no time for me to do anything else but plunge my spade into the sand and start digging.

It was as if no time had passed. In perfect harmony, Levi and I began to move, arms furiously tamping down wet sand, forming the early shape of the castle we’d been practicing. The lumps of sand slowly began to come together in towers and walls, larger and grander than we’d made them before.

I drowned out everything else, focusing only on the sand sifting through my fingers and the rasp of the knife as it cut through walls. The sun, low in the sky when we started, rose higher and higher until it hit its noonday peak. We were approaching the end of our four-hour limit, and as the judge gave us a thirty-minute warning, I cast a wild-eyed look at Levi. While I was etching in doors and windows, and studding seashells into turrets, he was painstakingly working on a staircase for each of the four keeps.

He was being too ambitious. We’d only ever done one staircase before, and that had been during practice. Though we’d kept up a feverish pace since the start of the competition, even I doubted he’d be able to get them done in time. Without asking, I grabbed another knife and got to work. I was faster at it, I reasoned, so with any luck, we’d be able to get done.

The last half hour passed in a frenzy. It blurred past me, and by the time the judge called time, I’d only just finished crowning each tower with a tiny starfish. Levi stepped away from the castle and dropped his knife, blinking in weary exhaustion at our creation. I shaded my eyes against the sun to look at it. It was a masterpiece, way better than anything we’d done before.

“Oh my God, yours looks so good,” squealed Lucy.

A relieved laugh burst out of me. “So does yours,” I said, raking my eyes over the tall tower they’d built. It had been hand-molded to look like coral, twining and twisting to almost five feet. They’d dug a moat around it and filled it with water, lining the perimeter with beautiful shells Lorcan had bought for the hermit crabs.