Contents ( 66)
- Cover
- Books by Valerie Fraser Luesse
- Title Page
- Copyright Page
- Dedication
- Contents
- Map of Florida
- one
- two
- three
- four
- five
- six
- seven
- eight
- nine
- ten
- eleven
- twelve
- thirteen
- fourteen
- fifteen
- sixteen
- seventeen
- eighteen
- nineteen
- twenty
- twenty-one
- twenty-two
- twenty-three
- twenty-four
- twenty-five
- twenty-six
- twenty-seven
- twenty-eight
- twenty-nine
- thirty
- thirty-one
- thirty-two
- thirty-three
- thirty-four
- thirty-five
- thirty-six
- thirty-seven
- thirty-eight
- thirty-nine
- forty
- forty-one
- forty-two
- forty-three
- forty-four
- forty-five
- forty-six
- forty-seven
- forty-eight
- forty-nine
- fifty
- fifty-one
- Epilogue
- Keep Reading for a Preview of Valerie Luesse’s Next Book!
- Prologue
- one
- Acknowledgments
- About the Author
- Back Ads
- Back Cover
He turned to Luther and nodded. “Finders keepers.”
forty-one
Mallory Square was like a daily Mardi Gras. The whole island, it seemed, gathered there to watch the sunset, and street performers took advantage of the crowd, miming, dancing, swallowing fire—anything and everything to get attention and tips. Peyton held Lisa’s hand and escorted her to the edge of the square, finding an empty spot on the waterfront. He put his arm around her as they took a seat and dangled their feet over the ocean.
The sun looked like a giant coral balloon they could reach out and touch as it slowly drifted down from the sky. Its orange glow was casting light on the turquoise water, making colors Peyton had never seen before. Lisa, as she so often did, seemed to read his mind when she said, “Those colors aren’t in my crayon box.”
As the sun dropped lower, the water changed colors from luminescent turquoise to deep blue, and the whole sky dissolved into shades of pink and coral. Now the big orange globe looked as if it were only a foot or so from the water.
“I half expect it to splash when it hits the ocean,” Lisa said.
“It just looks so close,” Peyton agreed. “Somebody told me there’s a green flash on the water right when the sun disappears.”
They kept their eyes on the sun, now slipping faster and faster into the ocean. Just as it fell below the horizon, a split-second flash of green kissed the water and the whole crowd gasped and applauded.
“Did you see that?” Lisa exclaimed.
“I did,” Peyton said. He was about to kiss her when he felt a tap on his shoulder.
An older woman who reminded him of Aunt Gert smiled and handed him a sketch. “You two made my sunset,” she said. “This one’s on the house.” Then she disappeared into the crowd.
The woman had drawn Peyton and Lisa from behind, not in any detail but with well-placed lines and curves that let the viewer’s imagination fill in what was missing: A boy and a girl sat very close, dangling their feet off the edge of Mallory Square, his arm wrapped around her. An island wind was blowing her long red hair. Both were silhouetted against a giant orange sun, the turquoise sea before them.
“We look happy,” Lisa said.
“How can you tell from the back of our heads?” Peyton teased her.
“I just can.”
Behind them, the crowd was celebrating the sunset with laughter and music and every kind of revelry. But Peyton could barely hear them as he laid his hand against Lisa’s face, leaned over, and softly kissed her. “I owe you a dance, don’t I?” he asked her.
“Yes,” she said, so quietly that he could barely hear her. He helped her up, then took the drawing and put it in the bag with her clothes, which he had strapped to the scooter.
They heard music coming from somewhere nearby and followed it to a bandstand at the end of a wide pier just off the square. Peyton heard the familiar drumbeat of “Sing, Sing, Sing” and turned to Lisa. “Miss Wallace, may I have this jitterbug?”