“Some cousins. They’re out in the East Bay, but I think they used to live in Chinatown.” He looked at me encouragingly. “You should ask your mom.”

  Now I knew what he was trying to do: get me to call her. But she had a phone, too. She could call me if she wanted.

  * * *

  —

  We exited 101 North at Sir Francis Drake Boulevard, which we took all the way to Woodacre. The road passed through well-manicured suburbs with relatively tasteful strip malls at first, but bit by bit the strip malls became more worn-out, and the trees and hedges became wilder and less trimmed. We drove past Safeway, the last supermarket before Woodacre, and Sir Francis Drake High School, and then we went through the little hippie town of Fairfax, and at last the road broke out into open space. Brown hills dotted with green oak trees rose up on either side as the road wound between them, and all was laid bare beneath the wide blue sky. It felt like an entirely different world from the New England we’d just come from, where one town merges right into the next, and the sky always seems to be held at bay by trees and buildings.

  Just past Spirit Rock Meditation Center, Dad turned left onto Railroad Avenue, which led into Woodacre. It was barely a town—a post office and a market and that was about it. The road narrowed and lost its center stripes, curling up and around the hills. The air smelled of sunbaked wood and grass, and the wind had hushed so that we could hear the birds singing. At last we rounded the final bend, and Dad pulled up behind my grandmother’s car, an old Honda Civic, in a gravel-covered pullout at the side of the road. Just ahead of the pullout was the green-painted gate that led up to the cottage.

  After Grandpa died, I thought my grandmother might move back to Berkeley, where her friends were, but she had stayed. She had adopted a dog—a black lab that she named Analemma—and told everyone she preferred the remoteness of Woodacre.

  Now I climbed out of the car and followed my dad to the trunk, where we pulled out two big suitcases and two backpacks. Dad was only staying for a couple of days before flying north to the Deer Bay Writers’ Colony in Washington, where he was spending the rest of the summer. He was supposed to finish his second novel there, but it was six years late by now, so I had my doubts. As I lugged my suitcase toward the gate, the reality of my summer began to sink in. I was staying here. Here.

  I unlatched the gate and clumsily shoved the suitcase through. I heard a dog start barking. Analemma.

  “I’ll get that,” Dad said. “Will you take the backpacks?”

  He held them out, and I took them without meeting his eyes, but I saw the expression on his face: that sad hesitance he’d worn almost continually since that day a month ago.

  I turned away and started up the brick steps to the house. It was built on the side of a hill, so you had to climb up a meandering, mossy brick path to access it. Along the way were several terraced gardens planted with ferns and hostas and flowers that could grow in the shade. A wheelbarrow filled with a tray of flowers was parked beside one of the garden plots, and a water bottle was perched on a nearby bench as if the gardener had stepped away for a moment.

  Around the next bend the house came into view. The front door was painted turquoise blue, and it was opening already. Analemma shot outside, a blur of shiny black fur, and I had to drop the backpacks on the brick patio and kneel down to greet her, slobbery tongue and soft floppy ears and wriggly muscle.

  “Hey, hey,” I said, laughing.

  “Analemma, come,” my grandmother said. Ana’s ears perked up and she glanced back at Joan for an instant as if she were contemplating disobeying her, but Joan snapped her fingers, and Ana went. Then my grandmother smiled at me and held out her arms. “Aria,” she said. She was in her seventies, but you wouldn’t have known it by the way she looked. She was wearing faded jeans rolled up at the ankles, Birkenstocks, and a loose red-and-orange peasant blouse. Her gray hair was trimmed in a short, stylish cut that revealed dangling bronze earrings.

  I got to my feet and let her enfold me in a hug. “Hi, Joan.” She smelled like coffee and lemon-scented soap, and as my arms went around her I felt a loosening within me, and for a horrifying second, I was afraid I would start to cry. I suppressed the urge, but when I pulled back, my grandmother gave me a sympathetic look and kissed me on the forehead as if I were a little girl.

  “We’re going to have a good summer,” she said.

  I didn’t have time to respond, because behind me Dad was arriving with my big suitcase, and then Analemma bolted forward, and Dad had to squat down to greet her. Joan told me I would be staying in the guest room. Dad would have to take the sofa bed for the couple of nights he’d be here.

  Because the house was built on a hillside, the interior was on three levels, with most of the living space on the second floor. I carried my suitcase upstairs and rolled it through the living room, with its vaulted pine ceiling, Joan’s painting Southern Cross on one wall, and into the guest room. The double bed was covered in a patchwork quilt that looked like it was about a hundred years old; I recognized it from every previous visit. Over the bed were three black-and-white family photos, though they didn’t look like anyone else’s family photos.

  There was one of Dad and Aunt Tammy as kids, double exposed so that their faces appeared to be echoed inside each other’s. One shot of Grandpa and Dad, when Dad was a teen, both looking directly at the camera with exactly the same curious expression on their faces. And a self-portrait of my grandmother, taken when she was much younger, her reflection floating in a window.

  I heard Dad and Joan and Analemma coming upstairs, and Joan called, “Come and have lunch.”

  Analemma dashed into the guest room and bumped my hand with her wet nose. “You want me to come?” I said, rubbing her ears with my fingers. She gave a soft woof, so I followed her out into the living room.

  Dad had left his suitcase by the cold woodstove across from the purple velvet sofa. In the kitchen, lunch had been laid out on the round wooden table: a big bowl of salad with olive oil and balsamic vinegar, a take-out rotisserie chicken, a loaf of sourdough bread, and a pitcher of iced tea.

  “Help yourself to food and let’s go sit on the deck,” Joan said, taking out plates and silverware.

  I had only eaten a stale bagel on the plane, and as I watched Dad cut into the chicken, I realized I was starving. I piled salad and chicken onto a plate and tore into the bread, and Joan gave me a glass of iced tea. I took my lunch out to the deck, which opened off the kitchen and had a view of the Marin Hills through the trees. Gently rolling golden-brown waves beneath a powder-blue sky. It was warm but not too hot, and the air was dry. Northern California summer.

  “Matty, you sure you don’t want to stay a bit longer?” Joan asked as she sat down.

  “Sorry, I can’t,” Dad said between bites of his salad. “The timing has been difficult this year.”

  He was being diplomatic, but I knew it was my fault.

  “I have to get some work done today, too,” he said. “Do you mind if I use your studio to write?”

  Grandpa had built an art studio for my grandmother on the highest part of the property, so that she could get as much natural light as possible. But after Grandpa died, she had moved most of her work into the house, into his office, which was on the third floor along with their bedroom.

  “I haven’t been in there for a while,” Joan said. “It’s probably covered in dust.”

  “I don’t mind the dust. I just need a room.” Dad took a swig of iced tea and looked at me. “Ari, you need anything else before I get to work?”

  “No.”

  “We can talk about your plans for the summer,” Joan said.

  In the distance I heard the front door close, followed by footsteps crossing the wooden floors. Analemma, who was lying in a pool of sunlight on the deck, thumped her tail against the floor as a person in dirt-stained cargo shorts and a baseball cap came out onto the deck.

  “All finished?” Joan asked.

  I figured this was the missing gardener.

  “Yep. All done.”

  I gave the gardener a second look and realized she was a woman, although if you didn’t pay too close attention it would be easy to mistake her for a man. She was boyish, with short hair beneath her Giants baseball cap, dressed in what looked like boys’ clothes. She was probably in her twenties. Both her forearms were dark with tattoos; I couldn’t make them out, but the designs looked intricate.

  “Steph, this is my son, Matthew, and my granddaughter, Aria,” Joan said. “Matty, Aria, this is Steph.” Joan went back into the kitchen, where I saw her rummaging through her purse.

  “Nice to meet you, sir,” Steph said to my dad, extending her hand to him as if they were man to man. As she came closer I saw some of the tattoos more clearly. A snake, maybe, or fish—something with scales.

  “You helping out my mother?” Dad asked.

  “I do a little yard work,” Steph said.

  “She’s good,” Joan called from inside. “You know all my neighbors want to hire you. You could have a monopoly on Woodacre yards if you wanted.”

  “Thanks,” Steph said.

  Joan came back with a check and handed it to her. “Same time in two weeks?”

  “I’ll be here,” Steph said. She glanced at me. “Nice to meet you, too. Your grandma’s told me a lot about you.”

  I felt the tiniest bit self-conscious. “Oh yeah? You know she lies.”

  Joan’s mouth quirked into an impish grin. “Everything I said was true,” she insisted.

  Steph smiled and pocketed the check. “I wouldn’t doubt it. I’ll see you in two weeks.” She gave me a quick look as she left, as if she wasn’t quite sure what to make of me.

  It wasn’t like I was struck by lightning or anything, but I remember that last look, that fraction of a moment before she left. I remember thinking I wish you were a boy, because then my summer would be a lot more interesting.

  This is why I was spending the summer in Woodacre instead of on Martha’s Vineyard: A boy took some topless photos of me and posted them on Tumblr. The photos got around, and somebody spray-painted slut on my locker, which meant the school counselor got nosy and called me in to her office. I wouldn’t tell her what the graffiti was about, so she poked around on her own and found the photos somehow, and then she called my dad and told him.

  I came home from school one afternoon to find my dad waiting for me in the living room, where he sat me down and forced me to tell him about the whole thing. Even though I warned him not to look at the photos, I think he did. He couldn’t meet my eyes for days after that.

  That might have been the end of it, except my dad then called my mom in Vienna, where she was playing the title role in Tosca. My parents divorced when I was six, and I suppose it was my dad’s duty as a parent to tell her what had happened, but the second he told me he was calling her, I knew it wasn’t going to end well. I had to listen to her yelling at me over the phone about how I had no respect for myself and she was ashamed of me.

  “It could’ve been worse. At least it’s just my top,” I said flippantly.

  “I don’t know how you can joke about this,” my mom said. “How could you let your boyfriend take pictures like that?”

  He’s not my boyfriend, I thought. But I said, “You don’t understand.”

  “Then explain it to me.”

  But I couldn’t.

  After that call, my summer plans completely unraveled, and before I knew it, I was on that plane to Woodacre, to spend the summer before college under my grandmother’s supervision.

  I’m telling this all wrong. I should start over.

  * * *

  —

  The boy’s name was Jacob Krieger. He took the photos during Haley’s big party in mid-May. Haley Pierce was one of my best friends, along with Tasha Lewis. I’d known Tasha since second grade, and Haley since she moved to Wellesley in seventh grade. In eighth grade, we became a trio. Because Tasha was Black, I was Asian, and Haley was white, Haley’s parents treated us like the multicultural promised land and were always encouraging us to do things together. But the three of us moved in somewhat different circles in school (Haley was a swimmer, Tasha was a debater, and I did Science Olympiad), although there was always an overlapping area—the intersection of our Venn diagram. In March of our senior year, Tasha and Haley had a falling-out I didn’t understand, and for a while we no longer overlapped. Our intersection was empty.

  Then Haley had the idea to throw a house party before prom and senior week—the last party of our high school years, the kind we’d all remember at reunions to come. And we intersected again. It felt like old times, with the three of us lying on Haley’s king-sized bed, making a YouTube playlist on our phones while talking about who to invite.

  Jacob was an automatic choice, along with all the guys on the lacrosse team, because they overlapped with Haley’s swim team circle. He had a reputation for being a partyer and a commitment-phobe, but in that charming way that guys can get away with. He looked kind of like Chris Hemsworth, but less built. I knew who he was, but before the party, I’d never given him much thought. It wasn’t that he was out of my league; our leagues were simply different.

  The day of the party, I walked over to Haley’s to help set up. Her house was only about a mile away from mine, but it was in a different universe from the condo my dad and I lived in behind Central Street. We dealt with drafty windows and old doors that either stuck or didn’t quite close. Haley lived in a mansion on a hill. It looked like a classic white colonial with black shutters, but it had been extensively remodeled. Everything inside was new and seemed to be made of marble or glass.

  When I arrived at the foot of the long driveway, I saw Tasha’s red-and-black Mini Cooper already parked at the top. It was early evening on a Saturday in May, and it finally felt like spring. It was just warm enough to wear shorts, and the trees were thick with white and pink blossoms. I headed for the gate to the back patio, where I knew Haley and Tasha would be setting up for the party. Haley’s mom had taken us to Whole Foods the day before, and she’d paid for huge amounts of guacamole and chips, fancy cheese and crackers, organic sodas, and bottled water. Haley’s mom had even gotten us a bunch of prosecco to celebrate our upcoming graduation. We expected people to sneak in beer and liquor, and we expected Haley’s parents to look the other way. As long as nobody drove drunk, it would be fine. We were seniors and deserved to let off some steam.

  As I came around the side of the house, I saw Haley and Tasha before they saw me. They sat facing each other on the edges of two loungers. Haley was saying something and leaning toward Tasha, one hand outstretched. Tasha was looking at her through her oversized sunglasses, so I couldn’t see her eyes, but there was a weird stiffness to her face. I wondered if they’d had a fight. But then she caught sight of me and jumped up.

  “There you are!” Tasha said, looking relieved. She pulled a bottle of prosecco from the giant cooler nearby. “Let’s have a toast!”

  “Hey, Ari,” Haley said. She got up and grabbed three red Solo cups from the party supplies, passing them out.

  Tasha poured in generous slugs of fizzing prosecco and said, “To graduating.”

  “To partying,” Haley said.

  “To us,” I said. We knocked our plastic cups together and drank, but I noticed that Haley and Tasha avoided looking at each other.

  * * *

  —

  The party officially started at eight o’clock, but it didn’t really fill up till almost nine. A lot of people came, spreading out over the backyard and going in and out of the basement, although “basement” was a misnomer. It was an entire floor dedicated to entertainment that opened directly onto a lower patio. There was a kitchenette with a wet bar stocked with prosecco and the sneaked-in booze, a home theater with velvet seats where music videos played on a big screen, a game room with Ping-Pong and foosball tables for increasingly drunken gaming, and a lounge area with squishy sectionals for conversations that would lead to hookups.

  By the time Jacob noticed me, I was pretty drunk. I left Tasha and Haley dancing in the home theater while I went to get some water. As I was digging in the fridge, Jacob asked me to grab a bottle for him, too, and then we had to edge around the crowd in the kitchenette, and we ended up trapped in a corner of the lounge watching one of Jacob’s teammates attempt to down way too much beer way too fast.

  Jacob leaned over and said in my ear, “I always wanted to kiss you.”

  I almost wasn’t sure I’d heard him correctly, but the sensation of his breath on my ear was unmistakable. A shiver went through me involuntarily.

  I could have said You’re lying, you’ve never thought about me before this minute. I could have said That’s a terrible line. I turned toward him, intending to give him a withering look, but the expression on his face stopped me. A small grin on his mouth, a sparkle in his eye, all mischief.

  “You’re always so mysterious, Aria West,” he said.

  “I’m not mysterious,” I said, but I felt flattered. I wanted to be mysterious.

  “I’ve known you since, what, sixth grade? How come we’ve never hooked up?”

  I thought I should be offended by his question, but the feeling of flattery only seemed to intensify. In the lounge, they were chanting for his lacrosse buddy to drink faster. Strains of “Blurred Lines” floated out from the home theater. I didn’t say anything in response, which only made Jacob lean close to me again, his mouth practically on my neck as he whispered, “We don’t have to talk if you don’t want.”

  He must have felt the shiver go through me again. I was a little irritated by my body for responding when I wasn’t sure if I wanted it to, and then I thought, Why not? This could be the twist of the night for me—even the twist of the year. Ever since sophomore year, I had made it my rule to never hook up with anyone from school. I knew that was one reason Jacob thought I was mysterious. But now, school was almost over.