Ashby Hale unashamedly looked like a surfer. He dabbled, of course, considering his family possessed a summer estate perched right on the coastline, with the porch a mere stroll away from pristine sands and crystalline waters of a smooth cerulean hue.

As your best friend, his family and your family tended to compile on joint holidays over the summer with other friends, which you were grateful for, as it distracted from the summer depression of sitting in your room as if quarantining. No people, just shitty reality television and a bowl of atrocious snacks that should have been labeled as toxic waste.

So yes, it was you, ashby, his twin elijah, joshua perdio and abby laurence on vacation after senior year.

The day was warm but not humid, a lazy breeze grazing your skin as you sat on the damp sand toying with shells, the seawater lapping at your feet as if testing whether it could reach you. You were damp, not because of a swim, but because elijah had unceremoniously dumped a bucketful of water on your head ten minutes earlier.

You were also watching ashby swim, not creepily, in your opinion. Just subtle glances that you would drown yourself over if he caught wind of.