It’s early when Evan wakes. The edge of the sun is just beginning to creep across his bedroom ceiling. He stretches, forgetting where he is for a moment—until the distant sound of surf drifting through the open window hits him.
Waves.
He’s out of bed in an instant, elbows braced on the cool stone railing of the balcony. Below, the Pacific is alive—swell hammering the cliffs, whitewater exploding against the rocks. Sets are rolling through clean and hard, stacked tight together, overhead and hollow—and just like that, the half-formed plan he made last night—to force himself to be productive, have a look at the job offers his agent had sent over—melts away. Not today. Not with waves like that. He grins, already turning back into the room. Jeans are yanked on one-legged, T-shirt pulled over his head halfway down the stairs. Dora’s keys. His wallet. Breakfast can wait.
Evan stops halfway to the garage. There’s a truck parked at the edge of the lawn, backed just onto the strip of grass that separates the Rosiers’ driveway from the Blacks’. A beat-up silver Tacoma—sun-faded, dent in the passenger door, paint flaking near the bumper.
It doesn’t belong among the Porsches and Mercedes of Palos Verdes Estates. Evan frowns, curiosity catching at the edges of him. He walks toward it, glances up the Blacks’ drive.
Someone’s coming down. Board under one arm, towel slung over his shoulder. Tall. Tanned. Dark curls pushed back with a pair of sunglasses.
So that’s who Everyone Else is, Evan thinks.
His heart gives an uncomfortable little stutter, something like nerves, and he fights off a grin as he leans back against the hood of the truck and waits, arms folded. The man slows when he sees him, brow furrowing. There’s a flicker of hesitation—the brief pause of someone placing a face—and then the shift. Recognition blooming.
“Shit, no way—Ev?”
Evan lets his own smile break. “Should’ve guessed this pile of junk was yours.”
“Damn, man. What’s it been? Years.”
“Seven,” says Evan.
“Right,” says James. There’s a pause, a little awkward—and then James clears his throat. “Last I heard, you were some big-shot screenwriter.”
Evan has a bizarre moment of wanting to lay out his entire heart—to let it all come tumbling out. New York. The failure of it all. He doesn’t; instead, he just says: “Yeah, well, New York kind of sucks, man. No waves.”
James laughs at that, and it’s like the sun coming out—bright and warm. A sound Evan remembers more than he wants to admit.
“You riding today?” James asks. Like no time has passed. Like Evan’s nine years old, standing with Reg as they watch James and Sirius from the shore, waiting for the okay to paddle out.
“That was the plan.”
James flashes him a grin—all white teeth and sunshine. He slips his sunglasses out of his hair and onto his nose.
“I’m heading down to Indicator. You should come.” James lets the offer hang a beat before tipping his head, grin widening. “If you think you can keep up.”
Evan rolls his eyes, but he’s smiling back—the kind of smile that sneaks up on you, light, the kind you don’t notice till it’s been on your face for a while. He jogs back the way he came, retrieves his borrowed board, and slides it into the bed of James’s truck before climbing into the passenger seat.
“Twenty bucks says you wipe out in under ten minutes,” James teases, throwing the truck into reverse.
And then they’re off—dust kicking up behind them, boards rattling in the back, the road sloping down toward the cliffs and the break beyond. The cliffs drop off to their right, the Pacific stretching out beyond, sharp and silver-blue, sunlight flashing off the break like glass. The windows are down. The salt wind cuts through the cab, tangling Evan’s hair as he fiddles with the stereo. He settles on something upbeat, a bit rocky—Third Eye Blind, he thinks. James drives one-handed, easy, like he knows every bend in the road by heart. Evan shoots a sideways look at him—he hasn’t changed. Not really. Older but still James. His dark hair a mess of curls, slight stubble across his jaw. There’s a tattoo that wasn’t there seven years ago—some tribal design on his bicep—and a small gold hoop in one ear. Both new, but they suit him. He’s still gorgeous—still got the kind of face that makes you lose your train of thought—and apparently still hums along to the radio without much care for pitch. Evan hides a smile, turns, and looks out the window. They pull off near the bluff above the Cove, the truck jolting slightly as it settles into the gravel—head-high sets breaking clean below.
The trail down is steep—loose stone and brittle scrub, the air warm with dust and salt. Cliff grass brushes their ankles as they move. James leads, board tucked under one arm, body tilted just enough to keep balanced. They reach the sand. The tide’s drawing steady lines along the shore, and the swell is rolling in slow and glassy. A few surfers already float in the lineup—wet-suited silhouettes against the gleam.
James drops his board and stretches, arms loose, spine arching as he rolls out his shoulders. Then he bends, catches the long pull cord on his wetsuit’s back zip, and tugs it upward in one smooth motion. The kind of practiced movement that speaks of years in the water—smooth, automatic.
“You ready, rich boy?”
Evan snorts, reaching for his own zip.
James paddles out ahead, long strokes cutting through the surface with practiced ease. Evan follows, slower but steady, lungs pulling deep with each breath. A few voices—low, joking, easy—call out greetings, mostly to James. Evan lets himself tune them out, focusing on the soft slap of water against fiberglass. Sunlight dances on the surface, scattered and gold. The salt clings to his lips, the breeze tugs at his hair. He revels in the way the ocean holds you without asking anything—the way it demands your full attention, but nothing else. There’s no room for guilt, or regret, or whatever shape New York and Barty still take in the back of his mind. There’s just this. Salt. Sun. Motion. Breath.
And then the wave comes.
James calls it—“Go!”—and Evan turns, paddles hard, arms burning. The swell rises beneath him, catches, lifts—and he’s flying.
The first wave is magic.
The second, better.
The third, a lesson.
A reminder that the ocean is always in control.
One moment he’s balanced, slicing forward like he never left. The next, the nose of his board digs deep, the swell rears back, and the water swallows him whole. He tumbles—salt, sky, board, breath—everything spinning. His leash jerks tight around his ankle, and then he breaks the surface, coughing, blinking water from his eyes.
James carves past him on the next wave, shouting, “Twenty bucks, man!”
“Eat shit,” he calls back, but he’s smiling. Wide. Unselfconscious.
Because the wave threw him, sure—but it caught him first. And in those few seconds, before it all went sideways, he was flying. Truly free.
Afterward, they sprawl on the sand, boards abandoned nearby, breath still uneven. The morning sun is climbing, warming the curve of the beach, turning the air soft and gold. James lies with his arms flung wide, eyes closed, chest rising and falling in the steady rhythm of someone who knows this kind of tired. Salt crystals dust the edges of his jaw, hair wet and curling.
“That one of Sirius’s boards?” he asks, eyes still closed, voice loose with exertion.
Evan squints into the glare, lifts one hand to shield his face. “Yeah,” he says. “I sold all mine.”
“Even Nelly?”
Evan turns his head to look down at James, amused. “You remember Nelly?”
James cracks one eye open, looks up at him. “’Course. Orange. Black rail tape.”
Evan smiles. “My first great love.”
James’s mouth quirks, and he closes his eyes again. “First time you took her out, you wiped out—hit yourself in the face. Came up with blood pouring out your nose and a busted lip. You must’ve been thirteen, maybe. Sirius nearly had a heart attack.”
Evan lets out a quiet laugh as the memory stirs, hazy but warm. “You bought me half a pint of ice cream on the way home. Mint choc chip.”
“Told you to hold it against your face,” James says. “Keep the swelling down.” He huffs a short laugh. “Not that you listened—were more interested in eating it than anything else.”
“Can’t believe you remember that.”
“Pretty hard to forget—you scared the shit out of both of us.” James opens his eyes, props himself up on his elbows. “Sirius chewed me out the whole way home. Kept saying I shouldn’t have let you go for that wave. Think he felt guilty because he’d been distracted—wasn’t paying attention. Was off chatting up Alicia Patil instead of watching you and Reg.”
James chuckles and shoots Evan an amused look.
“Told him I didn’t let you do anything. Would’ve liked to see him try and stop you.” He grins then, wide and bright. “Stand by that too—most determined kid I’ve ever met. No wave too big. And always the last one out of the water.” He pauses, lets the words hang in the morning air for a moment, and then says with a slight frown, “Thought it was weird you picked New York for college. Couldn’t really picture you anywhere without waves.”
The words are thrown out lightly, but they catch somewhere deep. Evan swallows, watching the waves instead of James—the safer view, when those dark eyes have always seen more than he wanted them to.
“I fucking hated it, man,” admits Evan—half to James, half to the ocean. “Used to dream about the beach almost every night.”
“Why’d you stay then?” James asks.
There’s something in his voice Evan can’t quite place. Not judgment. Not curiosity exactly. Something quieter and sharper, like a rip hidden beneath whitewater—out of sight but all the more dangerous for it.
Evan considers the question. There are a dozen ways he could answer—half-truths and dodges that would roll off easy. He could say work, or money, or timing. But in the end, he settles on the only one that feels honest.
“I fell in love,” he says—and then, trying to ease the weight of it, the way the words sit heavy in his chest, he shoots James a wry smile. “Turns out a person’s a bit more complicated than a surfboard.”
James makes a low sound in the back of his throat—could be acknowledgment, could be commiseration. “Amen to that,” he says, and then, glancing down at his watch, he adds, “Should probably head. Got work at eleven.”
Evan stands, and they walk back up the steep path up the cliffs, the drive back quiet. James pulls into the Blacks’ drive, and they stash both boards in the garage.
“So Will and Bri just cool with you keeping boards here?” asks Evan as James pulls the garage door shut with a clatter, and they head back down the drive.
Sirius’s parents had never been subtle about their disapproval—about any of Sirius’s tendencies, really, but especially the one where he collected friends from outside the gilded gates of Palos Verdes Estates. Evan remembered more than one fight about it, Sirius’s anger spilling out into slammed doors and brooding silences. Back then, Evan hadn’t fully understood what that meant—had been too young to understand the bigotry behind why Sirius’s parents didn’t like him hanging around with James, and by the time he was old enough to get it, Sirius had left for college and the arguments had been buried under stony silence and disapproving looks whenever James’s name came up.
“Apparently Sirius finally convinced Will that growing up in Pedro doesn’t make me contagious.” James shoots him a grin, wide and unbothered. “Ninety percent sure Brian thinks I’m the pool boy. Last time I ran into him, he called me Miguel and tipped me fifty.”
Evan laughs, shakes his head. “Yeah. That tracks. Some things never change, I guess.”
At the bottom of the drive, James pauses—keys in hand.
“You just visiting, or back for good?” he asks.
There’s something in his voice again—that same undercurrent from before, the pull beneath the water that Evan still can’t name. James is watching him from behind his sunglasses; Evan can’t see his eyes, but he can feel the weight of them all the same.
He shrugs, forcing a small smile. “Sort of playing it by ear, to be honest.”
James nods, unlocking the truck. He slides into the driver’s seat, the door closing with a soft, decisive thud. For a moment he just sits there, hand on the wheel, then looks up at Evan.
“Don’t be a stranger, yeah?”
Evan lifts a hand in something between a wave and a promise. The Tacoma rolls away, sun flashing off the roof, the engine a low hum fading into the curve of the hill.
He stands there longer than he needs to, the sound of the truck dissolving into the quiet. The day is warming up, the air smells like asphalt under sun and salt.
Back for good.
The thought sits in his mind like a pebble dropped in water—small, but the ripples reach far. He sighs, shoves his hands into his pockets, and turns back toward the house, the hush of the ocean rising somewhere beyond the cliffs.