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☀️🌊 SWEETWATER SUMMERS 🌊☀️
Playlist
☀️ August — Taylor Swift
☀️ Golden — Harry Styles
☀️ You Are In Love — Taylor Swift
☀️ Kiss Me — Sixpence None The Richer
☀️ Sunroof — Nicky Youre & dazy
☀️ Best Friend — Rex Orange County
☀️ She Looks So Perfect — 5 Seconds of Summer
☀️ Dandelions — Ruth B.
☀️ Perfect Places — Lorde
☀️ Sweet Disposition — The Temper Trap
☀️ Beach Baby — Bon Iver
☀️ Kiss Me Slowly — Parachute
☀️ Kids — MGMT
☀️ Dog Days Are Over — Florence + The Machine
☀️ Give Me a Kiss — Crash Adams
☀️ Astral Projection — Yumi Zouma
Beau
I love a lot of things about coming home.
I love the ocean, the way the Atlantic looks like a massive, bruised sheet of glass right before the sun drops below the horizon. I love the sharp, clean smell of salt in the air that clings to your skin the second you roll the windows down on Route 9. I love the way Sweetwater Cove somehow looks exactly the same every single time I come back, from the peeling paint on the bait shop to the weathered docks that have survived a dozen coastal storms.
But mostly?
I love her.
Which is a massive fucking problem considering she has no idea.
“Are you planning on helping, or are you just going to stand there staring dramatically at the water like you’re filming a country music video?”
I glanced over my shoulder, pulling my gaze away from the horizon to find my sister, Cora, glaring at me from beside the tailgate of my truck. She was hoisted up on the bumper, a heavy cardboard box of my leftover gear balanced against her hip.
I grinned, leaning my weight back against the driver’s side door. “Maybe I’m having a moment, Cor. Let a man live.”
Cora snorted, wiping a stray strand of dark hair from her forehead with the back of her forearm. “You’ve been home for exactly five minutes, Beau.”
“Exactly. It’s an important moment. Very foundational.”
“It’s a gravel parking lot.”
“It’s home,” I countered, shifting my stance.
She rolled her eyes so hard I was surprised they didn’t get stuck in the back of her head, but there was a familiar, affectionate tug at the corner of her mouth. God, I’d missed her. I’d missed all of it. The quiet rhythm of the town, the people who knew my shirt size before I even bought a shirt, the thick, heavy familiarity of a place where nobody gave a shit about my batting average.
Professional baseball was great—it was everything I’d ever dreamed of. I got paid a ridiculous amount of money to play the game I’ve loved my entire life, standing under stadium lights with thousands of people screaming my name. But after months of endless road trips, identical hotel rooms, sterile clubhouses, and scripted post-game interviews, there was something about coming home that finally settled the restless, spinning gears inside my chest.
My phone vibrated in my pocket.
I didn’t even have to look at the screen to know who it was. My stomach gave me away before I could even slide my hand into my denim shorts, a sudden, sharp kick of adrenaline hitting my ribs.
*Saylor.*
I pulled it out.
*Landing in ten. Meet me at the bakery?*
A slow, helpless smile immediately pulled at my mouth, wiping away whatever smart-ass comment I was about to throw at my sister.
“Is that Saylor?” Cora asked, her voice dropping into that specific, knowing tone that always grated on my nerves.
“No,” I lied smoothly, locking the screen.
“You’re smiling.”
“I’m allowed to smile, Cora. I’m a happy guy.”
“Not like that, you aren't. You look brain-damaged.”
I shoved my phone back into my pocket, grabbing the strap of my heaviest duffel bag and swinging it over my shoulder. “Mind your business.”
“Oh my God, it is Saylor.” Cora dropped the box onto the truck bed with a loud thud, pointing an accusing finger at me.
“Bye, Cora,” I said, turning on my heel and starting the short walk toward the driveway.
She scrambled down from the bumper, following me like a persistent shadow. “You’ve literally been in love with her for your entire life, Beau. It’s getting pathetic.”
“I have not.”
“Beau.”
I ignored her, keeping my eyes fixed straight ahead on the gravel path. Unfortunately, my sister had never once taken a hint in her entire life. She possessed zero boundary awareness when it came to me.
“You know everybody in town thinks you’re dating, right?” she pressed, jogging a little to keep pace with my longer strides. “Like, the entire population of the Eastern Seaboard assumes you’re sleeping together.”
“We’re not dating,” I said, my jaw tightening slightly at the thought of how much I wished that statement was a lie.
“That’s the embarrassing part,” she fired back.
I laughed despite myself, shaking my head as I reached the driver's side of my own car.
Twenty minutes later, I was pulling into a tight parking spot right outside Anderson’s Bakery. The moment the engine cut, my heart did that stupid, erratic skip it always did. The exact same thing it had done since I was sixteen years old and realized I was completely, utterly ruined by the girl next door. It was the same reaction that hit me every single time her name popped up on my phone screen during the season, distracting me in the middle of batting practice. It was pathetic, really, how much power she held over me without even trying.
The brass bell above the heavy oak door rang with a sharp chime as I stepped inside.
The smell hit me immediately, washing over me like a warm wave. Freshly baked sourdough, rich coffee grounds, hot sugar, and the cinnamon rolls her mom spent hours perfecting. It smelled like safety. It smelled like home.
“Well, look who finally decided to come back to the real world.”
And there she was.
My chest tightened so fast it actually stole the breath right out of my lungs. Saylor was standing behind the glass display counter, wearing a faded yellow sundress that hit her just above the knee and a pair of scuffed white sneakers. Her dark blonde hair was twisted up into a messy, chaotic bun on top of her head, a few loose tendrils framing her face. There was a faint smudge of white flour right across her left cheekbone.
And somehow, she was still the prettiest fucking girl I’d ever seen in my life.
Which was saying something. Over the last two years in the league, I’d met actresses, models, influencers—women whose faces were plastered across billboards and millions of Instagram feeds. Women who were paid to look flawless. But none of them had ever done a damn thing for me. Not a single one of them could even hold a candle to the girl standing under the buzzing fluorescent lights of a small-town bakery.
“Hey, Sailor,” I said, my voice a little rougher than I meant it to be.
Her smile widened, her blue eyes lighting up from within. That smile got me every single time, destroying whatever armor I’d built up over the winter. The nickname had been mine since we were kids, a stupid pun based on her name that I’d started using when we were eight. Nobody else called her that. Nobody else would ever get away with it.
Before I could even think about what to say next, she rounded the edge of the counter, dropping the dish towel she was holding.
Then she threw herself at me.
I barely had time to brace my feet before her small frame was colliding hard against my chest. I caught her automatically, my hands finding their places on her back like it was second nature. Like I was built for it. My arms wrapped tightly around her waist, lifting her slightly off the tiled floor as her momentum pushed into me.
Her soft, melodic laughter filled my ears, her face buried in the crook of my neck, and just like that, the eight grueling months I’d spent away from this town completely disappeared. The road trips, the pressure, the noise—it all just dissolved into the background.
“Missed you,” she muttered into my skin, her breath warm against my collarbone.
Something fiercely protective and heavy settled deep in my chest. I tightened my hold on her, pulling her flush against me, feeling the steady beat of her heart against my own. I held on maybe a second longer than I should have. Maybe a little too tight for two people who were supposed to just be friends.
“Missed you too, Sailor,” I murmured, my hand resting on the small of her back.
She pulled back just enough to look up at me, her hands still resting on my shoulders. Blue eyes, sun-kissed skin from the early summer weather, and that same devastating smile.
God, I was so screwed.
Because every single summer I came home and told myself that this was going to be the year. This was the year I finally grew a pair and told her the truth. This was the year I stopped being a fucking coward, stopped hiding behind the safety net of our childhood, and stopped pretending she was just my best friend. And every single summer, I choked. I fell right back into the easy comfort of what we already had because the thought of losing her entirely was worse than keeping my mouth shut.
But standing here right now, with her held tightly in my arms and the scent of sugar and salt clinging to her skin?
For the first time in my life, I wasn’t sure I could survive another summer of playing friend. Because something about the air between us felt different today. It felt heavier, thicker, charged with a strange kind of gravity.
And I had a terrible, beautiful feeling that this summer was going to change everything.
