Chapter One

Liliana Conlee, her mom and her brother was on their way to the fleming's house.

"Can you drive any faster?" Lilliana said to her brother. 

"If you want to get pulled over then yes!" Tanner Bit back. 

"No I don't, but you're going 20 miles per hour and the speed limit is 55!" Lilliana said sticking her tongue out.

"You're over exaggerating Lilliana, I'm going 50 miles per hour! and you should be the one to talk you don't even have your permit so HA!" Tanner remarked.

"Humph!" Lilliana said and put her feet on the dashboard,

their mom was in the back sleeping. 

"GET YOUR FEET OFF MY DASHBOARD!" Tanner yelled, 

"No, because it's gonna be my car soon!" she said turning the music up and started singing and then their mom woke up and started singing badly. 

"SO I PUT MY HANDS UP THEY"RE PLAYING MY SONG THE BUTTERFLIES FLY AWAY!" Lilliana and their mom sang loudly while Tanner smiled and shook his head. The trees started getting thicker, taller - the air shifting from highway dust to that soft, pine-and-lake smell that only meant one thing. Summer. Tanner turned down the music just a little as the gravel road crunched beneath the tires. 

“We’re almost there,” he muttered, 

trying to sound unbothered even though the corners of his mouth were still fighting a smile. Lilliana immediately sat up straighter.

“Wait - actually?” she asked, already flipping down the visor mirror.

“Yes, actually. We’ve been on this road for five minutes,” Tanner said. “You’d know that if you weren’t performing a full concert back there.”

Their mom stretched in the backseat. “That was a *beautiful* concert, thank you very much.”

“It was something,” Tanner teased.

Lilliana ignored him, pulling her hair forward over her shoulders. She fluffed it, twisted a piece around her finger, then let it fall dramatically. She tilted her head left. Then right. Then leaned closer to the mirror. Tanner noticed.

“Ohhh,” he dragged out slowly. “What’s all this?”

“What?” Lilliana said quickly, pretending she wasn’t dabbing lip gloss onto her lips with intense focus.

“You fixing your hair for the trees? Or the mailbox? Maybe the dock?” he continued.

She snapped the gloss shut. “I always look nice.”

“Mhm.” Tanner smirked. “You trying to impress Chase or Jordan Flemming?”

Lilliana froze for half a second - just long enough.

“I am not!” she said, way too fast.

Their mom leaned forward between the seats. “Ohhh, are the Flemming boys coming this year?”

“Yes, Mom,” Tanner said. “They own the house next door. They come every year.”

“I do not care about Chase,” Lilliana said, smoothing her hair again. “Or Jordan.”

“Didn’t say you did,” Tanner replied innocently. “Just interesting how you went from ‘feet on the dashboard gremlin’ to ‘lip gloss commercial’ in thirty seconds.”

Lilliana gasped. “You’re so annoying.”

“And you’re blushing.”

“I am not!”

She absolutely was. The lake came into view through the trees - glittering under the late afternoon sun. The big wooden summer house appeared around the bend, white paint glowing gold in the light, porch swing swaying gently in the breeze.

Lilliana’s stomach flipped.Tanner pulled into the driveway, gravel popping under the tires. Next door, the Flemmings’ place looked just as it always did - dock freshly stained, boat already uncovered. And right on cue, two familiar figures were down by the water. Tanner followed her line of sight and grinned.

“Well, well,” he said. “Looks like someone’s already here.”

Lilliana quickly checked herself in the mirror one last time, pressed her lips together, and pretended she hadn’t been staring.

“Don’t say anything weird,” she warned.

“Oh, I would never,” Tanner said sweetly, turning off the engine.

She pointed a finger at him. “Tanner. I mean it.”

He just grabbed his keys and stepped out of the car.

“Hey, Chase!” he called casually toward the dock.

Lilliana’s jaw dropped as she scrambled to open her door.

“Shut up!” she hissed, hopping out and smoothing her shorts like she hadn’t just panic-adjusted everything. Tanner leaned against the car with a smug smile.

“Better fix that hair again,” he whispered as she walked past him.

Lilliana rolled her eyes - but she couldn’t stop the tiny, nervous smile forming on her lips as the summer officially began.