"Welcome to the afterparty, Skye Jameson!" Are the first words I hear when I wake up.

Wait. I'm not in my van.

I sit up rapidly and search around me, and I am definitely not in my van.

"What...?" I blink, looking around me.

"You're on a boat." Sophie flops down in front of me, and it becomes apparent that I'm in a bed... still on Reiley—no Ed—Ed's superyacht.

"Woah." I rub my sore head, "How come I'm not back at my van?"

"Because you practically fell asleep here anyway." Sophie shrugs, standing up.

I blink, "Where's Ed?"

"Ah, so he finally told you, did he?" She grins at me, "'Bout time...he's out on the deck already."

Sophie springs up and bounces out of the room, full of energy, leaving me wondering how the hell I ended up staying over last night.

Is this... I begin to think, swallowing as I look around me, is this Ed's bed?

I push back the covers to see I'm dressed in some sort of cotton nightgown. It's comfortable, sure, but I don't know how the hell I got into last night; I was pretty wasted.

I should've eaten more food yesterday...

Slipping a light blanket around my shoulders in order to cover myself up some more, I stumble my way out into the sunshine, ending up on the top deck of the superyacht.

"Morning, sunshine." Cole smirks at me, stretched out in a jacuzzi wearing a pair of boardshorts, next to a girl I think I saw last night, who's wearing the teeniest bikini I've ever seen.

Nodding at them and then looking away, I see Reil- Ed standing with his arms leaning against the railings.

"Hey." I step over to him, aware he's just wearing some loose, low-hanging pj pants.

"Hey, gorgeous." He grins at me, and wraps me in a hug from behind, his strong arms resting on my waist. I'm forced to suck in a breath as he whispers in my ear, "How did you sleep?"

"It was...comfortable." I tell him, stepping away from his hug, "It's been ages since I've slept in an actual bed."

"Well," He shrugs, and I struggle to keep my gaze on his face, "My bed's always open to you."

"It was your bed?!" I exclaim, folding my arms around me, "Where did you sleep?"

"In a guest room." His eyes flit up and down my body, "No biggie."

"So, I basically stole your bed." I state, looking out across the ocean.

"Yeah, but you looked crazy sexy in it." Ed informs.

A blush rises in my cheeks, as I ask, "How did I get out of last night's clothes into this?"

"Sophie helped you." He assures me, "You got pretty wasted last night...and I didn't want your first experience of me taking your clothes off to be a fuzzy one."

"You want to take my clothes off?" I raise an eyebrow at him.

Ed walks over to grab me some coffee, "Yeah, why wouldn't I? You're smart, you're beautiful, you can surf, and you know my full name."

I can't help but laugh at that.

"You're even more beautiful when you laugh." He pushes a mug and a croissant into my hands.

"Thanks, Ed." I smile back at him, and his grin widens when I say his name.

"So...lovebirds, what are we gonna do today?" Sophie sidles up beside us, and Cole climbs out of the hot tub and heads over to us, wrapping a towel around his waist.

"Depends if and/or when Cole's girl is leaving." Ed huffed.

"She can leave right now." Cole tells him, before yelling over his shoulder to the 'his girl', "You've got 15 minutes to get yourself ready, then I'll take you back to the shore."

"But, Cole...what about last night?" She pouts, "Didn't that mean anything to you? Don't you wanna see me again?"

"14 minutes." Cole responds, still not looking at her.

She hops out of the jacuzzi and runs down the deck stairs, beginning to cry a little.

"Heartless much?" I throw a dirty look at Cole.

Cole merely shrugs a shoulder and grabs a mug of coffee.

"Cold-hearted Cole." Sophie shakes her head at him, "You'll never find love if you keep having one-night stands."

"There's no such thing as love." Cole spoke into his mug, whilst slurping the coffee.

"I think there is." I defend, crossing my arms.

"Well, you're a delusional romantic then." He scoffs, finishing the last of his coffee.

I hate it when guys do this: pretend like they're all emotionless, thinking it's cool, when actually, girls prefer it when guys say how and what they're feeling...instead of pretending to be emotionally detached, and only in it for one thing.

Sighing, I turn away from Cole as he goes to prep his RHIB to take that girl back.

"Don't stress about him." Ed tells me, "He's always been like that ever since his ex-girlfriend broke up with him and left him to go to Harvard Uni."

"I heard that, Teddy!" Cole yells back over his shoulder.

Ed grits his teeth and mutters to himself, "I hate it when he calls me that."

You're really hot when you're angry... I silently muse as I regard Ed.

"Excuse me?" Ed frowns at me.

"I'm just gonna...go now." Sophie says before sloping off.

"What?" I frown right back at Ed.

Wait a second. Oh damn.

"You said that I'm really hot when I'm angry." Ed raised an eyebrow at me.

I scrunch my face up tightly, "I said that aloud?"

"Yup." Ed chuckles, and takes his hand in mine, linking our fingers together.

Snapping my eyes open, I see that he's now stood close to me.

"Hey." He smiles down at me, his fingertips caressing my cheek, sending butterflies flitting in my stomach.

"Hi." I smile back, feeling my cheeks stain with pink.

His eyes flick down to my lips, then back up to my eyes, then my lips again, and he starts moving his lips to meet mine.

Eyes widening in realisation, I swallow, and back away from him, "I've not brushed my teeth yet."

Ed laughs lightly, "I don't care."

"Well, I do." I tell him firmly, "I don't want our first kiss to be with me having just got out of bed."

He smirks, "How d'you know we didn't have our first kiss last night?"

My mouth drops open in shock, surely, I'd remember something like that happening?

"I'm kidding, Skye, I'm kidding." Ed laughs at me, grin wide. "You were too wasted, and I wouldn't even dreaming of taking advantage of you like that."

I suck in a breath, "Thank God."

"See ya later, losers!" Cole yells up to us as he climbs onto his RHIB, with 'his girl' in tow. "I'll bring Kai and the others back with me."

"Later, Cole!" Ed yells down to him, prior to shaking his head, sighing and leaning against the metal railings.

I fidget for a moment, before mumbling something about brushing my teeth and hurrying away from Ed.

We almost kissed. I begin over-analysing, stressing out. We almost kissed and I chickened out. Ed wanted to kiss me, and I chickened out...who knows if he still wants to kiss me?

After hurriedly brushing my teeth in a very posh bathroom with a previously-packaged toothbrush, (meaning it was new), and sticking my clothes from last night back on, I step out into the sunshine again.

"What exactly are we doing today then?" I ask Sophie when I see her. "I mean, I should probably just go back to my..."

"I called it the afterparty this morning, but the truth is, we'll probably just hang around the yacht all day." Sophie shrugs, as if hanging around a superyacht all day is a normal occurrence for her – which, to be fair, she probably did. "I dunno know, maybe do some snorkelling, watch some movies..."

"Hey, Skye." Ed appears, and places a hand on the small of my back.

"Hey, Ed." I smile up at him, realising how much the name 'Ed' suits him...I mean, not that 'Reiley' doesn't suit him, but Ed is such a sexy name...belonging to such a sexy guy...

"Skye?" Sophie snaps her fingers in front of my face. "Earth to Skye?"

"What?" I shook my head.

"You spaced out for a sec, there." Sophie eyes me, "What were you thinking about?"

"Errm..."

"I'm back, people!" A voice shouts up to us, and I see that Cole has returned on his RHIB, alongside Kai, the other girl that was surfing the other day after no-sky July, another girl and a couple of other guys.

It turns out that the surfer girl is called Jessica, the other girl is Madison, or Maddy, and the guys are Kai (from the other day), Jacob and Austin.

It turns out that Jessica and Maddy are twins; they both have beautiful, glossy, raven-coloured hair and matching birthmarks on their right eyelids. Jacob has short blonde hair, and Austin has messy ginger hair—both equally as good looking.

"That's a pretty dumb name." Maddy looks me up and down once I told her my name, a disapproving scowl on her pretty face, "I mean, that's like being called Cloud. Or Misty. Or Rain."

Jessica elbows her twin, "Mads, stop being such a bitch!"

"It's fine." I laugh nervously, thinking it's really not fine.

Ed steps up next to me, and voices, "I think Skye's a great name."

"Whatever, Teds." Maddy chews her lip, but shuts up.

Feeling self-conscious around the beautiful twins, I fold my arms and ask, "So. What now?"

"Now," Ed turns to me, "The afterparty can really begin."

"Can I have some food first?" I look up at him.

He laughs, "Of course. But then, we're going snorkelling."

After consuming three croissants and waiting half an hour for my food to go down, we start getting ready to go snorkelling.

Sophie lent me a rash vest, and for some reason, they had, like, 15 snorkel & mask sets on board the yacht, so it's not long before we're ready to go in.

"Have you ever been snorkelling before, Skye?" Maddy asks mockingly.

"Yes, I have, actually." I retorted, glaring at her as I pulled my mask down over my face.

On the count of three, we dive down off the side of the yacht down into the refreshing, cool water that's a gorgeous blue-green and the coral beneath us is brightly coloured—like an underwater rainbow.

The ocean never ceases to amaze me: from no-sky July to today, everything feels so new and so unexplored...especially in comparison to Miami, a tourist destination. Sure, California's also a honeypot site, but it seems like I've found a quiet, tranquil part of it, and everyone around here appears to be local.

After popping back up to the surface to inhale a huge lungful of air, I swim down again, drawing closer to the rainbow coral, that I can now see is surrounded by equally colourful fish flitting around—creating an unreproducible performance.

I'm wondering how this could possibly get any better, when Reil- Ed slips his hands around my waist and smoothly pulls me into an underwater embrace. His arms lock my body close to his and our legs are sliding together under the silky water.

I want to stay like this.

Unfortunately, my lungs start burning and my head starts pounding; I can only hold my breath for so long.

I point upwards with my index finger, and Ed nods, releasing me so that I can swim up for air.

Gasping as I reach the surface, I pull my mask off and rub my face.

"You okay?" Ed pops up next to me, removing his own mask.

I bob my head, "Better now."

The others pop up near us, all gasping and tugging their masks off as well.

"Not bad, Skye." Jessica smiles at me, "I didn't expect that you would last that long."

"I'm from Miami," I tell her, smiling back as we swam back over to Ed's yacht. "I've had a lot of practice snorkelling, so I can hold my breath for quite a while."

"That's cool. I'm sorry about Maddy." She pulls an apologetic face, "She can be a bit much when she's around Reiley."

"How come?" I frown, pulling myself up on to the lower deck.

"They were an item in high school." Jessica nods to herself, "Reiley broke it off because he found Maddy cheating on him with Co– with some other guy."

"Oh." I swallow, feeling bad for Ed.

"Yeah, and things have been awkward between them ever since." Jessica admits, "And, honestly, Maddy can't get over him."

"Wonderful." I mutter to myself; Maddy's beautiful, regardless of how much of a bitch she seems.

"Movie time, people!" Cole shouts to us as we begin towelling ourselves dry. "Get yourselves dry and then come to the movie theatre."

"Thanks for commanding people around my boat, Cole." Ed rolls his eyes as he peels his rash vest off, once again unveiling his gorgeous body.

I catch myself staring as droplets of salt water trickle down his chest, running along his abs...

"You're drooling a little there, Skye." Jessica chuckles.

"Whatever." I grumble, pulling my own rash vest off. Which gets him staring at me.

"Was...was Cole here last night?" Jessica asks me.

"Yeah, he was." I tear my eyes away from Ed and towards Jessica.

"Was he...with a girl?" She questions, trying—and failing—to seem unbothered.

"Yep." I nod, noticing how the smile had slipped off her face at some point.

Jessica doesn't say anything, just nods and heads over to her twin, linking their arms together.

What did I say?!

Wait a second...hold on...could she be? Hang on.

"Hey, Ed?" I step over to him, "Did Cole's ex ever come back from Harvard?"

"Yeah, she did." Ed affirms.

"What's her name?" I inquire, raising an eyebrow.

Ed smiles at me sadly, "Jessica. Yes, Maddy's twin Jessica."

"Oh shit." Rubbing my forehead, I swear, "So you dated Maddy whilst Cole dated Jessica?"

"Yup." He shakes his head, "I dated Maddy until I found her making out with Cole. And Jessica dated Cole until she found Cole making out with her twin sister, Maddy."

"Damn. How are you all still friends? I mean, isn't it super awkward all the time?" My eyebrows furrow together.

"'Cos Cole and I have been friends since kindergarten, so we made up. And 'cos I'm still friends with Jessica, and she often brings Maddy along with her." Ed explains as he walks me inside.

Saying nothing, I just nod, thinking that sounds super awkward.

I don't know where the rest of the day had disappeared to, because when we were sitting down to watch a movie, it was already late-afternoon. Maybe I slept in quite a bit...and then maybe we were snorkelling for longer than I'd thought.

I didn't really watch the movie—it was some trashy comedy; most of the time I was just watching Ed, watching him laugh and smile, watching him relax around his friends.

This has been a pretty good afterparty, I think to myself, smiling a little, relaxing into the chair some more.

After the after the party we're gonna keep it going
We're gonna rip it up, the neighbours might complain

This is good, I think, I feel good.

But nothing lasts forever; all good things must come to an end.