"Parker has always had a thing for you. This is his way of pulling on your pigtails like in first grade." Tonnie adds as we make our way shallower so she can touch. She's been providing me with reasons for the past ten minutes.

"In first grade, he cut my pigtails off. He didn't just pull them." I point out. I still cringe whenever I hear the snip of scissors.

"Well, that was just his way of doing it." She shrugs her shoulders. We're now both standing as waves lightly make our bodies sway.

"What about in second grade when he accidentally tripped me while I was getting off the bus." I make air quotes when I say the word accidentally.

"That was an accident. Even you agreed. Wait, did he do it on purpose?" Tonnie's face looks surprised.

"I broke my freaking arm and he laughed. Of course, he did it on purpose." I admit. It's one of the few secrets I have ever kept from her.

"Oh, I didn't know. Why didn't you tell anyone?"

"Because I decided getting even would be better."

"Were you the one who..."Tonnie lets her voice trail off as the boys join us.

I nod my head before embracing Nico. "Looks like you found us." I smile.

"It wasn't too hard." Nico kisses my cheek.

"Yeah, we knew Tonnie would need to be able to touch because she sucks at swimming," Travis adds with a smirk.

"I hate you." Tonnie splashes water into his face.

"Right back at ya, babe." Travis moves his hands as if he is going to splash her to make her cringe, but instead grabs her.

"Put me down!" Tonnie squeals as he holds her up out of the water.

"You want me to put you down?" There is a dare in his eyes.

"I swear if you don't put me down right now I will—" We never get to hear what she'll do because Travis has dunked her.

"You son of a –" She starts and stops herself just in time.

"I'm sorry what was that? I just didn't catch the last bit of that." Travis says sarcastically and cups his hand around his ear.

"Gun. I was going to say you son of a gun." She says through gritted teeth. Travis and Tonnie have a bet going that the first to swear will have to do whatever the other tells them to for a whole day. They started it when they were still happy together, but now that they hate each other it's that much more important to win.

"Sure." He nods his head and reaches forward to dunk her again. I kick my leg out and wrap it around his, causing him to fall in after her.

"Nice!" Nico high fives me. Then he grabs my hand and pushes me under.

I come up to the surface spluttering. "Oh, you better swim fast."

"What ya gonna do? Go Kraken on me?" He winks.

I blush at the nickname that my water polo team gave me. It was embarrassing enough when they called me out for MVP, even if that was part of my goal. It helped me get a scholarship to a couple of universities along with my grades. The only one I care about though is Stanford. I've been wanting to go there since sixth grade.

"Now that should be the least of your worries." I inch forward as he steps back. We both tune out the fight going on between our friends. Soon we are swimming out into the ocean.

I use a butterfly stroke to fling myself closer to Nico. Once I grab his foot I yank him back to me. He, of course, doesn't really fight me. I dunk him and then he wraps his arms around me. We are treading water together, perfectly in sync.

"You really are a magnificent swimmer. You know that, right?" He kisses my nose as his arms wrap around me. I lean closer to him and let my arms snake around his shoulders. "You're perfect."

"Doubtful. But, do you know that you're a magnificent boyfriend?" I shift so that my mouth is a breath away from his. When I speak my lips are touching his. Then he kisses me back all words forgotten. I wrap my legs around his waist and let him push me against a big rock as his hands go to my hair. When we pull away we're both breathing hard.

"What the?" I feel something land on my head. It's a red flag with something written on it but I can't read the words because the water has already started to wash them away. Nico takes it from me and tosses it onto the rock before giving me another quick kiss.

"Okay, I think we better head back," Nico says after we catch our breath.

"Yeah, make sure we still have two live friends." I laugh as Nico tickles my side before letting me go.

"We really need to do something about them." He says as we start swimming back slowly.

"I know. It's never been this bad." I shake my head when they come into view.

"Well, maybe they've already fixed it," Nico says hopefully as he sees them too.

They are laughing while splashing each other. Travis lifts Tonnie up and after she nods her head he throws her into the water. This time, unlike before we left when she comes up for air she is smiling. He swims over to her and that's when everything falls apart.

"What do you mean, who is she?" Travis hisses.

"Who is she? The girl you were just checking out?" Tonnie raises her voice which Travis hates.

"What are you talking about?" He says with a look of embarrassment.

"I saw that look you gave her; that tramp in the red bikini over there." She points to an unsuspecting teen. "See, you just did it again."

"I looked at her because you just pointed her out. You're crazy, you know that right?" He is throwing his arms up in exasperation. "What about the guy from last week?"

"Josh? He's my brother's best friend. He was giving me a ride home."

"Sure, giving you a ride home."

"Screw it. I'm done. I don't care about Lana's surprise vaca anymore. I'm leaving." Tonnie starts marching towards the shore. Nico looks angry then shrugs.

"Sorry, I guess the surprise is out. We're actually staying for the week. If your parents ask we're staying with Aunt Mary, but we actually got rooms at a hotel. Happy Birthday!" Nico says with a guilty look on his face.

"Really? Thank you so much." I give him another hug and a peck on the lips. "I better go after Tonn; talk to her."

"Yeah and I'll talk to Travis."

"Oh, and how did we get the rooms?" I ask knowing that he wouldn't have planned ahead enough to get rooms. Hotels here fill up much too fast and he's more the spontaneous kind of planner.

"Parker. He planned it out actually. He has the week off from work and figured it would be fun to hangout. I used his idea to make it into a week all about you." He is beaming happily at me, so proud of himself.

"Wait, Parker's staying with us?" Could this get any worse?