The summer heat clung to Lena’s skin like sweat and memory.

She hadn’t meant to run into Mae so soon, but of course the first person she sees back in Willowbridge — dusty, too-quiet, slow-ticking Willowbridge — is her. Standing in front of that same riverbank, barefoot and sun-kissed, paintbrush between her lips like a cigarette, sweat slipping down her collarbone.

Five years gone, and she still looked like that.

Mae turned around slowly, like she’d felt her. Eyes that once stared up at Lena from a pillow in her grandmother’s attic bedroom now held no innocence. Just quiet fire.

“…Lena,” she said, not a question, not a welcome. Just a spark thrown onto dry wood.

Lena’s throat dried.

“Mae.”

Mae stepped closer. Not fast. Just deliberate. The same way she used to untie Lena’s swimsuit strings behind the boathouse, laughter sticky on her tongue.

“You’re back,” Mae said, voice low and rougher than Lena remembered.

“Just for the summer,” Lena lied. Or maybe hoped.

Mae’s eyes fell to Lena’s bare shoulder where the strap of her tank top had slipped down from the heat. Her lips barely parted.

“I wondered if you’d ever show your face again.”

“Missed me?” Lena shot back, but her voice cracked at the end. Because Mae hadn’t looked away.

And then it happened.

Mae closed the gap, the paintbrush falling somewhere near their feet. One hand slid around Lena’s neck, slow and sure — like she had every right to touch her. Lena’s breath caught. Mae leaned in, her lips brushing the shell of her ear.

“I never stopped dreaming about the sounds you made that night,” Mae whispered. “But you just left.”

Lena shivered.

Mae stepped back, leaving heat behind on Lena’s skin like a brand.

“See you around,” she said, and turned.

Lena stood there trembling, her heart thudding hard between her thighs.

God, she thought. This summer’s going to ruin me.