Chapter 7
“You’re taking your tools?” Wes said as they prepared to walk out the door for supper.
“Figured I would. If they don’t want me messing around in their house after supper, I’ll just carry them back over. It’s not a big deal,” Gramps said as he carried his toolbox to the door.
“Let me carry it,” Wes said. “I didn’t do my workout today, and this’ll catch me up a little bit.”
He figured he needed to add that in order for Gramps to allow him to carry the tools.
“How do you think I stay so spry? It’s because I carry my own tools.”
“Why don’t you carry the box of screws yourself then, and that’ll take a little bit of weight out. Plus, I think it might fall out anyway.”
“All right. That sounds like a deal,” Gramps said, grabbing the box of screws, which probably did weigh close to five pounds. His toolbox was not a small one.
Wesley had to stop himself from whistling as they walked out of the house. He’d been smiling at the oddest times for the last fifteen minutes, even though the storm kept coming closer, and it felt like the lightning was striking just off the shore in the lake.
He wasn’t overly fond of storms, not that he was afraid of them, just...preferred to have weather that wasn’t storming. He’d been locked outside during a thunderstorm once when he was a kid and hadn’t liked them since .
Still, he was looking forward to seeing Birdie again. It wasn’t even that they had such an enlightening conversation. It had just been gentle teasing, and she’d prompted his brain in such a way that it had unleashed a whole torrent of words. He felt like he’d set a really good hook, and he was actually eager to dive into his story, but not so eager that he would skip supper.
He hoped to have helped her just as much, and he thought maybe he had, because she spent the entire time writing. If she’d only gotten one word written the day before, then she’d gotten a ton more work done with him. Hopefully that gave him a few brownie points, since he was planning on asking her if she wanted to do it again.
He followed Gramps up their stairs and then waited while Gramps rapped on the screen door. The storm door was open, almost as though they were anticipating the storm and enjoying the breeze.
“I hope you don’t mind if your napkin is underneath your plate today. They kept blowing off the table,” Gram said as she opened the door for them to come in.
“Our only concern is about the food, napkins are secondary,” Gramps said, walking in holding the box of screws.
“My goodness, what do you have there?” Gram said, looking at the toolbox that Wes carried.
“The young whippersnapper thinks he’s a big shot and wanted to carry my toolbox. Relegated me to this box of screws,” he said, holding up the screws as evidence.
“What in the world are you bringing your toolbox over here for?” Gram asked, sounding perplexed.
It was like they hadn’t talked about exchanging food for work yesterday, or maybe she thought they were joking.
“You have some windowsills that need to be fixed, don’t you?”
“But I don’t have any wood,” she said.
“I was going to send the youngster back over to the house for some of ours. He’ll have to cut it and bring it back. I didn’t bring my saws over.”
“Oh, nice,” Gram said. “Go ahead and set the stuff down, and you guys can wash up for supper. Birdie is in the bathroom preening.”
“I’m not preening,” Birdie said as she opened the door at the back of the cabin and stepped out of the bathroom. Her hair had been straightened from where the wind had messed it up earlier. He liked the mussed look a little better, but he would never tell her that. She looked more natural, happier somehow. In a way that stirred his soul. “Gram told me to comb my hair because it was all messed up from the wind.”
“That was ten minutes ago,” Gram said to Gramps with a wink.
“Well, there were some other things I had to take care of while I was in there. Do I need to go into details?” Birdie said with a teasing glint in her eye. She seemed a lot lighter, a lot looser, more relaxed than she had the day before. Was that because of spending the afternoon with him? Or was she just happy that she’d finally gotten some of her writing done? Whatever her job was, whether it was a marketing exec or something where she had to come up with short little catchy slogans for advertisements, or something else, he was glad that she seemed to be able to work.
“No, child. You can spare us those details. I think you know better,” Gram said, her words sounding more serious than her tone. He liked the teasing between the two of them. It reminded him of him and Gramps. There was definitely a respect there on his end, but it wasn’t a fearful respect, it was an affectionate love, and a confidence that no matter what he did, his gramps was going to be okay with it. Even to the point of getting suspended from his job.
He had to admit he had a little bit of trouble taking his eyes off Birdie; she just seemed to glow. But he followed Gramps to the sink and started washing his hands as a crack of thunder exploded overhead. A gust of wind blew at the same time, and the screen door flew off its hinges.
“Goodness, I wasn’t expecting that,” Gram said as she hurried to grab the screen door. Birdie followed her out, and they leaned it against the railing, with one of the rocking chairs that sat on the porch pressed against it to keep it stabilized against the railing so it wouldn’t blow away.
They came in, closing the door behind them. Two seconds later, the dark clouds opened, and rain poured down. Wesley knew this because almost as soon as the rain started coming down, it started leaking in the window over the sink where he stood.
A gust of wind blew it so hard that a drop landed on his nose.
“All right, I guess we were one storm too late in fixing this window. It’s leaking.”
He remembered what Birdie had said about not liking to be cold and wet.
“I think we should start with this window, Gramps,” he said.
“I’m thinking we should start with the roof,” Gramps said as he watched drops of rain hitting one of the plates on the table .
“The roof leaks?” Birdie said incredulously, like she couldn’t imagine such a thing happening. Maybe she couldn’t. It was probably the stuff of nightmares if she hated to be cold and wet as much as she had said.
Just then, a big crack of lightning snapped what felt like right beside them, cutting between the two cottages, and thunder roared immediately following it.
“That was close,” Gram said as the thunder rumbled away.
She had no sooner said that than the lights snapped off.
They all stood there as though frozen, and Wesley tried to figure out what to say. It wasn’t like they could fix it.
“Well, at least dinner is completely cooked.”
“I can get some candles,” Birdie said, going over to what must have been her side of the cottage and rummaging through one of the drawers of the dresser. Interesting that they weren’t brimming with clothes. Most of the women Wesley had known had ten times as many clothes as he did.
Birdie seemed to dress pretty simply, but...he wondered if that was on purpose.
He kind of thought he might suspect who she was. At least, he had an idea.
Regardless, she came back with several candles.
“It’s not dark now, but it will be, and we’ll have the candlelight to make things cheerful for us while we eat.”
“That’s kind of you to consider the rest of us considering that you love storms.” Gram’s words were cheerful as she set a steaming casserole dish on the table.
“I never met anyone who really loved storms,” Gramps muttered as he directed Wes to set his toolbox down just inside the door.
Water glasses had already been filled, and there was already a salad sitting on the table too.
“The only thing that’s going to be messed up is the apple pie. It won’t be cooked, since I had it timed to be ready to come out right after we were done eating.”
“That’s too bad, although I like apple pie well enough that I just might be okay eating it raw.” Gramps settled himself into a chair.
“No. I will not allow you to eat it raw. That’s just, ew.”
They all laughed at Gram’s exaggerated shudder and exclamation.
Before they started passing anything, Gram looked at him and said, “Would you like to say grace tonight? ”
It didn’t completely surprise him, since she had asked Gramps to say it the night before.
“Sure,” he said, tempted to add that his grace would not be nearly as entertaining as Gramps’s, but he didn’t.
“Let’s pray.” He bowed his head and waited a second for everyone else to follow suit. “Lord God, thank you for the reminder of Your power and majesty in the storm that’s raging outside. Thank you for the warm cabin and the relative dryness of it as well. Thank you for this food, thank you for the ladies who prepared it. Please bless it, amen.”
He had to say relative dryness, since during the prayer he could hear the plunking of the water coming down from the roof and hitting someone’s plate. His plate.
“I guess I’ll just dump this water out,” he said, grabbing his plate and carrying it carefully to the sink. The ladies twittered behind him, amused that the roof was leaking directly over his place setting.
He supposed he really didn’t care. He didn’t mind being wet, and he certainly didn’t mind being cold. He’d grown up loving hockey, and he couldn’t exactly play hockey without ice, so being cold was right up his alley.
If they had known that he was a hockey player, he might have made a joke about his preference that water be in its solid state. But he didn’t want to make anyone question what was going on. No, that wasn’t true, he didn’t want to make Birdie question what was going on.
He sat back down in time to give his plate to Gramps who was dishing out casserole. Everyone else had a little bit of salad on their plates, so he grabbed some too. Salad wasn’t exactly his favorite, but he knew that, again, he needed to fuel his body the best he could. Even though it was the off-season. He was working with a handicap, since he was going to be coming into the season late, and he supposed he should do everything in his power to make that handicap as slight as possible.
“So I guess it’s good that we know where the cottage leaks now anyway,” Gram said as they ate together, the rain still pounding on the roof. That sound, along with the flickering candles, somehow gave the whole cabin a cozy feeling to it.
“Do you really think that you’ll be able to fix the window? And should we just get someone to fix the roof?”
“I can fix the window easily, and if Wesley is up to it, we can fix the roof. We used to do roofing way back, when he was a teen. He always gave me a hand and was quite good at it. But that might be beyond his pay grade now. ”
“I can put a roof on. The metal roof won’t be hard at all. I’ll need someone to help me though.” He couldn’t do it by himself, and Gramps wasn’t going to be able to lift the pieces of metal onto the roof. “Actually, it would probably be helpful to have two people.”
“I’m one,” Gramps said.
“All right,” he said slowly, trying to figure out how he was going to tell Gramps that he really didn’t want him on the roof, and he also didn’t want him handing the metal pieces up. They were sharp, and if he dropped one, it could kill him. But it wasn’t like he had to reach up to a second story. The whole cottage was just one story. It would probably be okay.
“Maybe you can find someone in church on Sunday,” Gram suggested.
“Maybe. I’ll keep an eye out. Maybe there’s something that I can do for someone else, and we can trade off.” It wasn’t like he had a whole ton of things to do. He just needed to write a book. And he got a chapter written today, so if he could write one chapter a day, even one chapter every other day, he’d have it done before his suspension was over.
And that was really all he needed.
“We’ll have to have a few days to get the materials though. So you’re going to have to deal with the leakage until then. Although we can get the window fixed as soon as the electricity comes back on.”
“As long as it’s not raining, we’re not in any hurry,” Gram said easily.
Wesley noticed that Birdie actually ate a few bites of her food today. Maybe she had just been nervous because of the company, although she didn’t seem like the shy, retiring type that couldn’t eat in front of people. He’d met girls like that, and they’d been a lot less competent than Birdie.
Regardless, he was happy to see her eating. Maybe being out with him for several hours had stirred up an appetite. Or maybe she’d eaten something before supper yesterday and hadn’t been hungry.
He supposed it really wasn’t any of his business, and if he really wanted to know, he should ask.
They finished the supper by candlelight, and as natural daylight faded and the lights did not come back on, he caught Gramps’s eye. They should probably go.
Gramps seemed to agree, and it wasn’t long before they took their leave.
The rain had long since quit, and the night was almost upon them. The whole world smelled fresh and clean, and the clouds had actually parted in the sky to show stars .
“That’s a summer storm; here one second, gone the next,” Gramps said as they walked down the steps and headed toward their cottage. They had left Gramps’s toolbox with the ladies along with the box of screws, telling them they would be back in the morning to get the window fixed.
That was the way most storms were; they didn’t last forever. Storms of life were the same, including his suspension and the grief of losing Gram. Gramps hadn’t said anything about her for the last two days, almost as though meeting Gram and Birdie and getting some good food had made him...not forget about her, but made the sting of her death not hurt quite so bad. Part of losing someone was being lonely without them. They always left a hole that could never be filled, but preferably, when something got taken away, it was always nice to try to put something else in its place.
Whether that was people or things.
“It was nice to have some good food two nights in a row, and they invited us back tomorrow. You think they’re just inviting us because they feel bad for us?” He didn’t want to wear out their welcome, but he had to admit he wanted to see Birdie as much as he could. They’d already agreed they’d meet on the beach at one.
“I think they probably enjoy our company just as much as we enjoy theirs. Gram definitely likes to cook for people. She reminds me of your grandma.” His words were said a little softer, less gruff than Gramps usually was.
“Same. I mean, she’s not the same at all, but I agree with you, she reminds me of her. It feels good to be there. Cozy, like we’re a family almost.”
“You know, that Birdie is a nice girl,” Gramps began.
Wesley put up his hands. “No. Don’t even start. I’m already in enough hot water, trying to dig myself out of the hole I fell in after Gram passed. I don’t want to get entangled with anyone.”
Although he already had.
“You’re meeting her tomorrow, and you seemed to enjoy her company tonight.”
“I can be friends with her. That’s fine. You were just talking families and all that good stuff, and I don’t know where my future is right now.”
“You don’t need to play another day of hockey in your life. In fact, I believe I told you several times that I thought it would be a good idea for you to retire.”
“I can’t retire with this over my head. I need to, if not retire on top, at least retire with a clean slate. ”
“I can’t argue with you there, son. That’s probably wise.”
“Thank you. You don’t usually use that word in conjunction with me, so I’ll take it.”
“I don’t mean to not use it. You do have a good head on your shoulders. Just sometimes you get a little hot.”
Wesley didn’t say anything. He hadn’t really been hot when he’d gotten suspended. He’d just...been playing with so much concentration and determination that he hadn’t looked to the right or to the left, just focused and intent on nothing but the puck. He hadn’t really meant to hurt Jack Flipps, but the play had been out of his control, and he had been out of control as well.
Once he’d gotten out of the zone in his mind and realized what he’d done, it was too late and a huge brawl had started. He didn’t even fight the suspension. He deserved it. He had let his team down, his coach down, his fans down, and his family down. Most of all Gramps.
If Gram had been alive, she would have been the first person to tell him that he’d done wrong, but she would have also been the first person to understand what had happened. He was just playing on autopilot.
He couldn’t play with his emotions, because the grief was too deep.
Grandma and Gramps had been the only parents he knew, and losing Gram had been hard. Harder than he expected.
It also brought him face-to-face with his own mortality. That was cliché, but true. He wasn’t going to live forever, and it had been an eye-opening realization, even though he had known it on a surface level all of his life. Just, a guy got to a certain age and realized that he was getting older, and old age wasn’t that far away.
It had just been a lot, and since it was the last game of the season, the rules of their league said the penalty had to be assessed on the first games of the next season. He was lucky that the Icebreakers hadn’t traded him.
But they were a decent team, family oriented, and he had played there for a long time. Plus, his contributions were apparently greater than a month’s suspension.
Regardless, he was curious about Birdie, liked her, but only wanted to be friends. And Gramps had better get anything else out of his mind.