Chapter Thirty-Six
Eye of the Twister
Jordan
I feel like I’m making hash marks to count the days I’ve been in prison when I cross another day off on my wall calendar. It’s Monday – that’s five until the cross-camp game. Doomsday? Definitely.
I check the weather. It’s ninety degrees Fahrenheit outside. Of course. Abnormal heat is just what we need this week. I step out of the shower, slap on my camp T-shirt with my nose already wrinkled in discomfort, grab my granola bar, banana and backpack, and head outside to face the destruction.
It is decidedly not good. My sunglasses fog up right away – it’s moist heat. Disgusting. I shoot Rod a quick text: why does it feel like the apocalypse outside???
I’m not sure if I’ll get a reply or not.
He’s been in his own head all weekend. I wondered at first if it was something I’d done, but then I realized that it’s got to be more than that, considering his ex just rolled into town madder than a wet hen, which, evidently, is customary.
No wonder the poor guy has been suffering for all these years.
My heart wrenches when I think about him alone with Tali for those years, overwhelmed and just plain sad.
And honestly, I feel for Charlotte, too.
I just haven’t pinpointed exactly what that particular feeling is yet.
Charley Crockett serenades me over the radio as I pull into the parking lot at the field.
I sigh in relief when I realize that the sprinklers around the field are on.
This isn’t necessarily good for lacrosse – no one likes wet lacrosse.
But, more than that, no one likes heat-stroke lacrosse, and we’ll prevent the latter by totally drenching the kids.
I’m welcomed by the same sight as on my first day at camp.
Rod is already at the goal, hammering the stakes into the ground with his sleeves rolled up and his cap on backwards.
He looks way more refreshed after presumably spending yesterday rotting at home (for his sake, I pray that’s what he did).
He shoots me his billion-watt smile when he sees me coming.
‘Hey, you.’ I drop my bags on the bleachers and head over, hands to my forehead. ‘Oh my god.’
‘Yep.’ He gives the last stake one final smack with his big blue mallet and looks up. ‘Remember when we played lacrosse in Rebecca’s backyard?’
My eyes widen. Very not-safe-for-work of him. The memories are, in fact, a bit too vivid. I choke on my words, my cheeks heating up. ‘Uh. How could I forget?’
‘Imagine that but with these sprinklers.’ His smirk is definitely not-safe-for-work. ‘I’m getting Rebecca sprinklers, Curly.’
I scoff and make a couple of incoherent ‘thinking’ sounds. ‘That’s not worth paying for,’ I eventually say with full confidence.
‘For you? Anything.’ The look in Rod’s eyes is all the closeness I need, with nothing but colourful intentions that I’d be happy to partake in.
The kids, for the record, are also eager to have the sprinklers at our disposal today.
We start them stretching and drilling, and Rod and Benny intentionally set up cones in the splash zone.
Our entire team laughs and hoots as they dance through the spray, rounding the cones to make a shot on goal.
Even the three of us get into it, and no one is spared.
Our camp shirts are plastered to our chests, hair totally drenched.
It really hammers home the bit about how much I wish I’d had a resource like this back home, mentors to guide me down a path that wasn’t full of resentment and anger.
I’d be more bitter about it, but after these past two-plus months, I don’t really have reason to any more.
This crazy summer job has given me so many things, and even though I didn’t get to have this as a kid, I’m getting it now, and in full force.
After lunch, it only gets hotter out, and when the public district turns the sprinklers off, we all gather around Rod’s phone to ‘please, please, please’ over the hotline until they switch them back on.
By pick-up time, everyone is even more soaked to the bone than they were on the water balloon day.
Parents thankfully find this as amusing as we did; I am pretty sure it helps that we look about as drenched as the kids.
‘Maybe we should call ’em and let them know they can turn it off now,’ Benny chuckles, his face buried in a towel. He ruffles his dark hair as he dries it off, and when the towel comes away, it looks like he’s got multiple antennae up there.
‘We must be testing the budget pretty hard,’ adds Rod with a wink.
He, naturally, drops his cleats off to the side of his bag and runs right back out to the field barefoot, arms wide so that the sprinklers can hit every inch of his body.
Benny’s not far behind him, towel totally abandoned, and soon the both of them are swinging their shirts over their heads and dancing around bare-chested.
Rod freezes, eyes on me, and grins cheekily, with a ‘come here’ of his hand that I initially wave away.
‘The budget!’ I shout.
‘Just get in here!’ he shouts back.
Suffice it to say, I can’t watch the water drip down Rod’s perfect pecs and abs and every other upper body muscle without feeling an invisible rope pull me to him.
You can’t blame the girl who ran away from this guy back in May for trying to rectify her mistakes, which is exactly what I’m out to do.
My sandals crunch in the short grass, and a laugh escapes me when I collide with Rod, his arms wrapped around my body, lifting my feet off the ground.
The sprinklers absolutely blast us, and I’m fully roaring with laughter as Rod grins up at me, sunny-eyed, messy-haired. I don’t want to come down.
It’s a familiar, curt voice that does bring me down, though. ‘Would you go ahead and dry off, Rodney?’
Rod puts me down, looking so guilty for something he absolutely didn’t do. ‘Sorry,’ he mouths. My left eye twitches before I can calculate a reaction. Telltale sign of the twister has hit the trailer park.
Charlotte looks more upset than she did on Saturday, if that’s even possible.
She’s still got her arms crossed, and instead of the sweater, she has on belted khaki slacks and a short-sleeved blouse.
‘I’d like to spend some time with you and your daughter,’ she says pointedly, with a cut of her eyes my way.
‘If you don’t mind freshening up while I go pick her up, that would be wonderful. ’
So is she here just because? Real peachy.
Benny and I both cough very awkwardly and in a suspicious synchrony, and decide to take our leave.
We slip out of the sprinkler zone and over to our duffel bags.
I feel like a real homewrecker, actually, even though I know I didn’t wreck any home.
This Charlotte has quite a way with words. The two of us exchange a pained look.
As Rod retreats behind us, Benny chucks him a towel by way of a slap to his ass. I try extremely hard not to snort. Charlotte flinches, even though the towel is nowhere close to her.
‘I’ll see you at six,’ Charlotte says in the most clipped tone known to mankind, turning on her heel. ‘Just the three of us, please,’ she calls behind her.
I’m Team Rod in this, ride or die, but this chick is really, really testing me. My stupid eye twitches again. It doesn’t stop till I’m back at Rebecca’s place.
‘Complicated, ain’t he?’ Rebecca offers over an iced tea. I’m starting to really love these iced teas. I didn’t care much for them when I moved to New England, but this itty-bitty town has made me a fan. Particularly because iced teas here seem to come coupled with gossip.
‘How’d you know?’ I slump over in my chair, exasperated.
‘Whole town knows. That’s sort of how things work around Whittaker.’ She smiles warmly and tops my tea off with a helping from her shiny glass pitcher, slick with condensation. ‘It’s fortunate when people need a little extra love, and unfortunate when people are afraid word’ll get out.’
I push ice cubes around in the frosted glass with my straw as Rebecca goes on. ‘For what it’s worth, you can tell from the way Charlotte comes and goes. That man’s needed another fighter in his corner for ages. You’ve got that spirit. You’re a brave one. You’ll be alright.’
I turn to the TV for a moment and pretend I am very keenly interested in watching I Love Lucy reruns, but I can only lie for so long. ‘Did they … they knew each other for a while, then?’
‘Before high school,’ confirms Rebecca. She stands up with her empty glass and heads over to the sink, talks as she washes.
‘They grew up a couple doors down from each other. The original Wilson house, belonging to Rod’s family, it was actually the house that Genny now lives in.
She bought all the surrounding land for her farm, but she kept the house.
If you take a left out of there and keep going a few minutes, you’ll find Charlotte and Declan’s. Small town magic.’
I nod matter-of-factly. Sounds a little too familiar. In my own town of Prosperity, everyone you could possibly care about is a few miles in either direction.
‘Rod and Char, the both of them were always swapping glances at the fair, always “running into” one another at the market. Even when he played ball, she’d watch him while she cheered. At least, that’s the lore. High-school sweethearts. Were supposed to go till the end.’
That’s a piece of information I probably shouldn’t have dug for. My throat feels dry.
‘Then college, and,’ she shrugs, ‘everything changed. As things tend to when you grow up. Adulthood can hit like a ton of bricks.’
Rebecca’s smile is tight. When I think about it, she probably remembers when all of this went down.
Like everybody else in Whittaker, she probably watched it happen from the front row.
‘Rodney, he took on a lot. You know it well enough. Parenting alone’s no easy task.
And yet he kept holding out hope, at least at first, that things would work out, that there was still some hope of “till the end” between them. ’
‘Oh,’ I manage. I definitely shouldn’t have dug. I feel less and less sure of myself with every next word, but Rebecca glances back at me in between dishes.
‘But if you ask me … she wasn’t the warrior he needed.’ Rebecca turns off the faucet. She returns to the table, and in a gesture as tender as one of my own mother’s, one that immediately makes my eyes go all watery, she pats my hand softly. Same way my mom does. ‘You, darling, certainly are.’