Chapter 5
Chapter Five
Mia
Iwore the Agate Harbors T-shirt like a badge of honor for the rest of the week.
The shirt didn’t even have a tag on the collar—it was one of those nice shirts that had the label printed onto the fabric.
My mom didn’t say anything, even though I wore that shirt day after day.
She and Dad were too busy enjoying their own vacation.
Which was fine. I was enjoying mine too.
It was Friday—the end of the magical vacation I looked forward to every year.
It was hard knowing it was coming to an end and that I would have to wait a whole year for it to come again.
The freedom I had for this one week was like jumping into the deep, cold part of the lake.
It had my entire body tingling. I felt alive. I didn’t want the week to end.
It was almost time to go back to the constant ridicule I was used to. I’d almost forgotten what it was like to be under a microscope, to have my hair forcibly brushed and to wear clothes I wasn’t comfortable in. A week up here did that to you, let you escape from reality.
I wasn’t the only one escaping. Mom and Dad had met their quota for the number of margaritas a person could drink in a single week, and I hadn’t seen Ruby much at all.
I already knew that tomorrow she’d sit next to me on the long car ride back to the Twin Cities with dark bags under her eyes and a smile on her face.
But it was still Friday for a little bit longer, and Friday meant fireworks.
It was an Agate Harbors weekly tradition.
I bet Bower was really missing his lighters this summer.
He loved a fireworks show, whether it was the one his grandparents set off every week or his smaller, maybe-less-than-legal display.
Bower was supposed to meet me at the beach at sunset—well, at the boardwalk on the beach.
There was no way I was going to walk on the sand with my socks and sandals.
The sun looked like a scoop of ice cream, melting into the horizon. With every moment that passed, the orange color melted into pinks and reds, so different from the dark lake beneath it. It’d soon be dark enough for the fireworks to start.
The view from here on the boardwalk was fine, but I knew Bower would want to watch the fireworks from the rocks we’d sat on last year, back when I’d been able to walk on the sand to get there.
They were the perfect viewing spot. But they were across the beach and up some rocks that he wouldn’t be able to piggyback me over.
“Hey,” Bower said behind me.
I turned, a smile automatically on my lips. “Hi.”
“Ready to go?”
When I nodded, Bower started walking across the sand.
I stood there watching him, sand flicking up every time he took a step in his flip-flops.
I was jealous. What it must be like to walk across the sand, not caring about the grains rubbing against your skin, making your teeth hurt.
I could only stand there like an idiot. At least I felt like an idiot.
Bower stopped and turned around once he realized I wasn’t following him. “Shit, I forgot.”
I was a little taken aback. He’d never sworn in front of me before.
“Give me a minute. I’ll be back, Mia.” Bower held his palms out in front of him, willing me to stay where I was.
A minute later, he came back out of breath like he’d been running, a pair of yellow rain boots in his hands. They were tall—adult-sized.
He held them out to me, and I took them in my hands. “So you don’t have to worry about the sand.”
My stomach did little somersaults inside my body. I didn’t know what to say to him. No one had come up with a solution like this for me before. It was like my quirks weren’t even a problem for him.
“They’re from the resort’s lost and found,” he said. “Don’t worry about ruining them.”
I gladly kicked off my sandals and pulled on the rain boots. They were hot for a summer night and way too big, but there was no way I’d ever complain. I could walk on the sand like everyone else now. How had I not thought of this before?
I left my sandals on the boardwalk for later and stepped into the sand. I sunk down a bit, the sand spilling over the tops of my feet, but it didn’t touch my skin. The rubber blocked all the sand, letting it tumble off with each step.
I followed Bower across the beach, enjoying the view of the lake now that I didn’t need to worry about the sand.
The sun had fully set, but there was still an orange glow around the horizon.
Bower’s grandpa had his motorboat tied to the small island out in the lake away from the beach.
I could see his silhouette unpacking boxes of fireworks.
Young kids ran around with sparklers in their hands, their mothers following behind them, warning them to be careful.
We got to the end of the beach where the sand turned into rocks, which turned into boulders, and Bower and I carefully climbed up.
He put his hands on the rocks to balance himself.
I was slower since I didn’t want to touch the rocks and the sand that would inevitably be on them.
It turned into a balancing act, my arms outstretched to counter my body.
Bower stopped at a flat rock among the boulders.
The rock was level and large enough for us to sit.
There were even a couple rocks behind that we could use as back rests as we watched the fireworks.
If I remembered right, this was the exact spot we’d watched the show last year—the fireworks would explode right in front of us.
I closed my eyes and took a deep breath.
I needed to commit this moment to memory.
The waves slapped against the rocks before withdrawing back into the lake.
The birds were singing their good-night songs.
I opened my eyes, taking another look around.
There were rock cairns built all around the sitting area—stacks of flat stones balanced on top of each other.
Some were tall with ten or more rocks, while others were built with just a few.
“Look what washed up,” Bower said. There was a pile of rocks near his feet, and he bent down to pick one up. He brought it over to me, holding it out in his hand. “An agate.”
I’d seen them in gift shops around here but never found one in person before. They were so popular with tourists and rock enthusiasts that you had to go far off the beaten path to find one in the wild. This one was yellow, with dark bands around it.
Bower took a minute to wipe it off with his shirt before he gave it to me. I took it in my hand and spun it around in my fingers. It was gorgeous. “There’s a whole bunch of them.” I motioned to the pile at his feet.
“Yeah, I started collecting them this spring after the snow melted,” Bower said. “Maybe I’ll sell them to guests or something.”
I walked over to one cairn and crouched down to admire the configuration. Every rock had to be picked specifically to balance the rock on top of it. “Did you build these too?” I asked.
“Yeah. I can’t usually find that many agates around here, so while I’m looking I like to build the cairns with the other rocks.”
I couldn’t stop the grin from growing on my face. The time it must have taken to build and balance the cairns. I was sure my mom wouldn’t believe he’d built them. Maybe not even his own grandma.
No one saw this side of Bower except for me.
“I want to build one,” I said.
Bower’s face lit up. “Sure! Let’s find a good base to start with.”
We searched around the boulders, looking for smaller rocks between them. Bower pulled a flat rock about the size of a dinner plate from between two boulders near the water. He set it down on one boulder near our firework-viewing spot. “Now we need to find rocks to balance on top of each other.”
I pointed to one near my feet. It was smaller than a dinner plate but still flat.
“Nice.” Bower picked it up and used his hands to brush off any sand that was on the surface.
He handed it to me. I walked over to the first rock and placed the rock in my hand on top of it.
We climbed around the boulders, finding smaller and smaller rocks to stack. I pointed, and Bower retrieved the rocks. He always brushed them off before handing them to me to stack.
It got harder to see as the sun fully set, but slowly my eyes adjusted as the sunlight dissipated and the moon took over, casting its soft light onto the earth.
In the end, we had a beautiful cairn about eight rocks high with a mix of brown and black stones.
Bower bent down to his pile of agates and studied them until he found one he liked.
He picked up a red one with lots of banding and took his time brushing any debris off the smooth surface.
When he handed it to me, it fit snuggly in the palm of my hand.
“For the top,” he said, motioning to my cairn.
I carefully placed the agate on top of the stack and stepped back a few paces to admire our creation. It looked steady, like it’d be here next year. Hopefully the wind or a wave wouldn’t knock it over and mess up what we’d built together.
It took me a minute to notice that Bower had gone quiet.
I looked over to where he stood next to me.
My face heated as soon as I realized he was staring at me.
I glanced just past him, pretending I was looking out onto the lake.
The waves were calm, and in the dark, the water seemed to stretch on forever.
I breathed through my nose, but the cool breeze blowing off the lake did nothing to cool my reddened cheeks.
I couldn’t stare out at the lake forever—I was acting weird enough as it was. The lake was pretty and all, but I’d never just stood and stared at it for this long…
This was starting to feel awkward when it shouldn’t. This was Bower—I knew him. I could look at him. I’d looked at him a million times this week.
After another moment, my ears buzzed with the much too quiet silence between us.
I glanced back over to see if he was still staring.
He was.
This time I didn’t look away; instead I watched his eyes as they darted around my face.
“Mia, I think—”
Pop! Pop!
Bower and I turned around to the lake just in time to see a red-and-yellow firework explode in the air over the water.
Bower grabbed my wrist and guided me back over to the flat rock with the backrests.
We sat there watching the fireworks. I pulled my legs in, wrapping my arms around my shins, staring at the sky.
It was funny how a place could feel like home even when it wasn’t. It hadn’t happened quickly, but over the course of the last several summers, Agate Harbors had begun to feel like home to me. I felt safe here. I could be myself without having to worry about hiding the awkward parts of me.
The grand finale of the fireworks show was loud and bright. We could hear his grandpa hoot and holler from the island when it was over, and everyone on the beach cheered before packing up their gear to head in for the night.
The moon’s glow cast just enough light that Bower and I didn’t need a flashlight to climb back to the beach.
I took one last look at my cairn and the little oasis Bower had built.
He was busy sifting through his agates, pocketing a few to bring back.
I plucked the red agate from the top of my cairn and tucked it into the side pocket of my shorts.
I sighed, my shoulders slumping. It was time to go back.
Bower offered his hand to me, and I took it, using him as leverage as I balanced over the rocks. By the time we reached the beach, it was already deserted.
I thumbed the agate in my pocket, making sure it was still there. Making sure I had a piece of Agate Harbors to take with me when I left.