Chapter 6 #2
The creak of the screen door had both of us turning to see Bower stumble through the door into the cabin. The door slapped against the outside wall before slamming closed behind him. Dirt covered his legs up to his knees. His hands and wrists were equally as filthy.
He scanned the room as if he was searching for something—until his eyes landed on me.
“Mia.” His voice was several octaves lower than it had been last year. He looked different too. He was taller and had filled out with muscle. A slight shadow of brown facial hair covered his chin and cheeks.
My heart began to beat faster, and my palms started to sweat. Nerves danced along my limbs. I’d never felt like this around him.
“Oh, Bower! Don’t track dirt into this house. Go wash off!” Betty shooed him out of the cabin, and I heard the hose turn on outside.
I stood up with the Popsicle in my hand and peered out the screen door of the cabin, watching Bower grumble as he hosed himself off.
“I think Bower has some fun plans for you this week,” Betty called out from the kitchen. “You’re going to the crayfish contest again, right?”
I nodded, unable to stop myself from staring through the screen again at Bower. He was bent over, letting the hose water run over the top of his head. He flipped his head back up, smoothing the wet hair over the top of his head with his hand.
“Good. You can’t let anyone take that winning streak away from you!”
Bower finished up and walked back toward the cabin to turn off the hose. I scurried back to the table, sitting in a chair with my back to the door.
His voice met my ears. “So, don’t be mad, Grandma…”
I froze, the Popsicle halfway out of my mouth.
Bower stopped in the doorway, his eyes widening as he saw me sitting in his kitchen. He paused at the Popsicle I had my lips wrapped around before his gaze went lower, stopping at my feet—at my sandals. His eyes narrowed, and his mouth sunk into a frown.
Betty’s sigh brought Bower’s eyes away from my shoes.
“Dean and I had some trouble with the boat today.” He walked past me toward his grandma, still dripping from the hose he’d sprayed off with.
I slowly slouched down in my chair.
“What happened now, Bower? Don’t tell me the sheriff’s involved again.” Betty stopped what she’d been busying herself with in the kitchen to turn to him.
“No, no, nothing like that. We just kind of…sank it.”
“You did what? How’s that even possible?” She put up a hand. “Wait. Don’t tell me it was your grandpa’s motorboat.”
Bower combed his fingers through his wet hair, looking at the ground before he looked back up at Betty. “So, Dean had this rifle—”
“What in the hell were you boys doing with a rifle?”
My body hunched even further, the wooden Popsicle stick clenched between my fingers.
“It’s Dean’s mom’s new boyfriend’s hunting rifle,” Bower explained.
“And well, it went off in the boat and the bullet put a hole in the hull. We tried to drive it back, but it filled up with water right before we got it back to the dock.” He ran his hand through his wet hair again.
“It’s underwater just outside of the marina. ”
That explained the mud and dirt he’d showed up in. He and Dean had probably swum from the boat into the marina, then walked through the muck to get to shore. Was I getting a glimpse of the Bower everyone gossiped about but I’d never seen?
“How does a rifle ‘go off’ in a boat?” Betty’s face was red, her eyes shooting lasers toward her grandson. “Answer me that, Bower.” Even I could feel the heat coming off her.
He looked down at the floor. “We thought we could shoot fish from the boat.”
“You’re something special, Bower.” She shook her head and began feverishly wiping the counter clean with a rag. “You’re lucky Mia’s here and I want her to have an enjoyable week.”
They both glanced at me, and I tried to sink even deeper in my chair. If I got any lower, I’d be on the floor.
“If she wasn’t here, you’d be attached to my hip for the rest of the summer,” Betty continued.
“You know what? After this week, you will be. You’re going to be my personal assistant for the rest of the summer.
Screaming children at Kids Camp? You’re dealing with them.
Five-a.m. doughnut pickup on Sunday morning? You’re on it.”
Bower groaned, looking down at the floor.
“You’ve shown me you need supervision, Bower, so that’s what you’re going to get.” She opened a few cabinets in the kitchen just to slam them closed. “Mia, get him out of here before Gill gets here.”
I pulled myself up out of the chair and threw my Popsicle stick away before hurrying toward the doorway.
Bypassing Bower, I opened the screen door and exited the cabin.
The door didn’t slap closed behind me, so I knew he was following.
Even as I walked further away from the cabin, I could hear pots slamming and the odd curse word coming from Betty.
I turned around once we were a decent distance away from his cabin.
Bower still had his eyes on the ground, every so many steps launching a rock off the trail with the toe of his shoe. “The boat was old,” he grumbled. “It was an accident. No one got hurt. It isn’t that big of a deal.”
I held back my opinions on shooting a rifle on a boat. It seemed unnecessarily dangerous—but I didn’t want to sound like his grandmother.
He’d always been happy when I showed up each year. This grumpy Bower wasn’t who I was used to seeing.
I didn’t like it.
We only had a week together, and I didn’t want to waste a minute of it.
I cleared my throat. “I guess you’re lucky I’m here, huh?” My breath caught in my chest as I waited for a response.
It took a second, but he looked up and smiled at me. There was the Bower I knew.
I couldn’t help but smile back. Over the course of the last year, he’d grown into someone my friends back home would call “cute.” I’d grown too, a little taller and in other ways… I wondered if he thought his friends would think I was cute too.
“I want to forget about earlier. Let’s go fishing.” Bower nodded toward the beach.
“With what boat?” I asked.
He rolled his eyes at me. “One that isn’t at the bottom of the marina.”
I held back a laugh, turning before I saw his reaction to walk toward the beach, where I knew he kept a canoe packed and ready to go.
“Hold on a sec,” Bower called out.
I turned around, watching him jog back up to the lodge. He was headed back into fire—Betty was still in there.
I curled my toes in my sandals, waiting.
A minute later, he emerged with yellow rain boots.
He remembered.
Grabbing the boots from his hands, I kicked one of my Birkenstocks into a nearby bush, pulling the rubber over my socked foot.
They were still several sizes too big. Balancing on my now booted foot, I kicked off my other Birkenstock.
Bower’s hand latched onto my elbow, instantly balancing me.
My socked foot slid easily into the boot, and I stood on two feet, unafraid of what lay beneath my soles.