by Scott, Eliot
I’d just kept on smiling at my Father, not caring about anything Grady was saying. For the first time ever, Father had just smiled back at me. He never does that. It was like my silence made him proud of something. He’d even defended me against Grady. He'd said the lands he'd given me suited my future and my duties to the family perfectly, just how Grady's suited his, and then he shut my brother right up.
I figure now that I'm growing up, I should stop wishing for a different family, a different father like how I used to do. Because of this gift, I mean to try to understand Father a little bit better, just how obviously Father is trying to do the same by me. Because why else would he have given me this perfect lake?
As I round the final switchback, I hear the splashing start up again.
I pause to listen and realize it's not the rhythmic sound of a fly fisherman tromping around and then pausing to cast, nor is it a swimming sound like I'd thought I would hear if someone were trespassing there to swim.
This splashing is wild—erratic even. Which means it's possible the person messing up my water and freaking out my fish isn't a person at all.
It’s got to be a bear.
The thought of a bear being this close makes my heart pound and my throat go dry with anxiety because we don’t just have black bears around here, we have grizzlies.
The salmon are also running right now. This lake connects to wetlands on the far side, and it’s fed by a big river that pours out into it on one side then travels out to the sound and connects to three other tributaries that also head into the ocean. It’s a perfect place for salmon to breed and lay eggs as well as for all kinds of animals to hang around.
I prepare myself to face something big. Maybe it’s not a bear, maybe just a moose—still an animal that can kill someone, but usually they’re more dangerous in the spring…
Just in case, I set my fishing rods, hang up my backpack full of lunch, water bottles, and a pile of books (ones I regretted bringing at about the four-mile mark) high up on a broken branch while I listen again.
The splashing sound repeats, followed by a noticeable pause. It's definitely something running in the shallows.
Splashes sound again, sporadic, loud enough to startle birds nesting in the trees above.
The sound moves a bit away from me, and I grow frustrated because there is no way to tell without looking. Hoping it will be focused on the lake, and not consider me any sort of food source—and because I can't resist watching a bear catch fish—I inch around to drop down behind some scrub bushes.
My eyes follow the line of the lakeshore. I track wide water arcs that seem to be going off to the right and the left as something bends and ducks fast toward the surface of the water.
I'm completely disoriented when my gaze trips, then locks on these flashes of dark brown hair, flashes of blue denim shorts and gangly limbs all wrapped up in what sounds like peals of happy laughter.
"Got you. Yes!”
The dripping wet creature has just hand-plucked a squirming salmon out of the shallows. Without a blink she tosses it up onto the beach next to three others as though she does this all the time.
It's—she's—a girl!
A girl who looks to be about my same age, too. She can't be from around here because our town has only one school that includes elementary through high school, and I've never seen her before.
I would—anyone would—remember this girl. That's because even in cut-off shorts, pigtails, and thoroughly covered in mud, she's the most beautiful girl I've ever seen.
When she spots me staring, she's startled—I can sense it, but her calm and open expression is exactly the opposite of the awkward, galloping horses that have invaded my heart.
“Oh. Hi!” She turns and takes two steps in my direction, and I notice she's barefoot.
Because I'm on this huge Lord of the Rings reading-binge, I get this crazy sensation that she and I are from opposite worlds. In fact, her willowy limbs, and wild, dirty brown hair tinged with red, as well as her wise, blue-eyed gaze make her a dead match for the Elfin people of Rivendell. Seriously, it’s like she fell out of the exact pages I'd read last night.
Surely only elves can run barefoot over sharp stones to catch impossible-to-catch fish with their bare hands, right?
Only...no.
I shake my head to clear it from that silly idea and really look at her.
This girl, she’s dressed her ultra pale skin in layers of—well—sunburn and dirt. On closer inspection her cheeks are too red, and she's also not wearing any sort of gossamer gown. She's got clothes so tattered not even the thrift store would take them. Her hair isn't bone straight, either. It's braided, but I can see these escaping curls springing all around her freckled cheeks. Elves are not brunettes.
The girl smiles oddly like she was somehow expecting me.
When I don't smile back, she raises one of her perfectly arched, yet very mud-encrusted brows, as though she, too, wonders who and what I'm supposed to be. In a voice that's half question half laughter like she finds me amusing, she asks, “I’m here for a little adventure. Fishing. You know?”
I feel like I've been punched. My legs start to shake. She tilts her head to the side and next asks the question that confirms I’ve just met the girl of my dreams. "Don't you like fishing?" she asks me.
I work to close my mouth, suddenly annoyed with myself.
More unexplainably, I'm annoyed with her. Before I can think, I blurt out, "Haven't you been taught not to talk to strangers? It's dangerous. I don't even know you."
"Yeah, but strangers aren't usually skinny kids, are they?" Her comeback is so fast. She tosses her long braids behind her, and my eyes are caught on how the wet tips of them are now dripping against where her waist curves in at her lower back. "Besides, I could totally take you out, or outrun you if you turned out to be dangerous."
She laughs, and for the second time I get the sensation she finds me strange and entertaining, which only makes me more annoyed, because she's the one who's strange and entertaining—not me!
"I'm not a kid. I'm fourteen. A freshman—starting high school in August.” I pull myself up, hoping she notices how tall I am.
"Oh. Like me." She blinks, staring at me as hard as I'm staring at her.
"You look like a baby.” I sneer this time. She’s nothing like me.
“I do not. You’re really rude.”
I straighten my back more, and work to flex some muscles. “Well, you called me a skinny kid when I’m not. I’m also always first on my cross country team, so there is no way you could outrun me."
"You’re on a running team?“ She walks the rest of the way out of the lake so she's standing next to me and scrunches her face and looks me up and down like she's assessing me—my legs—to see if it’s true that I can run fast.
"Maybe we can race sometime? I run everywhere. And I think I'm fast, but maybe I'm not—you know—team fast. I'd love to find out. I'm hoping to join the cross country team next year, too—or maybe the track team.”
“That’s in the spring. Cross country is first,” I say, feeling all wise.
“Oh. My father and I think it would be cool if I could get all the way to the Olympics."
I try not to stare back at her long, perfectly shaped legs, but suddenly I can't seem to take my eyes off of them, because like her, they're so very well...designed. As well as covered in mud. And, hell yeah, a lot of people brag about speed, but I don't think she's doing that. She simply does look like she'd be really, really fast.
She shrugs and crosses her arms when I don't answer again, the movement releasing my gaze so it travels back up to her smiling face where I note the bridge of her nose and the tops of her cheeks are bright with a light sprinkling of freckles.
"Running and fishing are my top-two most favorite things.”
I can’t answer her. I can only stare and wish the lake would pull me into the water and save me from sucking at talking to a girl.
“I’m Jojo. Nice to meet
you.” She leans toward me, her expression extra encouraging like she can tell she's turned me into a stuttering fool. “This is the part where you say your name. Then, how about you tell me two of your most favorite things like I just did, and then we won't be strangers anymore. Okay?”
"Okay." I parrot, liking how this amazing girl seems to have on no makeup under all of that mud—or a bra, I’m pretty sure. Either way, I’m not going to stare in that direction again because I’m already so mind blown here. But my eyes keep wanting to dart there—to her wet chest.
She seems not one bit self-conscious compared to me. Nor does she seem to care where the mud is sticking to her, either. I’m also kind of impressed that not one of those usual girly comments about her “hair being wet” and “OMG, so messed up” has dropped from her wide, bow-shaped lips. And she isn’t concerned with the flopping-dying salmon she's thrown on the bank next to us.
She’s just ankle deep in water and talking to me as though this is the most normal conversation in the world—which means she just might be the coolest girl in the world, right?
I force my head together and try to just be myself. Be like her.
Be…cool. Be cool.
"I'm Alex. More than anything, uh…my top two favorite things are, uh…I love fishing. And books. I mean, reading.” I blink, trying again. “Fishing and reading are my two most favorite things. Yeah.” I shrug. “Look. I’ll prove it.”
She waits while I turn and trudge back to retrieve my backpack and my fishing rods from where I’d stashed them.
I pull out my lunch first, then lay out the rods next to my books and suddenly, feeling like I may have just shown her too much, I say lamely, “See?”
My eyes feel heavy with sudden embarrassment over my show-and-tell. I’m so lame.
“Wow. Cool. Nice rods. I don’t have one. Someday…” Her eyes are glued to my fishing poles, and I feel instantly renewed. I’m not so lame.
“It's why I've come up here. To…you know. Fish and read.”
“And have lunch.” She’s now eyeing my bag with great interest.
“Yes. And nice to meet you, too." I hesitate, testing the sound of her name inside my head first, before adding, "Jojo."
"Back at ya, Alex." She winks like she's testing out my name as well and my heart flips upside down as that smile of hers comes out again.
"Will you teach me how you catch fish with your hands?" I ask as I feel my smile widening to match hers.
"It's not easy." She shakes her head. "Could take all summer. Besides, it's my family's sworn-secret method. I’d never betray my family…so…I don’t know if I’m allowed.”
"I have infinite patience, and I'll promise never to tell or teach anyone else your family secrets. I swear.” I smirk through my words. I’m pretty sure we’re flirting. I like this.
She's chewing her lip, looking me up and down. "I’ll consider it, but only if you…share that lunch and…” She pauses to eye my books. “Teach me how to read?"
"You don't know how to read?" I gasp a little with surprise. I can see her wince, and I try to tone down my reaction. “How can that be?”
“I can…just not well. Not fast.” Her smile fades, and I feel guilty about it because I know my shocked reaction stole it away. "I can do Algebra equations all day long. But reading? Any sentence over three words and I'm stuck. If I try to go fast, or remember what I’ve read, everything falls out of my mind; nothing sticks. I don’t get to hang out with other kids much and my mom taught me. Homeschooled me, I mean. I thought, maybe you could show me how you do it? Give me your tips and tricks and stuff. I’ve got this thing—dyslexia is what my dad calls it. I just say I’m stupid, but I’m always trying to be better at it.”
Suddenly, all I want to do is be this girl’s hero, erase her doubt and bring the light back into her eyes—that smile. Please bring back that smile. “It’s obvious you aren’t stupid.”
“It is?” One of her arched brows shoots up. I hate that she thinks this about herself.
“Yeah. People just learn at different speeds. Like, I'm behind in math compared to others. I’m only in pre-algebra, but it will all balance out."
“I'm starting at West Tacoma High School, so I’m worried it will make me not fit in. I toured it last week. Seems really cool, but really huge."
"You'll be a freshman? At West Tacoma? West Tacoma High School?” I blink at her, dumbfounded. “West. Tacoma. High. School?” I blink again.
She nods at me, her expression shifting and I get it—she thinks I’m an idiot to repeat what she’s just said so many times, but like—how could I not know this? Know her? Our town is small and everyone would have been buzzing about this girl had they seen her, Grady especially, because she’s interesting and beautiful and…
“You got a problem with that? Is it not cool there? Is it, like…a trouble school?” She interrupts my scattered thoughts.
“Oh—no, it’s very cool. It’s just like…so will I…I’ll also be—be a freshman,” I stutter out, rattled as hell now. “This—that is—you know—so—cool to know you will be, too. And, I mean. Nice to meet you.”
“Oh. Um. Okay.” She laughs then. For sure she’s laughing at me but I don’t even care when she adds, “And look at us, not even strangers all of a sudden.”
“Friends already.” I laugh at myself along with her. My skin feels hot, and I suddenly don’t know what to do with my hands or feet. I’m not even sure I have feet.
“Well you never answered about sharing your lunch and…reading and…”
“Yes. Of course. I will. Of course.”
“I’d like that. Very much.” Her grin is wide and beautiful and real.
Damn…is this what love feels like? I think it, breathing out this sigh of breath I’d been holding this whole time. I'd had this idea that maybe she was a summer tourist and only here for the weekend or something, but she’s going to my high school.
Better, if she is going to West, and is standing here, then she must live nearby, as in close enough to walk to…often. This means she will be on my bus and everyone will wonder how it is I already know the beautiful new girl. I wonder if it's too soon to ask her to every single dance, and to be my girlfriend for the next four years, and hell…maybe she can just go ahead and marry me.
A girl who catches salmon with her bare hands and loves being covered in mud is the kind of girl I want to keep.
"Don't worry about the reading. I tutor kids at the elementary school, and I know all kinds of tricks that might help. If you're allowed to meet me here at the lake sometimes, I'll bring some books that might help you. How hard could it be to teach someone to read?"
"Very. You have no idea.” She frowns again. “I’m sort of broken. Very broken.”
I shrug. “All we can do is try. We'll start today with what I’ve got here, and I’ll bring books you might like next time. I'll bet you'll be reading ultra-fast before I ever land one fish with my bare hands how you just did.” She blinks at me then and makes this face as though she might still not want to show me how she catches the fish.
“Do we have a deal?” I press her.
“Yeah. Okay. What’s in the lunch bag?” She nods at it.
“Turkey and cheddar.”
I want to pat myself on my back, because I’m pretty sure I’ve just asked this girl on a date. Hell, she and I are sharing my lunch. We might just already be on our first date. Kind of. Sort of. Is it a date if God and the universe and your favorite lake hands the girl over to you out of nowhere? Is this girl part of my best birthday present ever?
I almost laugh at that as I hand her half of the giant baguette sandwich the cook handed to me on my way out the door.
She pushes back her heavy mop of now half-dried brunette curls and grins at me like I’m the best person in the whole world for sharing the sandwich. She takes a bite and talks with her mouth full as she cries out, “Yum. Best sandwich ever!” Then, “You got any desert in that bag?”
“Heck yes, I do. Fr
esh baked brownies.”
“Wow. You’re the best friend anyone could find.” She talks with a full mouth, and I’m in love.
I reach in and break the giant packed brownie in half and hand it to her. “Back at you,” I grin.
Just when I thought it was impossible, she smiles even wider.
As she chews the brownie down, making little mmm…mmm sounds while she’s swallowing it, my heart flips upside down so many times I think I’m having a heart attack.
And when we’re both done eating and she and I are standing in the lake, trying to land trout with our hands, I quickly change the order of my list of favorite things:
Fishing and Jojo's wide-eyed smiling face have the top two spots now.
Reading has moved to number three.
Forever.
6.
JoJo, present day.
During the funeral, I caught glares from everyone. From May, of course, but considering our greeting in the parking lot—the years I dated Alex—that was to be expected. What I didn’t expect from her were the soft moments, the few times I caught her staring at me like I was a puzzle. It was almost as if she’d been expecting me to look one way, and maybe I was different…or the same.
The looks from Grady, Alex’s brother, also were no surprise. His carried the most heat, the most hate—the most hunger.
I didn’t need to talk to him to see the boy who was awful had obviously turned into a man who was awful. I shudder, thinking his father would have been so proud at how he turned out.
I waited for Alex to look, willed him to turn to face me, knowing he could feel me watching. But he never looked. Not once. His will is stronger than I had expected. Or maybe it’s just as it should be.
As we filed forward to leave a rose placed on a silver tray on top of the closed casket, Grady even went so far as to blow a kiss my direction. Everyone heard the cackle under his breath. When I blew one back, he frowned, and all but ran back to his seat to face the parade of speakers all set to talk about what a wonderful man his father was—a gift to greater Tacoma.
