She was stubborn and brave and childish enough to say—no. That over there? That’s not going to be my life.
Eric guessed right; I feel the same way now.
And maybe he’s just along for the ride this time. Maybe he’s only here because he feels sorry for me.
We’ll give Serra her gift, toast her. Get through Sunday with a minimum of embarrassment. Then say our goodbyes.
But that’s okay.
That younger Becc was no one to pity. Gratitude washes over me, to know that that person still exists. That she’s right here, right now.
53
Ents
Saturday, 9:38 a.m.
Thirty miles south of Fort Bragg, California
Lila Boone, the four-star-rated eBay seller who has the third panel, lives in a low brown prefab house near the water. The fancier properties are on the bluffs, but Lila is close enough to the ocean that salt has eaten into her paint job, speckling the brown siding with white so it resembles a cheetah print.
Her weedy driveway is narrow, a chute between two overgrown juniper hedges, but I back the car up without scratching it.
She opens the door in a baby blue sweat suit, a chocolate Yoplait in her hand.
“I’m sorry we’re a little late,” I say.
“Glad to finally unload the thing.” She sets her yogurt on her porch swing and leads Eric and me around the side of the house. “It’s out back, in the rathole.”
Rathole? Eric mouths, raising his eyebrows in mock alarm.
“She just means the garage is messy,” I say under my breath, stifling another yawn. I’m on zero sleep.
We follow her across the weedy yard, past a rusted-out Camaro, an empty aboveground pool.
“Are you okay?” Eric asks, touching my shoulder.
“Sure, why?”
“You’re limping a little.”
“Oh, these shoes aren’t the best.”
I’m wearing my most broken-in running shoes, so it’s not their fault. My all-night march in sandals last night gave me a silver-dollar-size blister on my right heel.
Lila leads us to a peeling woodshed against a chain-link fence. A handwritten sign on the door says The Dave Cave.
She unlocks the door. “My ex. David Ratskeller. Also known as Ratbastard.”
“Oh.” I follow her inside.
When my sleepy eyes adjust I take in a jumble of objects—a shaggy Nerf basketball net, a dartboard, a Maxwell House can full of golf balls on a dusty workbench, a white-and-green nylon lawn chair. On every wall, stuffed animals. Not the cuddly child’s kind. The killed-and-mounted kind—a stag head, a fish, a snake. What might be a possum; I don’t want to look too closely.
I’ve lured Eric to a house of horrors.
“It’s the storage shed from Silence of the Lambs,” he mutters.
Tired and sore and blistered as I am, I can’t stop smiling to myself.
“So was your ex the...art collector?” he asks Lila. Trying to sound chirpy.
“Collector. Ha!” Lila snorts. “He used to sit out here in that chair and stare at your friend’s taxidermy doohickey for hours while he smoked out. He named the damn things. Frigging pets.”
Serra’s taxidermy doohickey is against the back wall. Panel three is the one in which we’re just floating. Not swimming, and not drowning, either.
One side of the panel is concealed by junk, but what I can see is worse than I feared. The top filmed in yellow grime, much of the front vandalized by white Hi, My Name Is stickers. Glenn has been renamed Geek Boy #3. I’m The Secretary, I guess because of the notebook in my paw.
I work on a sticker corner with my fingernail, but a fuzzy white scar remains.
Maybe Serra would be better off not knowing what happened to her beautiful work. How this piece of her heart was bought by a man who only wanted to laugh at it.
Eric appears by my side and says of the white mark, “We’ll buy some Goo Gone. That stuff’ll clean anything. So what’s the plan here?”
We don’t have much clearance; the bottom corner closest to me is wedged against the wall behind a heavy wooden bench and the other end is half-buried under a jumble of camping gear.
I wish I’d packed work gloves. I wish Lila was offering to clear junk from our path instead of standing in the doorway, silently counting her cash.
“Can you lift it over that stuff?”
He checks it out. “I think so, yeah.”
“Okay, you grab that end and when we’ve got it up, come toward me. I’ll pivot toward the door. Then we’ll set it down there and...regroup. So you can pick it up from the base and get a better grip.” I point with my leg to show Eric how we’ll rest the panel on the ground, perpendicular to its current position, then prep for the trip out the door.
“Regrouping station noted. We’ll regroup and regrip. Roger.”
“Lift on three?” I say. “One, two, three.”
We work together. I’m monitoring Eric’s strained face and he’s focused on mine.
The panel is two feet off the ground and our spines haven’t snapped, then it’s up to three feet. Four. We’re killing it; we could get jobs as professional movers.
We only have to raise it a few more inches so I can swing my end over the bench. No problem. All is well.
Our eyes are locked together, our smallest muscles connected. We couldn’t look away if we wanted to. And for a second, as we study each other, his expression says exactly what I’m thinking—this isn’t so hard.
Our bodies are in sync. We will deliver the gift. Have a good time with Serra. Part as friends.
Except.
Except it’s dark in the shed, and Eric’s hands are a bead too sweaty. In my elation or exhaustion I made an error calculating my angles, and tokin’, taxidermy-mad Dave left behind what feels, in the panicked second when my foot makes contact, like a Slip ’N Slide slicked with medical-grade lube and hidden in the shadows purely to sabotage my entire life’s happiness, but which I learn later is only a scrap of Hefty bag.
I slip.
A stab in the back of my thigh as I slam into a corner of the bench, a kidney punch as the piece hits my stomach. But I hold on. There’s a second where we can still recover.
I hear Eric’s oh, shit, the sickening crack of Plexiglas on concrete, but I don’t see him go down.
1:00 p.m.
Of the three accident survivors—me, the panel, Eric—I suffered the least damage. The back of my left thigh is tender, and there’s an interesting star-shaped welt below my belly button.
Panel three’s bottom-right corner chipped off, and it suffered a hairline fracture up the side.
Eric, in sandals, yanked off balance in his cluttered corner of the Dave Cave, stepped into the maw of a manual lawn mower. His foot is mercifully intact but his big toe is gashed from tip to web. He’s soaked Lila’s dish towel scarlet. His second toe juts straight out, like his foot is making a peace sign.
Lila, to her credit, became attentive as a candy striper after our fall. She draped Eric’s arm over her shoulder and escorted him to the convertible, ran for clean rags and ice. Helped me cram our bags in the tiny trunk so we could shove the panel into the back seat. She insisted on giving me back some cash, tossing me a handful of twenties for our trouble. “You deserve some shots after that,” she called.
Meaning whiskey, not tetanus, although the lawn mower blades were so rusty Eric should probably get a booster, too.
At Fort Bragg Emergency Services, Eric got seven stitches and a metal splint on his right toes. He has to wear an ugly blue Velcro boot.
My travel wardrobe, on the other hand, has been pared down.
I have my purse. I have my phone and driver’s license. What I don’t have is the floaty, bias-cut cerulean slip dress I planned to wear to the wedding. Or my wrapping paper for the weddin
g gift. Or even a change of underwear.
Lila left me a voice mail. “I guess this isn’t exactly going to make your day,” she said.
She found my suitcase by her juniper hedge. My World’s Litest Carry-On! in the Fresh Pine color option.
Green on green, and we were rushing, focused on freeing space in the back of the convertible for panel three and getting Eric’s foot looked at, so we forgot to throw it back in the car. Lila said I can pick it up or she’ll ship it, whatever I want. And she hopes we’re not too banged up.
Eric’s asleep, his left leg on the dash and his right stuck out the window. It’s not safe like that; if the airbag deploys he’s toast.
So I’m driving carefully, under the speed limit. We’re tracing the left edge of the continent, so near the water I can see white stripes of foam on the waves, a rocky island covered in a satiny, wiggling brown carpet of sea lions.
But the beauty of the scenery is lost on me; I want only to get to the wedding hotel. A few more hours of highway until I can eat, sleep. Buy a passable dress for tomorrow morning’s ceremony. Regroup.
My new trip motto: We can still regroup!
I’ve never been this far north, so close to Oregon. I imagine we’re flanked by a fairy-tale landscape. Giant mossy trees emerging from a sea of mist. Maybe those prehistoric redwoods are like the Ents, the kindly tree creatures in The Lord of the Rings. Maybe they’re on my side, helping me on my quest.
Imagining Ents, I drift over the median.
Pop-pop-pop-pop. Heart hammering, jerked alert because the rumble strip sounds exactly like pistol shots, I overcorrect into the shoulder and swerve back into my lane.
Screw the Ents. I’ll blast the AC on my face to wake up.
It’s fine. We’re fine. Regroup and regrip, Becc.
But Eric stirs. “What was that?”
“How’s your foot?” I try to sound peppy, like my Colossal Quad espresso from the drive-through Java Hut thirty miles ago had any effect and I didn’t almost crash us.
He grabs the box to pull himself up so he can examine me. “I think you need to rest. You look sort of...wild.”
“I’m fine. Don’t hurt yourself.”
“How much sleep did you get last night? Tell the truth.”
“Oh. Not my best sleep, but—”
“Becc. Give it up. Let’s find a rest stop or something so you can take a nap.”
54
360 Degrees
Saturday, 1:20 p.m.
I pull under the carport of Whistlin’ Pete’s Log Cabinettes: dark wooden boxes behind a cinder-block office and restaurant. There are signs in the window: KENO! and Kids Love Our World-Famous 360-Degree Log Run Play Table!! A plastic lumberjack guards the front.
It’s not the Sea Whisper. But I’ll take anything. A quick power nap and then we’ll hit the road again.
The glass door is locked, but there’s a button on the lumberjack’s ax, and a placard: If Door Locked, Please Ring for Service. I buzz but the only answer is the rip-crackle of Eric adjusting his Velcro boot.
I peer in. “The restaurant’s closed. They must be on their break.”
Eric buzzes longer. “But it said Vacancy. And they have to be here for emergencies or ice or whatever, if people are staying in the cabins.”
A woman emerges from the shadows in the back of the lobby and peeks out at us. She’s tall and gray, seventyish, rubbing cream into her hands.
“We’d like a cabin, please!” Eric shouts through the glass.
“We’re full up!”
“But it says Vacancy by the highway!” he yells.
“It’s on the fritz. Sorry, hon.”
She turns away but Eric knocks on the glass and she comes back.
“Is there any way you could let us rest in there?” He points at the ripped brown sofa behind her, next to the brochure rack. “Just for an hour? We’ll pay your room rate!” Eric shuffles wearily on his crutch to show how desperate we are. He leans against the lumberjack as if he can’t take another step.
“Laying it on a bit thick,” I mutter, yawning.
“Ma’am?” he says. “We’d really appreciate it. I can’t drive and she’s so tired she nearly fell asleep at the wheel just now.”
The woman approaches the glass, narrowing her eyes at Eric. His hair is sticking up at the crown and it could use a wash. She must think it’s a scam, complete with a faux injury to tug at her heartstrings. That we’ll break into her cash drawer and vanish when her back’s turned.
“Let me try,” I whisper to Eric and step forward. “I know it’s a weird request, but the thing is... I’m sorry, we forgot to ask your name.”
“Crystal.”
“Crystal, we’ve been on the road all day, and my friend’s hurt. What would it take to get us on that couch? We’ll pay you more than the room rate, even. And you can hold on to our credit cards if you want. Whatever would make you more comfortable. It would be...” Against all common sense? “It would be a great kindness.”
“Well, I don’t know,” she says.
“Please.” My voice breaks. I want this now. I’ve dragged Eric on this trip and thrown a pastry at him, busted his foot and nearly driven him off the road. An hour on a Naugahyde couch may not undo it, but it’s right there, and I need this one thing to go my way. “I promise we’re not con artists. I realize it’s a lot to ask, and you have absolutely no logical reason to say yes. But I’m asking.”
Crystal’s face softens. She unlocks the door and opens it a few inches. “I just can’t have you two napping in the lobby, hon. That won’t do.”
Damn.
Damn Whistlin’ Pete, whoever he is, and damn whoever sold David Ratskeller the MowStriderDeluxe that ate Eric’s foot.
“Well. We do have one cabin where the roof caved in last January. Big Doug fir limb broke off in the windstorm, so—”
“That’s perfect!” I cry.
“That’s fine!” Eric says.
“We’re using it for storage. Toilet’s working but the shower’s busted, and—”
“We don’t care! We love you!” I mean to say, We’d love it!
Though I do love her in this moment. I love her tattooed-on eyebrows and her smell of Pond’s Cold Cream. I love her lumberjack statue, with his dapper red plaid shirt rolled up to his plastic biceps and his muttonchop sideburns.
“I’ll get your key.”
* * *
Cabinette Eight, deep in the shade of the fir trees, is an icebox. Our bathroom roof is a blue plastic tarp, and the floor is crammed with random motel gear: restaurant sandwich boards, a tetherball pole in a concrete-filled tire, a life-size plastic figurine of a female lumberjack (two ponytails, skimpy denim shorts, suspenders; I have many questions but now’s not the time).
But the room has a working fireplace, and I’ve backed the car into a spot right outside the window so we can keep an eye on the gift.
Crystal drops off sheets and velour blankets, a Duraflame log, matches, and newspaper. She sets a tray of food on the TV. Biscuits, butter and jelly packets, two cafeteria milks.
“Sorry, they’re stale,” she says, though we’re eyeing the gold-and-white rounds with unmasked desire.
I open my purse. “How much do we owe you?”
“Well. You can buy a meal here later, if you like.”
“Thank you, Crystal.”
As soon as she leaves I slide open the chain-mail fireplace curtain and get a good blaze going. We sit on the twin bed closest to the fire and devour our biscuits. Three apiece, slathered with all the butter and jelly we can scrape from the tiny plastic tubs. We drain our milks in one gulp.
Eric flattens his milk carton. “Hey. You were pretty great. What would it take to get us on that couch?”
“I sounded like a car salesman. What would it take to get you in that S-S
eries?”
“Nah. You were...”
“What?” I inspect the tray between us. Press my finger on the biscuit crumbs, collecting them.
“You were always good with new people. You’re interested in them, and they sense it.”
“That’s... Thank you. You were pretty great, too. You really worked the crutch.” I glance up at him, a corner of my mouth curled in a wry smile.
He looks pleased. “That’s like winning an Oscar for...” a yawn overtakes him, his eyes closing completely until it’s over “...for a crying scene where you used menthol.”
His yawn is infectious and I answer with one of my own, my mouth stretching wide, like I’m singing an aria. “You should nap close to the fire so you don’t go into shock.”
“It’s seven stitches, Becc, I think I’ll survive.”
But I’m already sliding the mattress off the other bed. “Please. It’ll make me feel less guilty. About your foot.”
“Let me help.” Eric tosses his crutch on the floor and thumps over in the lurching, uneven gait he’s adopted because of the boot. He grabs the bottom of the mattress and we hoist it, turn it on its side.
“Careful, this maneuver didn’t end well last time.”
“Now we have experience.” He smiles at me from the other end of the mattress. “You got it?”
“Got it.” I try to focus on our task, but his lower lip is shiny from butter. And his brown eyes are steady on mine, his face tense, concentrating. Like that afternoon at the Cielo-del-mar. Back then he’d been above me, holding himself up on the narrow bed in the sun. Both of us aching to remove the last thin barriers between us.
I know it’s impossible now. My mind must have become porous from lack of sleep, to have let these images in.
“Still doing okay?” he asks. “We don’t need two injuries.”
“I’m fine.”
The room’s crowded with junk, but we move the mattress without anyone biting it, shove it next to the stone hearth.
We sit together on my bed, looking down at his.
Summer Hours Page 30
