by Robyn Carr
“Sure, I’ll take you out on it,” Cooper said.
“What else will we do?” he asked, looking completely unimpressed.
“Well, we can take the Rhino into town. I can show you how to paddleboard. We can fish off the dock. We’ll find stuff to do.” Cooper felt as if he was drowning—this was not going to be easy.
Then Austin pointed at the toy hauler and asked, “Is that where we’re staying?”
“Well, it can be. Or, if you’re more comfortable in the bait shop, there’s a very small apartment upstairs—big enough for you and your dad.”
“Bait shop?” he asked.
“It used to be a bait shop with a bar in it and now it’s a bar without any bait. Let’s take a look at the RV first.” Inside, Cooper’s heart sank a little bit. He didn’t have anything good enough for a son and he felt unprepared and a little like an underachiever.
They grabbed the luggage and headed over to the RV. Cooper opened the door of the toy hauler and let Austin step in first, followed by Spencer.
Austin stood in the middle of the living room and turned full circle, looking around, taking it in. Cooper was prepared for him to say something about it being a trailer, which it was. Then he turned to Cooper with bright eyes and said, “This is awesome!”
*
The weekend went better than Cooper had dared hope. The weather cooperated and they spent a lot of time on the water. Despite sunscreen, Austin got himself a little color. The toy hauler was full of sand from all his running in and out and so was the bar. Cooper’s upstairs apartment was like an indoor beach. They were going to have to revisit foot wiping. Austin not only loved the Jet Ski, but also bonded with Hamlet, who spent a lot of time at the bar over the weekend. Austin got to drive the Rhino across the beach with Landon as co-pilot. At night, they had a fire on the beach and roasted marshmallows.
“I don’t know if I can compete with this,” Spencer said.
“I didn’t think I could compete with ten years of history so let’s go ahead and write up a noncompete clause,” Cooper said, only half-serious.
Cooper hadn’t even considered the importance of having fun himself—he felt a huge responsibility to give fun. But, in the end, the weekend was satisfying. Spencer took off on his own a couple of times, exploring the general area, leaving Cooper and Austin on their own.
Once the weekend was done and he was back on his own, Cooper settled in to do the thing he’d been working up to. Knowing his parents were early risers, he phoned them early Tuesday morning—it was barely 7:00 a.m. in Albuquerque.
“Hey, Dad,” Cooper said. “You and Mom both up? Had your coffee?”
“Up and caffeinated. How are you, son?”
“Excellent. Listen, can you get Mom on the phone or put me on speaker? I have something to explain to you.”
“Okay, you’re on speaker.” Then his father said to his mother, “He has something to explain.”
“Cooper, are you all right? You’re not sick are you?” his mother asked.
“No, I’m fine. Perfect. Listen, this surprised the hell out of me so I know it’s going to really shock you. Um. Remember Bridget…?”
*
On a sunny Saturday afternoon in May Frank Downy walked a few blocks to Ashley’s house. He had a backpack and a soft cooler. When Ashley came to the door he asked, “Are you busy?”
“Not really. I was helping my grandma make cookies. Want one?”
“Yeah. And how about putting a few in a baggie and come with me.”
“Where?”
“Just to the beach and the south promontory,” he said. He lifted the cooler. “I came prepared for a little adventure.”
She eyed him suspiciously, but she couldn’t help her smile. She had no idea little Frank would grow into his looks and become a hottie. “What are you up to, Frank? Shouldn’t you be going to the prom?”
“I’m not going to the prom, Ash. Why would I? You’ll need tennis shoes—we’re going to take a little hike. You’ll like it, I promise.”
“You’re just trying to take my mind off the prom. You don’t have to,” she said. “Landon even offered to have two dates, but I’m still happy with my decision. I don’t want to go this year. Next year, maybe. Not this year.”
“Well, I’d love to take credit for doing something so chivalrous, but it’s a total coincidence. I was down on the docks this morning talking to a couple of the crabbers—the gray whales are running heavy. One of them said yesterday they saw several breach. They’re feeding on crustaceans close to shore on their way back to the Bering Sea from Baja. One of the guys said he thought more than the usual number is hanging around our coastline and not migrating this year. I thought we’d go out to Ben’s point.”
“Oh, that’s private….”
“I asked Cooper if he’d mind. We won’t disturb anything. Dusk is a good time.” He turned around. “I have everything we need. Blanket, binoculars, flashlight for getting back, Duraflame for the beach afterward. There’s a path out to the point. Not a good one, but a path. Come on—the flora is in bloom out there. Let’s go.”
“Flowers.” She laughed.
“Flowers, plant life, flora—whatever. And the birds are all in love, I can tell you that much.”
“What about the whales? Are they in love?”
“They took care of that in Baja,” he said with a grin. “I’m going. Want to come?”
“Yes,” she said, smiling.
“Put on some long pants and grab a sweatshirt,” he said. “There are lots of berry bushes out there. They’ll scratch up your legs. And you know, when the sun goes down—”
“I know, Frank. I’ve lived here my whole life. Should I make us a couple of sandwiches?”
He lifted the cooler just as Gina was coming up behind Ashley. “I did already. We’re set. Sandwiches, chips, case of beer…” He smiled at Gina. “Kidding. Diet Coke and green tea.”
“Just give me a minute,” Ashley said, whirling off to her room to get changed.
Gina stepped toward the front door. “This is very nice of you, Frank.”
“Thanks, but I was going out there, anyway. I went from the marina to the bait shop to ask Cooper if he’d mind if I hiked out to the bird sanctuary, and then I thought, maybe Ashley had nothing to do.” He could feel a little color on his cheeks. Being sixteen could be a royal pain. He’d been killing himself trying to think of something that might distract her on prom night and just lucked into the whales.
“Well, come inside. Let’s see what else we can stuff in that cooler,” she said.
But he had it pretty well stocked. In addition to the sandwiches and chips he had veggies and fruit.
Carrie grinned when he came into the kitchen as she’d obviously heard the exchange at the door. “Here you go,” she said, handing him a bag of cookies. “And is there room for this?” she asked, pulling a small, disposable plastic container out of the refrigerator. “Pasta and crab salad? Just fresh today.”
“Thanks,” he said.
She handed him two plastic forks. “Do you have napkins?”
“And wet wipes,” he said with a shy smile.
“You’re a dream date,” Gina said.
“I’m not a date,” he said. And he thought, I’m not a date, thanks to my idiot brother.
“I could call my friend Sarah and borrow her Razor and you could drive across the beach,” Gina offered. “If you left it by Cooper’s while you go out on the point, it would be safe.”
“Thanks, but I’m up for the hike. If Ashley is.”
She came bouncing into the room, jeans and tennis shoes on, hoodie tied around her waist. “Of course I’m up for it. I can’t wait.”
“We need to move it. I don’t want to get out there too late. Once the sun sets, the show is over. Let’s go.”
“Let me carry something.”
“I got it. When we have to go uphill you can have one of these handles.” Then he looked at Gina and said, “I don’t think we’ll be
late.”
“Ashley has her phone,” she said. “Just be careful and have fun.”
*
Gina called Cooper. “Hey, it’s me, Gina. Frank came by and said he asked if he could go out on the point to look for whales.”
“Affirmative,” Cooper said. “Permission granted.”
“He has food, a blanket, a Duraflame…. The log is for the sand, not the point, I take it. So, I think this is great—something for Ashley to do on prom night. But I’m just saying…”
“I’ll be here all evening, Gina,” he said. “After Sarah takes pictures of Landon and Eve before they head off to prom, she’s coming over. I see some deck time coming my way. I’ll keep my eyes and ears open.”
“I’m not really worried about her. She has her phone,” Gina said. “But it’s been a real rocky spring.”
He laughed. “Tell me about it! The whole world tilted on its axis!”
“I guess it did, didn’t it? Have I said congratulations yet?”
“A couple of times, I think. Don’t worry about Ash. Downy might be a dipshit who’s going to regret his manly moves, but I think Frank’s a standup guy. And for the record, I don’t think he’s just cleaning up Downy’s mess.”
“I think you’re right.”
“Did you know he can name every plant and bird on that point?”
She laughed. “I’m not surprised.”
*
Ashley had been on picnics all her life, but she’d never been on a picnic with Frank. It was like a biology class, but more fun.
Instead of climbing the stairs to Cooper’s deck, they walked up the drive, then out toward the point.
“I haven’t been out here in a while,” Frank said. “This place is covered with pine and manzanita, but there are some beautiful plants—wild ginger, salal, iris, ocean spray and even swamp rose, which is typically an east coast plant. The last time I was out here I counted ten types of fern—deer fern, chain fern, maidenhair, lady. There are several lilies, including mariposa, and that usually grows on the mountainsides.”
“You know all these plants?”
“I looked them up,” he said. “That’s a flowering currant and that’s Pacific blackberry.”
“Wow.”
“I know. Geek, right?”
“No! It’s cool,” she said.
“Ben was more interested in the birds—the loon, eagle, belted kingfisher, cormorant, merganser. I think he counted all the different birds he’d seen out here.”
“Are you into birds, too?” she asked him.
“I’m better with stars,” he said. “I should say I’m more interested in them. Here we go,” he said, reaching the end of the point. He dropped the cooler and backpack and pulled out a blanket to sit on and the binoculars, which he gave to her. “I’m counting on you to sight the first breach.”
She grabbed the binoculars and trained them on the sea. She was quiet for long moments before she said, “I saw a spout, but it’s a million miles out there.”
“I hope some come closer,” he said. “It’s a good day for it.”
“Do you do this often? Whale watch?”
“Spring and fall,” he said. He took an apple out of the cooler and offered it to Ashley. When she shook her head, he bit into it. “Sometimes I’d hitch a ride out with a fisherman. Nobody minds me. I’m quiet. Sometimes I’d come out here. Ben didn’t care because I was careful not to disturb anything. Sometimes he came with me. Before Dodger’s arthritis got bad, he’d come, too.”
“We haven’t had a dog since I was four,” Ashley said. “She was my mom’s dog. She was real old even then.”
“And you didn’t get another one,” he pointed out to her.
She shook her head. “I’m not sure why.”
He laughed. “I hope you don’t feel that way about boyfriends.”
“I do right now,” she said, but she smiled at him. “It’s going to be a long time. And I’m going to be much fussier. I’m not hooking up with some big dumb jock who has an ego the size of California.”
He just smiled. Then he pointed. “Spout. It’s much closer.”
She went back to watching, but without the binoculars. She scanned the horizon and saw another spout, a few minutes later. After about an hour, they each had a sandwich and a cookie, broke out some drinks, saw a few more spouts.
When the sun started to get a little lower over the Pacific, Ashley spotted a few dark humps in the water and wordlessly pointed.
“Here we go,” Frank said. And no sooner had he said that than there was a big breach, all the way up out of the water, not too far off the coast. “That’s what I’m talking about!”
Ashley had never done anything like this with Downy. If they were together, he wanted to be either throwing a ball or making out. But they had talked on their phones all the time—they even had to get a special plan for exchanging calls so they wouldn’t have such high monthly call charges. Several calls and many texts passed between them every day. Her grandma would say, “You young people text each other when you’re in the same room together. Don’t you realize you have to communicate to have a relationship?”
“Frank? Do you text many people?”
He gave a shrug, his eyes focused on the ocean. “If there’s a reason. By the way, that text that went around? I knew that was a fake.”
“You did?”
He looked at her. “Ash, you have a nice figure but that obviously wasn’t your chest.” And he colored a little.
“No joke,” she said with a laugh. Oh, my God, was she laughing at that horrible incident now?
“Everyone knew, except idiots,” he said. “There. Look out there.”
And sure enough, a pod. Close to shore. There were a couple of tail splashes and another breach. As Ashley knew, you could go whale watching for hours and never see anything.
“Do you date at all?” she asked Frank.
“I’ve been out a few times. Nothing special. I mean, nice girls.”
She laughed at him. “Who?”
“Paula from science club. We doubled with Kurt and Lynette. Paula is not very happy with me.”
“Why not?”
“I told her I just wanted to be friends,” he said. “I think she wanted to get married.”
Ashley crumbled into laughter.
“I didn’t think it was that funny,” he said.
“I know, I know. But that’s the thing about girls,” she informed him. “We all want to live happily ever after. And the sooner, the better. Even the ones who want some major career achievement still want to be adored forever. Believe me, Frank, it causes a world of trouble.”
“Did you? Want to marry Downy?”
“Oh, absolutely! We even talked about it—made crazy promises to each other about forever. We had plans—right after college he was going to go pro and we’d have a big wedding and I’d follow the team to games.” She shook her head. “So much for that idea.”
“And now?” Frank asked.
“I want to punch him in the face,” she said. “With a brick.”
Frank’s smile was huge. “I think it’s time to move this party to the beach,” he said. “I have a log. I’ll show you some popular constellations. If you’re up for that.”
“I’m up for it,” she said. “I might have to make a stop at Cooper’s. And, Frank? Am I getting credit for this course?”
“You get anything you want, Ash. How many whales did you see?”
“I don’t know! Twenty?”
“Nine.”
“Do you remember everything?”
He shook out the blanket to get the dirt and dried pine needles off. “Sometimes it’s a curse.”
*
The sun was setting a bit later over the ocean and it was Saturday night, big night in Thunder Point. Cooper had been busy, but by eight-thirty there was just one couple sitting on the deck, a candle on their table, a beer and a glass of wine before them. They’d come across the beach in their golf cart and would go
back the same way. Cooper wiped down the bar and took a glass of wine out to the deck for Sarah, bringing a beer for himself. There was a small fire out on the beach—Ashley and Frank. They were lying on their backs, looking up at the star-filled sky. Before sitting down he said to his last two guests, “Let me know if you need anything, folks. I’ll be right over here.”
“Thanks, Cooper.”
“My pleasure.”
Then he joined Sarah. He leaned back and propped his feet up on the opposite chair.
“I think you like this life,” she said.
“What’s not to like? A night in May by the ocean. And you right beside me.” He looked at her. “Landon will be out late. We can sneak upstairs.” He gave her a purely lascivious grin. “For a while.”
“You haven’t told me how your family reacted to your news. I’m dying to hear about that.”
“Oh, right.” He sat up straighter. “It was classic. My father was speechless and my mother started to cry. Austin is the same age as one of my nephews. Our conversation was a little awkward—they wanted details on how Bridget got pregnant six or eight months or a year after we broke up. I did the best I could with that—told them we’d called off the engagement but still saw each other sometimes. You know—old habits are hard to break. My mother said, ‘Henry Cooper!’ at least once. I tried to put Spencer in a good light—he and Bridget had been dating, but hadn’t gotten too serious until… Well, you know. But word spread and my sisters got in touch. They were ruthless—each one of them called me. They wanted all the intimate details of everything! They wanted to know who was sleeping with whom and when.” He chuckled and shook his head. “I told each one of them that the only really important things is that I was never, at any time, sleeping with Spencer. If you come from a family like mine, it is impossible to have a personal life.”
She pulled up her feet, circling her knees with her arms and resting her chin on her knees. “Are they happy with the news?”
“I think they’re a little too intrigued by the biology of it all. I promised to take Austin to meet them sometime. Probably this summer.”
