I’ve been a little off since my night with Shark on Saturday. It was amazing! I think I’m still operating in a post-climax fog. I can only hope it clears before the carnival committee meets later this week. Meanwhile, we’ve been texting, and he’s going for the loan to save his family business. I’m so proud of him, and I feel like he’s on the verge of opening up to me about his demons.
I mean, it’s demons, right? That’s why he’s built all these walls and has refused to let me in. He’s clearly attracted to me. He clearly cares about me. But he hasn’t been able to go any deeper than this superficial relationship we’ve had the past couple of years, at least not until the other night after his rugby game.
It has to be demons. It can’t be me. I’m awesome, right? And I’m helping him with his rugby team PR issue for free. I helped him with the kids at the game. And, trust me, I did some other very unselfish things the other night when he stayed over.
When I return to my desk, I start to open up my voicemail to see who called, but my phone begins to ring again. It’s Matt from Beach Buddies calling. Oh, good, I can tell him we secured the permit to host the carnival.
“Hey, Matt! How’s it going?” I stand up and start to head for the door to the little courtyard behind our building so I can talk to him in private.
I shoot the account manager who’s smoking a dirty look as I begin to pace between the sidewalk and the fence at the edge of the property line, my phone plastered to my ear. My co-worker snuffs out his cigarette and practically stomps back inside.
“Hey, Megan, do you have a moment to chat?” His voice sounds serious. Uh oh.
“Yeah, of course. What’s going on?” My voice quickly matches his in tone.
He huffs out a breath that makes static sound over the line. “I just got off the phone with Ollie’s mom, and I…we…have a problem.”
“What kind of problem?” My heart rate picks up its pace, exactly like it did in Andrea’s office.
“Ollie said some…disturbing things about your trip to Pennsylvania on Saturday.”
Disturbing things?
My brain lights up with memories, replaying conversations, reviewing images that flash before me, cranking through video feeds of every moment I can remember.
“Something about a naked man? Who tried to touch him? And you guys didn’t do anything about it?”
“What? No, none of that is true.” My hand flies up to my face, where I cradle it while I scramble for an explanation for the naked guy. “Well, there was a naked guy, but it’s not what you think…”
“Then what was it?”
I’m silent as I try to figure out how to explain it. What did Shark call it? Matt used to play rugby; surely he knows.
“I can’t remember what Shark called it…something about the guy got his first score and had to run around naked?”
“A zulu warrior?” Matt questions.
“That’s it! It was just a streak, I promise. There was no touching, nothing inappropriate. And I covered Sadie’s eyes.”
“Did you ever let the kids out of your sight, Megan?”
“No, of course not!” I fire back, not meaning to sound defensive, but totally sounding defensive. “Well, I took Sadie to the restroom, and the boys went with Shark at some point. And they were all in the truck with Shark when I was getting my sweater back from Walt.”
Then I remembered. When the game ended, Walt watched the kids while Shark and I tore down the tent and took it back to his truck to load it up. But we were only gone for ten or fifteen minutes, max.
Matt is quiet for a moment, like he’s contemplating what to say to me next. I think about mentioning the tent thing with Walt, but I’m one hundred percent positive nothing happened. We were just in the parking lot, not even all that far away from the field.
“I’m going to have to ask you, Walt, and Shark to make written statements. Ollie’s mom is a detective, and she’s already talking about charges for child endangerment—or possibly some sort of civil actions, Megan. This is serious. I haven’t been able to get ahold of Walt or Shark yet, but I need you to think very carefully about what happened on Saturday so you can provide an affidavit.”
Affidavit? Well, that sounds incredibly serious.
“Matt, I swear to you, nothing bad happened. The kids had a great time at the game and at the social. Ollie is a bit of a dramatic kid. Did you talk to the other kids yet?”
“No, not yet, but we will be.” His voice sounds cold. Frigid cold.
“Okay, let me know what else you need me to do.”
“I will.” And then he hangs up.
I’m left in the courtyard, soaking in the warm fall sunshine while my stomach drops into oblivion.
It’s Monday, and I’m pretty sure Shark was off today since he worked yesterday. I’ve never quite understood his schedule, but maybe if something is actually happening between us, I’ll be able to keep it straight.
Is something happening between us? The words he spoke to me on Saturday night before we fell asleep are ringing in my ear, as well as what I said to him: “Third time’s the charm…”
There was something in his eyes when he hovered over me on Sunday morning before he left. The sunlight was streaming in the window, making a halo around his dark hair and softening all his features. His eyes looked like calm waters for once, the deepest part of the sea near the horizon. He didn’t say anything, but the way he looked at me and the way he pressed his lips tenderly to mine before he climbed off, grabbed his dirty clothes from the day before, and rushed out so he could get to work on time, spoke volumes. The look was full of hope and a promise that he’d try, even if he couldn’t quite verbalize it yet.
We have to nip this in the bud, though. We can’t have any controversy surrounding the team, and I need to ask him if anything happened on Saturday that I’m not aware of. Or maybe we both need to go to Walt and ask together. Whatever the case may be, we need to be united more now than ever. And since Shark told me Walt responded well to my letting him down gently, I’m hopeful we can stay united.
I haven’t been to his place since that fateful night two years ago. If that night never happened, we probably wouldn’t be doing this now. I wouldn’t be helping out with the rugby team PR because he wouldn’t have felt comfortable approaching me for help. And if I wasn’t helping, the newspaper wouldn’t have been at that game and published a photo of him, which my parents recognized and uncovered our past relationship when we were kids.
We are getting a third chance. And it’s all because we unknowingly had a second chance two years ago.
It’s hard to wrap my head around how all the puzzle pieces fit into place, but the important thing is they do. No matter how unbelievable it is, third time really may be the charm.
His truck is in the driveway, so at least he’s here. I sent him a text to say I was dropping by, but he didn’t answer. So who knows what he’s doing. I shut the door of my Beetle and climb the steps to his porch, where I ring the doorbell. If his loan goes through, I wonder if he’ll break his lease on this little ranch house and move out to his dad’s farm. I don’t see why he wouldn’t.
When he answers the door, his lips twist up in a smirk. He’s happy to see me. He can’t even deny it.
“Hey, sorry for the short notice, but I need to talk to you.” I smile as he opens the door, and I head in, feeling the rush of cool air from his AC and a ceiling fan that’s whirring so fast, it almost makes me dizzy when I glance up at it. Should have known a guy named “Shark” would be cold-blooded. “Did Matt get ahold of you?”
He squints for a second like he’s confused, then shrugs. “Oh, I think he left a voicemail, but I haven’t checked it yet. I’m sure he’s just thanking us for taking the kids on Saturday. They seemed to have a good time.” He ushers me into the living room and pulls me down on the sofa right onto his lap.
He doesn’t know yet.
I try not to get nervous, but I am. I didn’t want anything to ruin the carnival or my
PR plans, but this is a shadow looming over all of us. I try to climb off his lap, but he drags me back down onto his thighs and wraps his arms around my waist.
“I’m glad you’re here.” He pulls me down so he can press a kiss to my lips. Then he sits back to look at me. “What’s wrong?”
Now I climb off, and he doesn’t stop me this time. I pace over to the window, wringing my hands. “Matt called me this morning, and…we have a problem…”
“What kind of problem?”
I reiterate the entire conversation I had with Matt.
He shakes his head. “I don’t understand. We didn’t do anything wrong… I mean, there was the zulu but—”
“That must have been it. Do you think we can go talk to Ollie’s mom? And we need to find out what happened when we were putting the tent up. You know, when we left them with Walt and the rest of the guys.” I turn to face him, then reach out to put my arm around his waist, but he takes a step away from me.
I know he’s confused and upset, but the rejection still stings. He walks to the other side of the room, standing in front of the hallway. “I think you should go.”
“Why? Shark, you said so yourself: we didn’t do anything wrong. We have to write out a statement and give it to the police, that’s all. Ollie’s mom is a detective, apparently, so she’s taking this very seriously. Doing things by the book. I don’t want to accuse the kids of lying, but they probably just misinterpreted something. Other than the zulu, we don’t even know what they said happened.”
His nostrils flare as he sucks in a deep breath, making his chest move. “Please,” he says, like it’s taking considerable restraint not to yell at me. “I need to be alone right now, okay?”
My heart starts to pound against my chest, drumming insistently as my eyes bounce between his. Why is he reacting this way? We didn’t do anything wrong! We need to be united right now, get our stories straight. Not that we have anything to hide, but we all need to be on the same page.
“Did something else happen I don’t know about?” My voice wavers as I toss out the question, and when it smacks him in the face, I see his skin redden with the first hints of rage.
“I can’t believe you would accuse me of that,” he seethes, his chest still moving in and out with his labored breaths.
“I’m not accusing you of anything, Shark. I’m as flummoxed by all this as you are!” Flummoxed? Not sure where the heck I pulled that word out of, but it seems fitting.
Shark scrubs his hand down his face as he closes his eyes and shakes his head. I can’t imagine the man ever crying, but if he were going to, he’d probably look like he does right now, his face so anguished and contorted, it looks like he’s in physical pain. He murmurs something under his breath, “I don’t even know why I bother,” or at least that’s what it sounds like.
“Bother with what?” Now my heart is truly racing, beating so fast I can hear my pulse in my ears. “With me?”
“Not everything is about you, you know,” he fires back at me, his words poison-tipped.
“Well, if you’d just tell me what the hell is going on, then I could leave you be, but you’re scaring the shit out of me, Shark. I don’t understand why you’re always so moody and distant, like you’re keeping this big secret from me. l thought we were about to start something together…to build our relationship, but we can’t if you’re going to push me away every time you get upset about something!”
He staggers toward me, the anger rumbling up his throat so violently that his jaw is ticking. “My past always comes back to haunt me, Megan. That’s why. It’s not pretty. It’s not pleasant. If you knew, you wouldn’t want anything to do with me anyway.” He stomps over to where he has a stack of papers on his countertop and swats them off, scattering them all over the floor.
“What’s that? Why are you doing that?” I bend down to pick them up, gathering them in my hands.
“A loan application so I can buy the carriage company,” he growls. “Never mind. They aren’t going to give me a loan. I don’t know what I was thinking, why I thought things would be any different this time.”
“What are you talking about, Shark? Just tell me what happened!” I demand, clenching the papers at my side, my other hand parked on my hip.
“You need to leave, Megan. Now. I’ll talk to you later.” He disappears down the dark hallway, leaving me there to wonder what just happened.
I look down at the loan application still in my hand. I’m taking it with me. No way am I going to let him ruin his dreams over some misunderstanding. There has to be an explanation for what Ollie heard and saw. Surely when the other kids tell their side of the story, Matt and Ollie’s mom will realize we’re innocent. Surely.
19
I feel bad for the way I treated Megan.
Now that I’ve slept on it, I can admit I handled it really poorly. Like the old Shark. Pre-therapy Shark. So I do what any adultish-type person would do: I apologize. Via text, which isn’t ideal, but I don’t know when I’ll see her again, and I’d rather get it off my chest than let it fester.
Shark: Hey, beautiful. I wanted to tell you I’m sorry for how I reacted last night. I’m a work in progress, so please be patient with me. I’m going to go talk to Walt and see how we can fix this. Sorry to get you mixed up in this crap.
As of ten o’clock this morning, she hasn’t answered me, but I know she’s busy trying to be a good little worker bee at The Buzz PR. I’m at work too, trying to focus on my patients and fixing their problems till I have rugby practice tonight and will get to take a stab at fixing my own.
Thankfully, when it’s busy, time flies as an EMT. Next thing I know, I’m stripping out of my uniform and pulling on my rugby shorts and a t-shirt so I can head to practice. I down an energy drink and a protein bar on the way—dinner will have to wait till after practice.
I can’t believe Megan hasn’t texted me back yet, but I’m either going to call her or stop by her house when practice is over. I don’t want this negative energy between us. We were just starting to find our way—exactly like she said. And I’ll need to come clean about some things. I definitely want to be the one to tell her before she finds out from anyone else, and with Ollie’s mom being a detective, it would only take her a matter of hours to run a background check on me and find out everything there is to know—though it wouldn’t be my side of the story.
I pull right up to the space beside the silver BMW. “Hey, Walt, we need to talk,” I announce as I’m stepping out of the car. He joins me on my walk toward the field, a clipboard with our roster, a list of drills, and some plays he wants to work on under his arm. Our coach can’t make practice on Tuesdays, so Walt fills in.
“Did Matt call you?” I ask him as our strides synchronize.
“Yeah, man. I’m so sorry to put you in the middle of this. The zulu…I should have told them no.” I glance over just in time to see him close his eyes and shake his head in apology. “But there’s something else too…something I didn’t tell Matt.”
We make it to the field, where I drop the mesh bag of rugby balls I’m carrying on the grass beside the bench. “What?”
My gaze snaps to his face, and the confidence our team captain usually exudes has vanished. He hesitates, his eyes sweeping across the field as if he’s searching for the right words.
“What happened, Walt? Tell me.”
He fills his chest with air and lets it out slowly between clenched teeth, as if this confession is a huge exertion of energy. “When the kids were with me—when you and Megan went to set up the tent—Vampire and I were fooling around, joking with each other. He called me a pussy.”
“Okay…I mean, that’s not great, but it’s not the worst thing I’ve ever heard. Couldn’t we tell the kids he was talking about his cat?”
“Well, this is the really bad part…” Walt bows his head in shame, an emotion I didn’t even know was in his repertoire. “I called him the F-word…and the other F-word. And I might have thrown an even wor
se word in there too.”
“No…” My eyes pierce through him, knowing exactly what word he’s speaking of. One I don’t even want to identify by letter.
“Ollie’s mom is a lesbian,” I share with regard to one of the f-words.
“Oh, bloody hell, of course she is!” He smacks his hand against his face. “I’m so sorry, mate. I didn’t even think they heard me…but Matt specifically said Ollie repeated some foul language to his mom. I told him, ‘C’mon, man, it’s rugby, you know how it is.’ We didn’t sing any of the songs in front of them. I admitted the starkers dude was a mistake, but it was a guy on the other team—we didn’t have any control over that. It was their turf.”
“Did something else happen with the naked guy though? Because Ollie said he tried to touch him…”
Walt’s eyes narrow as he seems to be in thought. “Oh, bugger, it wasn’t during the full monty…but later on when the kids went to the loo… I believe Ollie ran into the chap coming out of the stall. He might have thought he touched him, but I’m sure he didn’t.”
“Not on purpose, anyway…of course.”
“No, of course not. I forgot all about it, actually; that’s how innocent it was.”
“I should have been the one to take them to the bathroom.” I scrub my hand down my face. This is so screwed up. I can’t believe I’m going to have everything I’ve built over the past few years stripped away because of these kids we tried to mentor. No good deed goes unpunished… God knows that’s always been true for me.
Walt paces in front of the bench. A few other guys are making their way toward the pitch, late for practice, of course, but at least they’re here.
“What am I going to do, man? If the parents blame me for what happened…I could lose my business.”
“Yeah, I know how you feel,” I tell him. “Don’t worry. I’ll think of something. I’m going to call Matt tomorrow.”
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