by Sally Derby
“Not me. I’ll always want to come here.”
“You think so now, but …”
“I know so.”
I guess I sounded kind of belligerent, because she pressed her lips tight for a minute, then said, “Well, there’s no point in talking about it. They’ll be here in half an hour, and I want you and Josh out of the kitchen by then.”
When Josh came up from the pier, he had the live-sack in his hands. Mom peered in. “Wow!” she said. “That’s an impressive bluegill. Wait here and I’ll get the camera. We’ll send a picture to your dad.”
Josh looked from her to me, then back to her. “Naw,” he said. “He doesn’t need to see it.”
Mom closed her eyes and wrinkled her forehead. “I think he’d like to,” she told Josh gently.
“You can take one picture,” he conceded. “Maybe I’ll give it to him someday.”
Mom glared at me like this was my fault. But I didn’t have anything to do with it, I thought. Josh had a mind of his own, didn’t he?
* * *
I was sorting through a box of old bobbers and stuff down on the pier when Dave Becker’s car drove up. Another car came right behind, a Chevy wagon like ours, only a more expensive model, with wood paneling on the sides and back. As soon as the cars stopped, the door of the second car opened, and two kids about Josh’s age or a little younger hopped out. Their little-kid voices carried clearly. “Can we go down by the lake while you look at the cottage? Can we, Mom?”
A hesitation. Then, doubtfully, “I guess it will be all right. Don’t go out on the pier, though, and don’t get too close to the water.”
I had to laugh. She sounded just like Mom—wanting the kids to have fun, but worrying. I watched them skip down the steps. The one in front, a boy, had curly, copper-colored hair and a face full of freckles. The girl behind him had hair so red it was almost orange, and even more freckles. They went running across the grass right to the foot of the pier. There they stopped and looked at me.
“Is this your pier?” the boy asked.
“Mmm-hmm.”
“And the cottage, is it yours, too?” The little girl was trying to stand as close to the pier as her brother did, but he was blocking her way.
“Yes, the cottage is ours, too.”
“Why do you want to sell it? If we get a cottage by a lake we’ll never, ever sell it,” she said.
I thought about telling her I didn’t want to sell, but I figured it wasn’t any of her business, so I just shrugged.
“Is the water deep here?” the boy asked.
“Only about a foot or two here, but it’s over your head at the end of the pier.”
“That’s what we want,” the little girl told me. “The last cottage we looked at, the water was deep right at the shore. Mom said it would make her too nervous to live there. Maybe she’ll like your cottage.”
“I hope she won’t,” I said under my breath, but the little girl had sharp ears. “Why do you hope she won’t?” she asked. “Don’t you like us?”
I couldn’t help grinning at that. “How can I not like you? I don’t know you,” I said. “I just don’t want anyone to buy the cottage.”
“Not even if we give you a lot of money?”
“Not even then.” They both looked so disappointed, I felt mean. “It’s not up to me, though,” I said.
“Who’s it up to?”
“My mom.”
They looked at each other, and then they both turned back toward the cottage. “We’ll go look at your cottage,” the little boy said.
They ran across the grass and started up the hill. Halfway to the cottage, the little girl turned around. “If we buy your cottage, you can come and stay with us sometimes,” she called.
“Thanks,” I said. I said it sarcastically, but quietly enough, I hoped, that she couldn’t hear me. I knew she thought she was being nice, but this whole business brought out the worst in me. I watched them continue up the steps. If I didn’t want to keep the cottage so badly, they’d be people I’d want to sell it to. They looked like the kind of family who could have fun here.
This time I didn’t go up to the cottage while Mr. Becker was showing it. I wanted to, but I had promised Mom I would stay out of the way. “Actually,” she’d said, “I guess it’s just as well if you don’t go into town with us. Then if Dave has questions or a message for me, he’ll have someone to talk to.”
So I just sat there, listening to the breeze-driven waves slap the shore, looking out at the island. Three boats were out off the western point. I wondered how they were doing. Above me the woodpecker was tapping. Down at the channel end of the lake, a crow cawed. It’s not just the cottage I’d miss, I realized. I’d miss the lake itself. I knew there were lots of other lakes; southern Michigan was rich with them. But this was the one I knew. I knew the exact place the sun came up each morning. I knew where to fish when it was clear and when it was cloudy. I knew where the water lilies grew, and I knew how to pole through the reeds in the channel. I’d been learning this lake since I was just a little boy, but there was more of it still to discover. I’d hardly ever been all the way down to the eastern end. This was the summer Dad was going to show me how to use the motor; this was the summer the two of us were going to fish Pringle’s Cove, where there was supposed to be an old catfish bigger than you could believe. This was my lake.
The sound of footsteps on the pier startled me. It was Dave Becker. “Tell your mom I’ll try to call this afternoon,” he said.
“Do they like it?”
“Hard to tell. The kids sure do. I’ll keep you posted.”
I watched him stride back up the hill, taking the steps two at a time. For a minute, I hated him, even though I knew he was just doing his job.
After they left I went back up to the cottage and lay down on the porch with the book I was reading. It was peaceful, so peaceful I fell asleep and didn’t wake up till I heard our car door slam.
Mom came in the kitchen door. “Kyle?”
“Out here,” I called.
She came through the main room and stood in the doorway. “Well?” she asked. “Did Dave say anything?”
“He said he’d call.”
“Did he say whether they liked it?”
“He didn’t say,” I said. I could have told her the kids did, but what difference does it make what kids want? I kept still, and she went back into the kitchen.
I didn’t know what to do with myself that afternoon. I finished my book and played a game of Scrabble with Vicki, which was very nice of me because Vicki beats everyone at Scrabble. That was two mended fences, I thought. When the game was over, Vicki said she was going to find Andrea and Josh to go swimming. I thought about it, but I didn’t feel like swimming. Besides, I was staying away from the Marshalls. I’d joined them down at their float one day, and they were just as bad as I remembered. Plus they’d each grown about ten inches, and somehow this made them think they’d gained a year or two on me as well. I wasn’t going to be treated like a little kid by anyone. So even though swimming sounded kind of like fun, I decided instead I’d go see if Tom Butler was feeling any better.
“C’mon in,” he called when I knocked at his kitchen door for the second time that day. He was sitting at the table, a plate of ham and potatoes and green beans in front of him. There was a big stack of bread, a stick of butter, and a little pitcher of honey on the table, too. An open quart of milk stood by a full glass.
“I came to find out if you were feeling better,” I said.
“Fine now. Just a touch of indigestion.”
“Indigestion?” I asked, glancing at the table.
He grunted. “I said I was better.”
“Oh. Well, I guess you’ll want to go out tomorrow?”
“Far as I know. You want to take your brother along with us?”
“You sure you want him? I know he’d like to go, but sometimes he can be a pest.”
He let out a sound that I think was a laugh. “A pest, hm
m? Just like most boys, I suspect. Tell him if he don’t behave, we’ll pitch him overboard.”
“Okay, then. I’ll see you tomorrow.” I started to go, then turned around. “Say, Mr. Butler—I mean, Tom. Do you know, did anybody ever live on the island?”
“Nah,” he said, shoving half a slice of bread into his mouth and chewing vigorously. He swallowed before going on. “You couldn’t live out there. What would you use for heat in the winter? And drinking water, that would be a problem.”
“I hadn’t thought of that,” I said. “I was just wondering, that’s all.”
I let myself out the door and headed back for the cottage. So Tom Butler didn’t know someone had a cabin on the island. And if he didn’t know, was there anyone else who might?
As I got close to the cottage, I saw Andrea ahead of me, strolling along with her head down, her sketchbook under her arm. I thought I might as well catch up with her. Things had been kind of prickly between us lately, but I couldn’t stay mad at her, and I didn’t think she could stay mad at me.
I hurried, and she heard me coming and turned her head. “Hey, Kyle,” she said.
“Hey, yourself.”
“Those people this morning?”
“What about them?”
“You sounded funny when you were talking to Mom. Didn’t you like them?”
“I only met the kids. They were cute. And they want a cottage real bad. I don’t know what their parents thought about it.”
“Do you suppose we’ll get lucky and no one will want to buy it?”
“I don’t know.” I kicked a little stone, then bent over and picked up another. I pitched it at a nearby sapling. Bull’s-eye! “I’m beginning to lose hope. I asked Mom, if we could pay the taxes, then would we still have to sell? I didn’t tell her about the plan, I just said, what if? But she wouldn’t say we could keep it. She said she’d have to think.”
“Do you think maybe we should write Dad?”
“What for? If he didn’t care enough to come up here, why would he care if we have to sell it?”
“I guess you’re right.” She sounded discouraged, and I felt lousy for putting her in a bad mood, too.
“I thought you were going swimming this afternoon,” I said, hoping to cheer her up.
“I had something I wanted to do first.”
Again. Just like a door slamming in my face—“something I wanted to do.” Not, “I wanted to sketch the Petersens’ cottage” or “I thought I’d …” Well, cripes, what had she been doing? Not that I cared. If she wanted to keep her secrets, let her. But I bet she’d tell Vicki.
Before I could get really mad again, she said, “I’m going to swim now, though. Want to come?”
“Sure.” At least I’m good enough to swim with, I thought but didn’t say.
Maybe some of my anger sounded in my voice. She gave me a long, serious look, like she was trying to read my mind. “You don’t have to if you don’t want,” she said.
But suddenly that was what I wanted to do more than anything else. Just dive into the water, swim out to the float and let the water wash away all my worries. Why let the Marshalls or anyone else spoil my fun?
“Beat you to the cottage,” I told Andrea.
She laughed. “In your dreams, slowpoke,” and we both took off.
Fence number three was a hard one to mend, I thought as I ran.
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
I’D NEVER FOUND TOM much for laughing, not until the day Josh went fishing with us. But that morning he laughed a lot, and he probably talked twice as much as usual. For some reason, Josh affected Tom the way Mom did—both of them seemed to loosen his tongue. Tom even told Josh a riddle: “What’s gray, has four legs, and a trunk?”
Of course Josh guessed, “An elephant.”
“No,” said Tom with a perfectly straight face, “a mouse on vacation.”
I didn’t let Josh row. I figured there’d be too much weight in the boat. Besides, Tom suggested going almost all the way to the channel, down where the reeds stood high above the surface. There was plenty of bird life in the reeds and enough babies in the water to keep Josh’s bobber busy. “Don’t want you to get bored,” Tom told Josh.
“I won’t,” Josh said, and I believed him. As soon as they’d gotten back from town yesterday, Josh had gone straight out to the pier with his bait and his pole, and he hadn’t left until Vicki suggested swimming.
I had warned Josh before we left that he wasn’t supposed to chatter to Mr. Butler, and he was positively not to complain about anything. As it turned out, I needn’t have worried. Tom Butler was going to make sure that Josh had a good day. We’d hardly got our lines in the water when Tom reached into the big bag he’d brought along and pulled out a bag of little Milky Ways.
“Have a candy bar,” he invited us.
“No, thanks.” I shook my head—I don’t eat candy that early in the day. “It’ll make you thirsty,” I warned Josh as he took one.
“Thought of that,” Tom said. “I brought something to wash it down.” It was pop, of course. I noticed he hadn’t brought along a toothbrush, which Josh’s teeth could use after all that sugar.
How come Tom could eat candy and cookies all the time and not get sick? It didn’t make sense. But nothing made sense this summer. It should be Dad here telling jokes with Josh and giving him fishing tips, like how to decide where to set his bobber, things like that.
But Dad wasn’t here, and since he wasn’t, it was nice of Tom to give Josh so much attention. I didn’t blame Josh for eating it up. Once he tried to tell Tom a joke. He took a long time, because he kept getting mixed up and saying, “No, I mean …” and backing up a little. But Tom listened patiently, and when Josh said, “No, that’s not right, I meant …” for about the eighth time, Tom winked at me and smiled over Josh’s head. It was kind of like we shared a grown-up secret. I was surprised at the nice warm feeling that gave me.
But as the sun rose higher and the morning wore on, I started to get seriously annoyed. Tom had prepared for this fishing trip as if it were going to last days instead of hours. I never saw so much junk food in my life. And Josh, of course, thought it was great. Everything Tom offered him he ate.
I tried to discourage Josh from eating any more. “You’ll get a stomachache,” I warned, sounding just like Gram.
“Leave him be, Kyle,” Tom said. “He’s a growing boy. A few treats won’t hurt him.”
So the two of them kept eating and fishing and eating and fishing while I sat there feeling helpless. It was as if Tom knew ahead of time what a sweet tooth Josh has. I tried shaking my head at Josh and frowning when Tom offered him a second candy bar. After all, they’d already eaten peanut butter and jelly sandwiches and a whole bag of potato chips. But Josh just ignored me.
On top of everything else, in between bites Josh caught a really mammoth smallmouth bass, and he brought it in without any help, except for the netting at the end. You think that didn’t make him proud? He wasn’t about to pay any attention to me after that.
So all I could do was sit there fuming. I thought Tom would never say it was time to go in, but he did, and to my amazement he said it just like always, “Must be nine o’clock. Time for breakfast.”
After we pulled in, on the way up to Tom’s cottage, I lagged behind and pulled Josh’s arm. “He’s going to ask us to stay for breakfast,” I whispered. “You can’t be hungry still.”
“Sure I can,” Josh said with a grin.
Later, sitting at the table with a tall stack of pancakes in front of Josh, a smaller one in front of me, and a giant one in front of him, Tom looked over at me. Something of what I was thinking must have been showing on my face, because he said quietly, “Don’t be a killjoy, Kyle. Eating ain’t a sin.”
I was glad to get out of there that day. Josh and I walked home side by side, and I had absolutely no pity when Josh said, “My tummy doesn’t feel so good.”
Later on, though, when he threw up, I wasn’t as mad at him as I wa
s at Tom. He shouldn’t have encouraged Josh. When Mom started asking Josh about what he had eaten that might have made him sick, I just exploded. “It’s not what he ate, it’s how much he ate,” I said. I told her about all the snacking and the big breakfast. “Tom says eating’s not a sin,” I said. “But there’s some sin that has to do with eating—I remember learning that in Sunday School.”
“Gluttony,” Mom said quietly. “But it’s not for us to judge.”
“Why not?” I asked. “Didn’t he make Josh sick?”
“Josh made himself sick,” she said. “Tom didn’t stuff food down Josh’s throat.”
“But you should see the way Tom eats,” I raged. “It’s sick. No wonder he’s as big as a whale.”
“Tom Butler has been good to you,” Mom said. Her eyes darkened, so I knew she was getting angry. “That’s no way to talk!”
I couldn’t understand her. Her own son was sicker than a dog, and she was defending the man who’d made him that way. Well, I didn’t care what she thought. I was mad at Tom Butler, and it would be a long time before I’d forgive him.
Josh went in to lie down on Mom’s bed then. I hadn’t been back long enough to wonder where Andrea and Vicki were, but now I heard Vicki call to someone, “See you out there!” and she and Andrea came through the kitchen door.
“Hi, Kyle! You guys have a good time?” Vicki asked. She poured a dipper of water into one of the paper cups Mom kept by the water bucket. Andrea went straight to the fridge and pulled out a slice of cheese—Andrea doesn’t eat much, but she eats often. She sat down with Mom and me.
“Aren’t you coming?” Vicki asked Andrea, throwing away her empty cup.
“I may come out later—you don’t have to wait for me.”
“’Kay.” Vicki went into the main room.
“Where’s Vicki going?” I asked.
“Brad and Jeff asked us to come swimming,” Andrea said. “Vicki is so glad she bought that new suit.”