Between the Raindrops

by Schussler, Susan

  “Didn’t you get to bring your friends with you ever?”

  “Oh, sure, as we got older. By the time I was ten, my friends were up here all the time. In middle school, Jessica was always at the lake with us, especially after her parents got divorced. It was really hard on her, being the youngest and all. Her sister and brother had already left for college when all the bickering started. She used my house as a refuge to get away from her parents’ arguments. My parents practically adopted her.”

  “Yeah, divorce sucks. Nick’s parents had a pretty nasty divorce. He moved here from London when he was thirteen, and his parents got divorced a year later. His mom moved back to England with his little sister. He spent most of his time here with his dad. Sometimes, I think that’s why he’s the way he is, or it may be genetic. He’s just like his dad. The old nature-versus-nurture problem. No one knows where it crosses from one to the other.”

  Sarah glanced at him with a smirk. She loved it when he philosophized.

  They turned down a dirt road. On one side was a farm with spotted black-and-white dairy cows littering the hillside. Up on the hill sat a large white barn. On the other side of the road was a glimmering lake lined with cabins, a few of them spaced so closely together that you could barely see the lake between them.

  “Wow, there are a lot of cabins on this lake,” Will noted.

  “Yeah, it’s like its own little community,” Sarah answered as she parked her car alongside the cabin. She pulled up on the grass, out of the view of the road, because she didn’t want anyone to know she was there. Her cabin neighbors and relatives would drop by to visit if they saw her car.

  The cabin was modern craftsman style, with a wood siding exterior, stone pillars, and a large stone chimney. Sarah’s family had torn down the original 1950s-style cabin and rebuilt it six years ago. The new cabin had a screened-in porch on the lake side and a flagstone patio on the side opposite to where Sarah had parked. The property was splattered with hundred-year-old pine trees that towered high into the sky, making the new cabin feel like it had always been there.

  Will and Sarah moved slowly as they unloaded the car. Neither had slept much last night, and they both really needed some sleep. The ninety-minute drive had made this fact more apparent, and they both yawned as they exited the vehicle.

  Inside, the cabin was well lit. It had an open layout, with clean lines and simple styling. In the kitchen, the cabinets were made out of a light-colored hickory wood, and the floor was polished cement in a warm terra-cotta color. The natural colors blended into the cozy feel of an organized outdoors. Sarah kicked off her flip-flops, feeling the comfort of the cool cement floor on her bare feet. She made her way around the kitchen and family room opening windows, hoping to drain the cabin of the stifling heat.

  Will set the cooler on the cement floor and started emptying the food onto the counter. Sarah joined him and began loading the food into the refrigerator. When he had finished pulling out everything, he leaned back against the counter with his arms crossed, watching her. She sweetly bumped her hip against his and grinned at him before returning to her task. She quickly tossed the rest of the items into the fridge, not caring where. She could fix it later.

  Sarah turned around to face him and stated, “I’m so exhausted. I didn’t get any sleep last night. Would you mind if I lie down and rest for a little bit?” She smiled at him, begging him with her eyes, hoping he would join her.

  “No, I didn’t get much sleep last night, either,” he confessed.

  Then Sarah grabbed his hand and led him up the stairs to her small bedroom. She was glad that her mom had insisted that everyone put clean sheets on their beds before leaving for home, because she was too tired to make up the bed now.

  The room was warm and stuffy like the rest of the cabin, so Sarah crossed to the big dormer window, pulled up the blind, and slid the window up in its sash. She knew the breeze off the lake would make it bearable to sleep. The room was small, but efficient. It had a queen-sized bed with a pink comforter, a maple dresser with five drawers, and a closet. Covering the length of one wall was a built-in bench with a thick upholstered pad that could be used to sleep on if an extra bed was needed. Will sat down on the bench and looked at Sarah, as if he was waiting for her to take the lead.

  Sarah looked him in the eye. “Would you like the bench or the bed? Slow, right?” she said, joking about his comment at the hotel.

  “Well, since you’re not sure of your feelings for me yet, maybe I should sleep on the bench. You got a pillow?” he replied with a smirk.

  Sarah threw a pillow at him, hitting him in the head.

  “Ouch!” He rubbed his head as she scowled at him.

  Sarah surveyed the movie star in her bedroom. She had a hard time believing that she wasn’t dreaming. She couldn’t believe this was the same guy who knew her so well.

  She took a breath. “Will you lie next to me? I want to make sure you don’t leave.”

  He climbed onto the bed and patted the spot next to him. She settled in, and he wrapped his arm around her, spooning against her.

  “Sweet dreams, beautiful,” he said.

  “Sweet dreams.” She turned and kissed him on the cheek.

  When Will awoke a couple of hours later, Sarah was no longer in his arms. He gazed around, admiring the quaintness of the room. On Sarah’s dresser sat a well-played-with stuffed horse and an old spent firework robot with singe marks scarring the faded cardboard. They were obviously special to Sarah. Next to the horse sat a framed picture of Sarah holding a fluffy, round golden retriever puppy. Her toothless grin made him smile. Will wondered if it was the same dog she had mentioned died of old age a year ago. He noticed the four framed black-and-white photos above the bed. The little girl and the little boy in the pictures were playing on a distant beach. He knew right away that they were Sarah and Jeff. There was so much he knew about her, but still so much he didn’t know.

  He found her on the screened porch, curled up on the oversized wicker love seat, sipping lemonade and writing in a journal. The sun was high in the cloud-cluttered sky, and there was a slight breeze off the lake. He looked out over the water as he came onto the porch. The lake stretched as far as he could see from left to right, with cabins encroaching on the shore. Across the lake, structures dotted the hillside in an almost mirror image, but higher in the air.

  “Hey, beautiful,” he said and kissed her forehead. “I didn’t know you kept a journal.”

  “Since I was twelve. I am majoring in English. It’s sort of a prerequisite.”

  “Can I read it?” he asked, already knowing the answer.

  “I’m sure you’re capable,” she said with a giggle as she finished up writing and closed the book.

  “Excuse me, may I read it?” he said to appease her.

  Sarah pretended to consider his request. “Mm…no.” She smiled at him and took a sip from the tall glass dripping with condensation. “Lemonade?” she asked, holding up her glass.

  Will took a mouthful from her glass and swallowed.

  “Wow. It’s really amazing here,” he said as he looked out over the shimmering blue water.

  The water moved constantly, with large waves that beat against the dock and shore when the boats passed. Massive speedboats rocketed one after another through the center of the lake, trailing thin ropes tied to brightly colored tubes that skipped across the water. Children flapped, prone on the tubes, attached only by their tightly gripped hands, while hip-hop music blared from the pontoon next to the neighbor’s dock.

  “But I didn’t expect so many boats and people. I thought it would be more secluded,” he admitted as he sat down next to her.

  “It will be.” She looked down at her watch. “It’s two thirty now, and by four on Sundays, most of the boats are off the lake. By six, all the people will be loaded in their cars, heading back to the cities. You’ll see. There are only three families that actually live on the lake, and they are all retired, so it will get pretty quiet.”


  “It sounds like you have it down to a science,” he commented as he noted how the sunlight made her eyes look like jewels.

  “I’m just observant. By tonight, we’ll practically have the lake to ourselves. Most families only come up on the weekends,” she said as she looked up at him through her lashes. Sarah ran her fingers across his stubbled jawline. “Sexy,” she added, raising her eyebrows.

  “Sexy?” he whispered. “I didn’t shave this morning.” He liked her choice of words and her playfulness. “Actually, I need to buy a razor or borrow a disposable one from Jeff. I checked mine, and some shorts would be helpful too.”

  “I’ll show you where Jeff’s room is, but you’re keeping the scruff.” She smiled back at him mischievously as she got up.

  He grinned at her comment as he followed her. They went upstairs, and Sarah showed him Jeff’s room. It was just down the hall from hers, about the same size, and decorated in a sailboarding theme, with a large sailboard balanced in the corner. Sarah sat on the bed while Will dug through the dresser and found some clothes he thought would fit. He was about the same height as Jeff, but thicker, more muscular. He changed into the shorts right in front of Sarah without any modesty. It didn’t bother him at all.

  Will and Sarah spent the afternoon lounging on the porch while they watched the activity on the lake. They talked and stole kisses from one another. It felt so good just to be together that neither one complained about being confined.

  “So tell me what a typical day in the life of Jonathan Williams is like,” requested Sarah.

  “It’s different every day. If I’m not working and I’m at home, it’s pretty boring. I watch movies and read. I do my laundry and make meals like everyone else. I might have a business meeting over lunch, or dinner every once in a while, and I usually try to work out, just to maintain.”

  “How much?”

  “Do I work out?” he asked, and she nodded. “An hour every day, if I can. I have to work out more before a shoot.”

  “Do you like working out?”

  “Not always, but I have to, or I’ll end up on one of those Beach Bodies Gone Bad shows on the Celebrity Network, and no one will hire me.”

  “Give yourself some credit. You’re a great actor and super funny. You’re so talented you could do anything you wanted, no matter what you looked like.”

  “So I should let myself go and become a comedian?” He looked at her skeptically as the corners of his lips turned up.

  “If it makes you happy.” She grinned back.

  He playfully mussed her hair. “I actually enjoy acting, and working out isn’t that bad.”

  “So what’s a normal day when you’re acting?”

  “There’s no such thing as a normal day on set. One day, I might be waiting around, sunning myself on a tropical island all day long just to shoot one line, and the next day, I could be standing up to my hips in mud and rain for fourteen hours with my toes so numb that I can’t even walk. I guess that’s what I like about it—no two days are the same. It can get monotonous sometimes if shooting isn’t going well, but I think if I had to sit at a desk and do the same thing over and over every day, I’d go crazy.”

  “So do you get bored when you’re not working?”

  “I enjoy my time off,” he said, beaming, while his fingers caressed her cheek. “What other job can you work a few months and take the rest of the year off?”

  She looked at him skeptically.

  “OK, I usually do a couple of movies a year, and then there’s promoting, so I’m busy all the time lately. But I could take more time off if I wanted. I just want to make sure my career doesn’t end.”

  “As long as you’re happy.” She chuckled and poked him in the side.

  He jumped quickly into a standing position and turned to glare at her. “Don’t do that. I’m really ticklish.”

  She chuckled again. “I barely touched you.”

  He bit his lip as he scrutinized her.

  “Sorry, I didn’t know. I won’t poke you again. You can sit down.”

  “I just wasn’t expecting that. It caught me off guard. Jack used to hold me down and tickle me until I peed my pants. I’m better at controlling it now, though.”

  “Peeing or being ticklish?”

  “Both.” He sat back down next to her.

  As they sat talking, they watched the bigger boats disappear from the lake one by one. Sarah opened a magazine that was sitting on the floor and browsed through it while Will continued to survey the activity on the water.

  Not long after the poking incident, Will stood up again, this time in utter amazement. “Holy crap! Did you see that?”

  Sarah looked up to see what Will was so excited about. “What?”

  “A bald eagle just picked up a fish this big”—he held his hand out in front of him about a foot and a half apart—“in the water, right off the end of the dock. It landed three docks down. See it? It’s eating the fish. I want to get closer. Come on.” He crept out the screen door. The door whined as he opened it and snapped back into place behind him with a clap. Crouching down, he snuck across the yard, hiding stealthily from the bird behind the large pine trunks as he crossed two more yards.

  Sarah followed him outside, but hung back for a few minutes by the cabin. Then she slowly made her way across the grass to the side of the boathouse where he stalked the eagle. The wooden-slat boathouse pushed up against the water’s edge provided the perfect cover to watch the fish’s demise. They stood scrutinizing the predator’s technique of ripping the flesh off the bones until their laughter frightened the bird and it spread its giant wings to fly. They could hear the pounding of its wings against the air as the bird took off, and they marveled that such a big bird could actually get up into the air.

  “Have you ever seen that before?” Will looked wide-eyed at Sarah.

  “No, never—just a couple of times a summer.” Smirking at him, she picked up an old five-gallon bucket from the side of the boathouse and headed toward the end of the dock.

  “What are you doing? Won’t the eagle come back?” He followed her onto the dock.

  “Probably not. I have to clean this off before it dries and stinks up the place,” she said, bending down over the side of the dock and straining to fill the bucket with lake water. She pulled it up and poured the water all over the end of the dock. “This is my uncle Bob’s cabin, and we look out for each other’s property. If I don’t rinse it, he’ll have to scrape it off. Besides, the feeder fish will eat the debris.”

  “Here, let me help you,” Will said, taking the bucket from her and bending down to dip it in the lake again. He could feel Sarah’s eyes on his back as he hefted the water onto the dock, and he deliberately provided a show. He heard her mumble something under her breath, but he didn’t hear what she’d said. When he turned around, she was shaking her head.

  Mission accomplished, he thought.

  “Once the lake is clear, do you want to go Jet Skiing or swimming?” she asked. “Hey, Will, come on,” she added quickly as she spotted a bass boat trolling along the ends of the docks several cabins down. “We should probably wait it out on the porch until the lake clears. Sometimes the fishing boats come in pretty close to shore.”

  Will doused the end of the dock with the water and tossed the bucket to the side of the boathouse before they jogged back to the safety of the screened porch. They sat down on the love seat and watched the fishing boat glide by the end of Sarah’s dock. The spindly bald man standing in the front of the boat cast his line nearly to shore as he silently floated to the next dock.

  After he had passed, Will spoke up. “So I don’t see any Jet Skis.”

  “Down there at my uncle’s cabin,” she said, pointing. “And my uncle Tom’s cabin is the red one next to Bob’s. He has a sailboat and a four-wheeler.”

  “Uncle Tom’s cabin?” he questioned.

  “Yeah, Uncle Tom and Aunt Sue. Both my dad’s brothers have cabins on this lake. My cousin Ronnie
and her husband, Nate, own the log cabin on the other side, that one with the rocky ledge there, straight across.” She pointed. “They bought it two years ago. It doesn’t have a beach, and the steps are pretty steep to get up to the cabin, but you can dive off the cliff ledge. The water is over twenty feet deep there. It’s invigorating.” Sarah paused and gazed at Will. “I know I’m rambling, but we have keys to everyone’s cabins because we look out for each other’s places. Uncle Tom has an old rowboat that we’re always bailing out so it doesn’t sink. It was my grandparents’ boat, and when the water gets high on the lake like it did this spring, we have to put five-gallon buckets filled with water on Uncle Bob’s dock to keep the decking from floating away.”

  “Buckets?” Will asked as he started kissing her neck just above her collarbone.

  “Yeah…” She paused. “Um…” She took a breath.

  Will stopped kissing her neck and looked at her, waiting for her to finish.

  “Don’t do that,” she said. “I lost my thought.”

  “Something about buckets,” he said, then started kissing her again.

  “Stop,” she said softly, without conviction.

  He stopped, pulling back to see her eyes. “I just like to see that I can affect you the way that you affect me,” he confessed, showing his perfect smile. “So you were saying?”

  “Buckets,” Sarah enunciated slowly as she ran her fingers through her hair and squished her eyes closed. “Uh, we all help each other, and we share toys like Jet Skis and our ski boat.”

  Will stared at her in amazement. “Have I told you that I love you?” he asked as his dimple pulled deeper into his right cheek.

  “I believe you have,” she whispered against his cheek before she got up, kissed his dimple, and strode inside the cabin.

  Will paused for a minute, pondering Sarah’s response. After all that had happened at the airport, she still was avoiding the subject. He knew he had only been with her a few days, but they had known each other for months, and he’d known pretty early on that he loved her. He followed her inside and found her in the kitchen taking food out of the refrigerator.