This Summer Will Be Different(50)

24





Now





Felix is a mess—jittery and uncharacteristically clumsy. In the five minutes before we’re supposed to leave for Tyne Valley, he manages to knock over Christine’s Christmas cactus, shatter a water glass, and misplace his keys.

“He’s always like this on competition day,” Bridget says as we search the living room. “He’s also got these random superstitions, like wearing the hat and the shirt.”

I peer at Felix. He’s lying on his stomach, looking for his keys under the sideboard. When he stands, I see that the gray shirt he’s put on is almost transparent. I can barely make out its faded white lettering, but I’m sure one of the words is OYSTER. His olive green baseball hat also has an ancient-looking patina. It’s mesh-backed, with McINNIS SEAFOOD written across the front. I know from extensive social media creeping that it’s Joy’s family business.

“Wolf wore that hat when he won the junior shucking championship a million years ago,” Bridget says.

“Eleven years ago,” Felix corrects.

“I think you wear it to make Joy’s father cry,” she says. “The son he always wanted.”

Felix gives her a flat look, and then Zach calls from the kitchen, “Found them.” He holds up the keys. “They were in the cupboard with the glasses.”

Felix stumbles over a corner of a rug on his way to retrieve them.

“You’re even more of a disaster than usual, Wolf,” Bridget says.

“I’d say he’s about the same,” Zach says.

Felix shoots him a half-hearted glare. “It’s important to me.”

“We know,” Bridget says. “It’s your thing. Your only thing.”

“Not true,” Zach says. “He has two things: oysters and books.”

“I have more than two things.”

“Name them,” Bridget says.

“Get lost.” He turns to me, laughing. His gaze is warm—it feels like swimming in paradise. “Anything you want to add?”

“Try not to stab yourself.”

He winks. “No promises.”



* * *



? ? ?

“Why don’t I drive?” I say to Felix when we head out to the truck, but he shakes his head.

“I’m fine.”

He’s not. He drums his fingers on the steering wheel the entire forty-five-minute drive to Tyne Valley. He takes a break every so often to wave hello to an oncoming vehicle, or lift his hat, wiggle it around, and set it back on his head.

There’s a community supper at the fire hall, and we stuff ourselves with fried oysters and potato salad and coleslaw and lemon pie. Well, Bridget, Zach, and I do. Felix mostly pushes his food around.

We walk across the street to the arena, where people are streaming inside. Felix is so distracted, he trips over his own feet.

“Whoa there, son,” a large man says, holding Felix’s arm to keep him upright.

“Ray,” Felix says, giving him a hug. “Good to see you.”

Ray has an auburn beard sprinkled with white, sun-worn skin, and bourbon eyes. His T-shirt is the same green as Felix’s hat. It takes me a second to see McINNIS SEAFOOD written across its chest, and another to put it all together. Ray is Joy’s dad.

“Look who’s here,” Felix says.

Ray’s smile grows as he pulls Bridget to him. “It’s been too long, girl. But you’re too thin,” he says. “They don’t feed you back in Toronto?”

Bridget pats his belly. “Not as good as they do at home.” Ray lets out a deep laugh, as if it comes from the bottom of a well.

“Good to see both young Clarks here. Brings back memories,” Ray says after Felix introduces me. “I’ll never forget the night you took home junior shucker. You were, what, eighteen?”

“Seventeen,” Felix says.

“Seventeen.” Ray shakes his head. He puts one large hand around Felix’s shoulder. “Watching you win was one of the proudest moments of my life.”

“Mine, too,” Felix says solemnly.

“Well, I better find the wife. She gets antsy before the grading contest. Good luck tonight, son.”

“Thanks, Ray,” Felix says. “Break a leg.”

“So that was Joy’s dad,” I say to Felix as we head inside the arena behind Bridget and Zach.

“Uh-huh.” He’s preoccupied, his gaze pinging around the crowd.

“And the founding member of your fan club. He really likes you.”

He looks at me then. “Yeah,” Felix says. “Ray’s all right.”

The arena is already half-full when we get inside. Everyone is gathered on the concrete surface where the ice will become winter. There’s a stage at one end, a couple hundred folding chairs arranged in front. Canopied stalls are set up at the back of the space—a bar, an oyster station. Guns N’ Roses plays over the sound system, and volunteers mill about in bright red tyne valley oyster festival T-shirts.

I am absurdly overdressed. Most people are in cotton tees and shorts. Flip-flops or sneakers. I, on the other hand, have put on a silk smoking dress covered in oversize poppies, which I’d tucked into my suitcase on the unlikely chance Bridget wanted to go into Charlottetown for a night out. I did a cat eye.