“Pizza for dinner?” Mom stood at the doorway, eyeing the poster but saying nothing.
“They have pizza?” Barry’s Bay hadn’t looked big enough to have delivery. And, it turned out, it wasn’t, so we drove to the takeout-only Pizza Pizza, located in a corner of one of the town’s two grocery stores.
“How many people live here?” I asked Mom. It was seven p.m., and most of the businesses on the main drag looked closed.
“About one thousand two hundred, though I expect it’s probably triple that in the summer with all the cottagers,” she said. With the exception of a crowded restaurant patio, the town was pretty much deserted. “The Tavern must be the place to be on a Saturday night,” she commented, slowing down as we passed.
“It looks like it’s the only place to be,” I replied.
By the time we got back, Dad had the small TV set up. There was no cable, but we had packed our family DVD collection.
“I was thinking The Great Outdoors,” said Dad. “Seems appropriate, don’t you think, kiddo?”
“Hmm . . .” I crouched down to inspect the contents of the cabinet. “The Blair Witch Project would also be appropriate.”
“I’m not watching that,” Mom said, setting out plates and napkins next to the pizza boxes on the coffee table.
“The Great Outdoors it is,” said Dad, popping it into the player. “Classic John Candy. What could be better?”
The wind had picked up outside, moving through the pine boughs, and waves were now traveling across the lake’s surface. The breeze coming through the windows smelled like rain.
“Yeah,” I said, taking a bite of my slice. “This is actually pretty great.”
* * *
A BOLT OF lightning zigged through the sky, illuminating the pines and the lake and the hills of the far shore, like someone had taken a flash photo with a giant camera. I watched the storm, transfixed, from my bedroom windows. The view was so much bigger than the wedge of sky I could see from my room in Toronto, the thunder so loud it seemed to be right above the cottage, as though it had been custom ordered for our first night. Eventually the deafening claps faded into distant rumbles, and I slipped back into bed, listening to the rain pelting the windows.
Mom and Dad were already downstairs when I woke the next morning, momentarily confused by the bright sun coming through the windows and ripples of light moving across the ceiling. They sat, coffees at the ready, reading materials in hand—Dad in the armchair with an issue of The Economist, scratching his beard absentmindedly, and Mom on a stool at the kitchen counter, flipping through a thick design magazine, her oversized red-framed glasses balancing on the tip of her nose.
“Hear that thunder last night, kiddo?” Dad asked.
“Kinda hard to miss,” I said, grabbing a box of cereal from the still mostly empty cupboards. “I don’t think I got a lot of sleep.”
After breakfast, I filled a canvas tote with supplies—a novel, a couple of magazines, lip balm, and a tube of SPF 45—and headed down to the lake. Though it had poured the night before, the dock was already dry from the morning sun.
I placed my towel down and slathered sunscreen all over my face, then lay on my stomach, face propped on my hands. There wasn’t another dock for maybe another 150 meters on one side, but the one in the other direction was relatively close. There was a rowboat tied to it and a raft floating further out from shore. I pulled out my paperback and picked up from where I left off the night before.
I must have fallen asleep because I was suddenly jerked awake by a loud splash and the sound of boys yelling and laughing.
“I’ll get you!” one shouted.
“Like you could!” a deeper voice taunted.
Splash!
Two heads bobbed in the lake next to the neighbor’s raft. Still lying on my belly, I watched them climb onto the raft, taking turns launching themselves off in flips and dives and flops. It was early July, but they were both bronzed already. I guessed they were brothers and that the smaller, skinny one was probably close to my age. The older boy stood a head above him, shadows hinting at lean muscles running along his torso and arms. When he tossed the younger one over his shoulder into the water, I sat up laughing. They hadn’t noticed me until then, but now the older boy stood looking in my direction with a big smile across his face. The smaller one climbed up on the raft beside him.
“Hey!” the older boy shouted with a wave.
“Hi!” I yelled back.
“New neighbor?” he called over.