“It’s not that I don’t like him—he’s been sweet.”
“Good, Percy. He should be,” he said with a hint of exasperation.
“I know. That’s not the issue.” I looked down at my half-eaten bagel. “I told you before—I like someone else more.”
“The same guy you emailed about?” Sam asked quietly as I moved sesame seeds scattered on my plate with my finger. “Percy?”
“Yep, same one,” I replied without looking up.
“Does he know?” I looked up at Sam. I couldn’t tell if he knew we were talking about him. His expression was impassive.
“I’m not sure,” I said. “He can be hard to read.”
We finished breakfast in silence, and then I changed into a racer-back swimsuit Mom had bought. She had decided swimming was the perfect hobby and wanted me to try out for the swim team in the fall. I was considering it.
You couldn’t call it a nice day—it was muggy and overcast, but at least the lake was flat.
“You seem a lot less antsy today than you did last year,” I said as we stepped onto the Floreks’ dock.
“I actually had nightmares about it for a full week before you did that swim,” he said. “I thought you were going to drown and that I wouldn’t be able to save you. Now I know you can do it without breaking a sweat.” He kicked off his shoes and pulled his shirt over his head, leaving both on the dock. He rolled his shoulders in backward circles a few times.
“And now you’ve got all that,” I said, motioning at his bare torso, the shadows playing off the ridges of his chest and stomach. He chuckled.
“I’ll do a couple of warm-up laps with you, and then we’ll head out?”
“Whatever you say, Coach.”
Sometime while we were at the water, Sue and Charlie had come out onto the deck with coffees. I waved at them from the water while Sam got the boat ready. And then, giving each other a thumbs-up, we set off.
It wasn’t easy, but it wasn’t as hard as last summer, either. I didn’t need to switch strokes or slow down—I kept a steady, rhythmic pace. My legs were tired but didn’t feel as though they were going to drag me to the bottom of the lake with their weight, and my shoulders ached but the pain didn’t consume me. When I reached the shore, I sat in the shallow water catching my breath while Sam pulled the boat up on the beach.
“Seven minutes faster than last year!” he announced, hopping out of the boat, dropping a cooler bag on the sand, and sitting in the water beside me, his skin slick with sweat. “I think your mom’s right; you should join the swim team. You didn’t even stop to catch your breath!”
“Says the guy who practically runs a marathon every morning,” I panted.
“Exactly.” Sam grinned. “I should know.” He passed me a cold bottle of water, and I chugged half, handing the rest to him to finish off. The wind was starting to pick up and the air smelled thick.
“Looks like it could finally rain,” I said, watching the breeze dance through the leaves of a poplar.
“That’s the rumor. Mom says a big storm is supposed to hit,” Sam said, wrapping his arms around his knees. “Too bad she needs me to work an extra shift, otherwise we could do a scary movie night.”
“Blair Witch!” I suggested.
“Totally. How have we not done that one yet?”
“Well, I have, many times,” I said.
“Obviously.”
“But never with you,” I added.
“A huge oversight,” Sam replied.
“The hugest.” We grinned.
I was almost catatonic by the time I got back to the cottage, my belly bloated from one of Sue’s epic breakfasts and my body completely drained. I passed out on the couch and didn’t wake up until well after five, which meant Sam would already be at the Tavern, whereas I had the night off. My parents left me home alone all the time in the city, but they were always around when we were at the lake. I had fallen asleep so quickly the night before that it had barely registered that they were gone. Now I wasn’t quite sure what to do with myself.
Groggy, I shuffled into the bathroom and splashed water on my face, then slurped the cold liquid from my hands. I headed down to the lake with a notebook and sat on one of the Muskoka chairs at the foot of the dock. The wind had picked up since morning and was throwing whitecaps over the gray water. I jotted down a few ideas for my next story, but soon raindrops began to fall on the pages, and I was chased inside.