I looked over at Izzy squatted at the base of the dune. “Mary Jane!” she shouted. “Come pee in the sand!”
Suddenly I did want to pee in the sand. Just for fun. Just because the nudest I’d ever been in public was two weeks ago when I put on my bra in the dark beside my own house. I looked toward the car. Dr. and Mrs. Cone were pulling out suitcases and placing them on the driveway. Jimmy was carrying a brown-and-mustard-patterned suitcase toward the house. He looked back at me and said, “Go for it, Mary Jane!”
Before I could think it through, I ran to Sheba and Izzy. They were both standing now, with their pants pulled up.
“Do you have to pee?” Sheba asked.
“Yeah.”
“It’s like being a cat. You just kick sand over it when you’re done.” Sheba kicked sand over the big, wet oval near her feet. Even though I had gotten used to being with Sheba, my brain dinged a little alarm that said, You’re looking at Sheba’s pee.
Izzy tried to kick sand over her wet circle. She was barefoot and her toes kept hitting the pee spot.
“Can you barricade me from their view?” I asked.
“Yes!” Izzy shouted. “What does that mean?”
“Stand in front of her so no one can see.” Sheba moved so she stood between me and the house. Izzy positioned herself beside Sheba.
I backed up a bit so I wouldn’t pee on their feet, and then pulled down my shorts. The hot sun on my bare butt was a totally new feeling. When I was done, I quickly pulled up my shorts and then kicked sand over my spot.
“Can we poop?” Izzy asked.
“No!” Sheba and I said together.
The house was mostly on one floor, with a small second floor that had only a bedroom with a sitting room. The five remaining bedrooms were on the first floor, lining a long hallway. Some of the bedrooms shared a bathroom and some had their own bathroom. Mrs. Cone told Sheba and Jimmy they had to take the second-floor room, and they did. She and Dr. Cone took the front-most bedroom, facing the beach. This left four bedrooms for me and Izzy.
Izzy took my hand. “Will you share a room with me?”
“Sure.” I had been wondering what I was supposed to do after Izzy went to sleep. Was I to join the adults, or stay in my room? Even if Izzy and I shared a room, I could go in another bedroom to read.
Izzy pulled me into the room next to Dr. and Mrs. Cone’s. “Do you think there’s a witch here?” She dropped my hand and turned in a circle. The room had two single beds with anchor-print bedspreads that matched the wallpaper.
I turned in a circle too. Then I dropped to my knees and flipped up the bed skirt on the first one, and then the other bed. “No. There’s definitely no witch here.”
In the next room we looked again for the witch. This room had rowboat-and-fish wallpaper that matched the rowboat-and-fish bedspreads. The bedside lamps each had a copper rowboat for a base.
The next room had a double bed with daisy-print wallpaper and a solid white bedspread with lacy scalloped edges.
“Witch?” Izzy asked.
“Hmm, I dunno. But I don’t like this room. Don’t you think we should be in a beachier room since we are, actually, at the beach?”
The last room had beach-ball-and-beach-umbrella-print wallpaper with matching bedspreads. Izzy and I agreed that although it was beachy, it was too colorful to be peaceful.
“Rowboats or anchors?” I said.
“Rowboats,” Izzy said.
Once Izzy and I had finished unpacking, I took the week’s worth of recipe cards I had brought to the dining room table and read them to Izzy. She wanted to pick the order of meals. The dining room was open to the kitchen, where Mrs. Cone and Sheba were unpacking the bags of groceries—mostly snacks—we’d brought. They were talking about Jimmy and his progress. The way they spoke made Jimmy sound like a little boy—taking responsibility, learning to be alone, figuring out how to sit still with his thoughts, stopping himself and thinking before he takes action. I was glad Jimmy wasn’t around to hear them.
Dr. Cone walked onto the screened porch off the kitchen. “BONNIE!” he shouted in.
“WHAT?!” Mrs. Cone shouted back.
Dr. Cone lowered his voice. “What if we worked here?”
Mrs. Cone and Sheba walked into the screened porch. Izzy and I watched. Sheba thought it was too public and the rest of us would feel banned from the house.
Jimmy came downstairs, wearing his jean shorts and nothing else, and sat at the table with me and Izzy. Hanging from his neck was the leather-and-feather necklace. In his hand was a wide-brimmed straw hat with a red bandanna-print scarf tied around it. The hat looked like it belonged to a woman. “What are you two up to?” he asked.