The Last Summer Before Whatever Happens Next, page 7
The Canadian flag.
CHAPTER TEN
I ran back below. “Pep, Pep, wake up. We’re in Canada, Pepper, wake up!” I could hear myself sounding panicky and shrill.
“What? What the hell?” Pepper leapt up and followed me on deck, where I pointed to the red and white flag—its giant maple leaf waving in greeting.
“God almighty, Uncle Chet, what the hell have you done now?” she said.
“How long have we been asleep? We’ve got to get the hell out of here wherever we are. I’ll get Cheddar. See if anyone else is here. You wake up Uncle Chet; he likes you.”
With that, she jumped down below and shouted for Cheddar to wake up. He was up in a flash with the binoculars, scanning the buildings on the shore. No Coast Guard or harbormaster around yet.
“Mr. Toohey,” I whispered in a sing-song, nudging the giant of a man as his body ebbed and flowed with his snores. I moved the raincoat off his head.
“Mr. Toohey … Chet … Chet … Uncle Chet!” I spoke variations of his name louder and louder. He finally opened one eye and looked at me with one big blue eye. I didn’t know why, but he kind of reminded me of a whale.
“Flipper. Flipper,” he said, patting the side of my face. “You’re a grand girl. A grand girl. A credit to your dad. God, I love ya,” The great blue eye shut again, and the snoring resumed.
“He’ll be out for hours,” Pepper said with disgust.
“We’re in New Brunswick,” Cheddar said.
“No shit, Sherlock. I had a feeling it wasn’t Vancouver.”
“That means we’ve got to deal with Fundy tides. Looks pretty high now,” Cheddar said. “Where’s that whirlpool?”
“What whirlpool?” I gulped.
“Only the biggest one in the western hemisphere,” Pepper chimed in. “Did you flunk geography, Valedictorian?” I didn’t know if she was angry with me or just teasing. It was hard to tell with her.
“Anybody know the time?” she asked.
I picked up Uncle Chet’s hand and read the watch on his wrist.
“It’s almost noon,” I said.
“Our time. One in the afternoon Atlantic time,” Cheddar said.
“How’s the fuel?”
“Almost gone,” Cheddar said.
“That was probably a blessing,” Pepper said.
“A blessing?” I asked.
“Yeah. Who knows where we would have ended up if we had more fuel. He probably stopped here when he saw it was nearly gone. See if you can turn him over. Get under there, and see if his wallet’s in his back pocket,” Pepper said to me.
“Me?! I can’t put my hand in his pocket!”
“Go on, he likes you,” she said.
“You can’t move him. I’ve tried. And ten to one he doesn’t have any wallet or ID on him or anything. Everything goes on his tab. And he’s got tabs almost everywhere, but definitely not here,” Cheddar said.
“We’ll have to sail out of here. Do you know how to sail?” Pepper asked me.
“You know I don’t.”
“Oh yeah. But you sailed that Sunfish; you did alright for your first time,” she said.
“Which one is port again?” I asked her. She turned me toward the bow and wiggled my left hand with more patience than I figured I was entitled to after asking such a question. I grabbed a marker I found in the console and wrote a big P on the back of my left hand and a big S on the back of my right.
“Great. Just don’t turn around, Einstein. You take the helm. Cheddar and I will crew. You just turn the way we say to, and if he ever gets up, he can take over.”
My stomach lurched at the thought of piloting the Plunger. I may not know anything about sailing, but I knew that the Bay of Fundy was a peculiar place with strange tides. And that whirlpool—I did not want to be within fifty miles of that thing.
“What’s this guy want?” Cheddar muttered. We all looked to see an official-looking boat carrying an official-looking man toward us.
“Hmm. I don’t know. I think he’s just some guy,” Pepper said.
“No, he’s somebody. Harbormaster or something. Maybe a Mountie,” Cheddar said.
“I don’t even have a driver’s license!” I said, feeling the sweat suddenly burst from my underarms.
“That’s the least of our worries. Uncle Chet’s wanted in Canada.”
“What?!”
“Totaled a car. It wasn’t even his,” Pepper said.
“It wasn’t even him!” Cheddar shouted. I jumped. I had never heard him speak above his low-energy mumble.
“Yeah, stupid Scout. We were at a wedding in St. Andrews,” Pepper muttered. “Scout was so bombed he got in the wrong car and drove it into a rock. Uncle Chet took the blame so Scout wouldn’t lose the internship in the Senate.”
“Gran was so pissed she tried to marry Scout off to some bow-wow in a bigwig family up here, but he wouldn’t take the bait. And neither would they.”
“Uncle Chet was supposed to go to court, but he decided it was best to blow it off. Seriously, Ched, throw that tarp over him,” Pepper barked. “That harbormaster is coming straight for us!” Then, she called to this foreign authority with a big smile on her face.
“Hi!”
“You folks from the US?”
“Yeah. We got lost. We thought we were in Eastport,” she lied. “We were just getting ready to head back. We’re not coming ashore. Are we at high tide now?”
“Oh yes. You better take advantage of it. The water empties right out.”
“What about the whirlpool?”
“The Old Sow—that’s in the other direction. I thought you were headed back to the States?”
“Yes, of course. We just didn’t want to run into it.”
“Hmm. It’s the largest whirlpool in the world. The Old Sow can suck a boat down like a toilet. Say, ‘the Plunger.’ That’s an interesting name.”
“We bought it from a family who makes plumbing supplies, pipes, toilets, that sort of thing. O’Toole, I think it was.”
“I think you mean Toohey! Oh sure; we have a Toohey. Worth every penny. My folks installed that in ’74 when they built the house, and my kids have flushed everything down from diapers to report cards. Still going strong. You say you bought this boat?”
“Our parents did. We had permission to sail up to Eastport. Oops.”
“I didn’t realize Eastport had a dress code,” the man said.
“What? These old things? Thrift store finds. We’ve been wearing them as a college dare,” Pepper said. I was amazed—and relieved—at the ease at which lies poured from her mouth.
Pepper smiled and nodded and, every once in a while, looked over at me and winked. And then I remembered I had cash.
“I have cash!” I shouted. The ticket money!
“You have cash? What for?” the man said.
“Fuel. We need to get fuel.” Pepper said. The man pointed to a fuel station, and Uncle Chet snored loudly.
“What was that?!” the man said.
“Look, a walrus!” I shouted.
The harbormaster turned.
“No, m’dear. We don’t have walruses here.” Duh. I knew that.
“Probably a harp or harbor seal,” he said.
“We should get fuel before we totally run out,” Pepper said. The harbormaster waved us on, and Cheddar steered us over to the fuel station. We spent all the ticket money and started home.
The hum of the motor woke Uncle Chet. He stretched and stood up as we passed under the Passamaquoddy Bay Bridge, as if his internal compass indicated it was now safe for him to emerge. He pulled up his shorts, which were sagging halfway down his butt, and walked over to Cheddar, and they whispered a bit.
Uncle Chet wanted to stop in a port where he had an open bar tab. The place was closed, but Chet poked around until he found the owner doing paperwork in an office, and he agreed to open up and make us something to eat. We had to use a back door that was flanked by piles of empty booze crates and smelly old produce boxes.
As bright as the day was, stepping inside the bar was like stepping into the night. It was dark, cool, and smelled like old beer and mildew. We sat at the bar on twirly stools, and the owner put on the morning news. While the Tooheys all stared silently at it, I stole away and used the pay phone to call my dad.
“Uh, Dad.”
“Good morning, my social butterfly! I didn’t want to wake you, so I’m sorry I headed out without saying goodbye.”
“I’m not home. I—I had a sleepover with Pepper,” I said. Technically, it was sort of true. I couldn’t tell him the whole truth just now. He’d worry too much. Someday, I’d tell him the grandest Toohey story of all time. Just not now. Once upon a time, just north of the border, I woke up in Canada, I would tell him someday. After college. Maybe when he was in a rest home.
“Of course, I should have thought of that,” he said.
“We’re going for a sail. I don’t know what time we’ll be back. It might be really late. I might be sleeping over again,” I said, adding to my pile of almost-truths. It occurred to me that as a goody two-shoes with no social life for seventeen years, I had never had reason or cause to lie to my dad about anything. But standing in the office of a closed bar wearing a ball gown on a Sunday afternoon, it seemed like a good place to start, and I was surprised by how good I was at it.
“You’re a big girl now. You’ll be eighteen soon. I trust you to make your own decisions. This is just the kind of summer I wanted you to have. And with the Tooheys no less.”
“Bye, Dad.”
I felt terrible for lying. But I didn’t want him to think ill of Uncle Chet. Or worry. Or spoil my fun.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
After breakfast—or whatever that meal counted as—Uncle Chet perked up and took the helm. I didn’t trust him, so I stayed close by, sitting on the bench where he had slept and watching the shoreline. What if he got drunk again? I didn’t want to wake up in the Azores. Not today anyway. Not that I could even tell where we were. At least when you are driving down the road, you see signs that tell you where you are and how many miles to your next exit. Here, I had no clue. I figured as long as I could still see the shore—and the shore stayed on the same side of the boat—we had to be heading home.
I had grown so used to the familiar arc of Keech Harbor and Hazard Point that I hardly noticed them anymore. But these coves and headlands were all strangers to me. Their hills and curves were exotic configurations of rock and pine and shoreline and utterly new to me, although they really weren’t very far from where I had lived my whole life. My dad had been all over Down East Maine blueberry picking when he was my age, but I was hardly ever out of Keech—except for camps. I understood now why people came here on vacation. It was all incredibly beautiful.
Cheddar came and sat next to me. We sat in silence for a few moments.
“Are you going to be a CPA like your dad?” he asked.
“No. I’m going to study finance.”
“Uh-huh.”
“How about you? What’s your major?”
“Undeclared, I guess. I dunno,” he shrugged. “I’m going to work in the family biz so it doesn’t really matter what I major in.” He was back to his soft-spoken mumble, as if he didn’t want to commit to anything he said.
“You could study anything?”
“Yeah. Rocks for jocks. Frigging basket weaving if I felt like it. Whatever. I dunno. Where will you work after college?”
“I don’t know.” I laughed when I said it. What a funny question. How would I know that?
“That’s kinda cool, not knowing,” he said, and it hit me that, of course, his life was already mapped out for him.
“Does it bother you, having to work at the company? I mean, what if you wanted to do something else?”
“I don’t mind. I dunno. It’s not like I have some burning desire to be a doctor or anything. I figure the company pays for stuff, sailing, fun, prep school, college. Then it will be my turn to pay it forward for the next generation. I want my kids to grow up sailing and going to private school—no offense, not that there’s anything wrong with, you know, public school—”
“None taken. I was supposed to go to Pike’s school. But things happened.”
“Huh. That’s where I went, too. Imagine that. I wonder if we would have been friends. You’re way smarter than most of those girls I went to school with, by the way.”
Pepper joined us, squeezing in. It was the best place to sit on the Plunger, as it got the least spray and wind. “This is going to take for-frigging-ever,” she said.
“It’s okay. At least it’s a pretty day.” I shrugged.
“Chet’s making good time,” Cheddar said about his dad, as if he weren’t there, but he was just a few feet away at the helm. “He’ll get us home. He’s got a big meeting Tuesday.”
“Tuesday!” I shouted.
“Yeah, I mean we’ll probably get home late tonight, but I know for sure he’s got to be in Boston Tuesday morning.”
“How come it’s going to take longer to get home than get there?” I asked.
“This is the ocean, not Route 95!” Pepper shouted at me. “Who knows what time he left. Who knows what the tides and currents were like last night. Who knows what time we got there and how long we drifted around the bay.”
“Okay, Magellan, relax. We’re on our way home now,” Cheddar reassured her.
“Yeah, but while we’re up here tooling around, Meredith is digging her claws into Pike,” Pepper fumed.
“Give it up, Pep. People are gonna do what they wanna do,” Cheddar said.
“People hardly ever get to do what they wanna do,” she said, imitating his voice. “Oh look—shearwater!” Her mood changed instantly at the sight of the bird.
Cheddar ducked below deck and returned with binoculars, a guidebook, and a beat-up spiral notebook.
“Gannet!” I shouted, pointing starboard.
“How can you even tell? It just looks like a big gull,” she said.
“Audubon camp, three years in a row. See the black tips on his wings?” I pointed out like a true dork. “Northern gannets are the largest seabirds in the North Atlantic—they are in the same family as the brown- and red-footed boobies.” I couldn’t seem to stop myself until I heard Ched snort.
“Yeah,” he said, laughing and thumbing through the guide, “It says here they can have a wingspan over six feet!”
We took turns scanning, identifying, and jotting our bird observations in the notebook—species, date, location. We gave up when the herring gulls became so numerous that we didn’t notice anything else.
“I’m bored!” Pepper said and slammed the notebook down. “You’re pretty pink,” she said, her tone changing when she noticed my sunburn.
“So are you.”
Then we both looked at Cheddar.
“Holy crap, you’re cooked, Ched!” Pepper said.
“You’ve gotta get out of the sun, Ched,” I said.
We got up, took our stuff, and headed below deck. I paused at the top of the stairs.
“Don’t worry, he’ll get us home,” Cheddar whispered to me.
“Play cards? Crazy Eights? Gin rummy?” Pepper asked. We sat on the bed where we had slept, and Cheddar disappeared into the bathroom.
“Use spray!” She shouted at him.
I won at rummy, but Pepper ruled Crazy Eights. Then I fell asleep.
Sometime late Sunday night, we motored into Hazard Point. I woke up on the Plunger again, this time alone. Pepper was back at the big house. I wandered up the hill and found her in the kitchen, eating oatmeal for dinner. She was annoyed to find that Pike and Meredith had taken off alone somewhere and demanded to be chauffeured around trying to find them, but Cheddar refused.
“We’re all wiped, and I have to get Claire home,” he said. I didn’t ask, but I guess she didn’t have a license either. She must have been tired because she didn’t fight him on it. I followed Cheddar out to his dad’s massive Suburban. Uncle Chet snored in the back seat while Ched drove me home.
I was exhausted and sunburnt. My French twist had fallen out slowly over the journey home, spilling bobby pins all over the boat, but the layers of hair spray stayed, and the constant wind sculpted my hair into a rigid nest. Flo insisted on helping me comb out the knots. I think she was hoping to get some details out along with my snarls, but I didn’t say a word.
It was a quiet week. I didn’t hear a peep from the Point at all. I ran into Pixie at the library, and she said the crew had gone home to their real houses for a few days. I thought she would maybe want to get together and do something, but she didn’t offer.
But I did get a call. From Mom. I couldn’t wait to tell her all about graduation, my summer, the Admiral’s Ball, my scholarship, everything. Well, almost everything.
“Hey peanut! Imagine my surprise,” she began, “when I look in the mailbox and there’s my daughter on the cover of the New England Bee!”
“Mom, did you get the other clipping?”
“You were in the Bee twice?”
“No, the Keech Town Crier. My valedictorian picture. Didn’t you get it?”
“Oh, yes, I got that too. I am very proud of you. Your stepfather and I are both very proud of you.”
“I gave the valedictorian speech. I came in top in my class. Number one. I wish you had been there.” I couldn’t believe I blurted that out. It was true though. I had wished that.
“We couldn’t get away from work,” she said. “It was too close to the end of the fiscal year.” Whatever that meant.
“You could have called.”
“We sent a check … and I’m calling now!”
“All I did to get on the cover of the Bee was go to a party. In a borrowed dress.” Another sore spot between us. In town, it was a big event to go prom shopping. She missed that, too. It’s a day trip to a mall down the coast. Mine came from the Sears catalog. Meredith’s mother probably went with her. Probably told her how great she looked in everything.
