Perennials, page 17
Back at camp, he ran up the main drive, passing the empty horse arena and cutting through the dew-slippery athletic fields. Still not a person out. He turned the knob on his shower all the way to the right and stood under the ice-cold water for several minutes.
At flag raising, he stood beside the flagpole with his hand at his heart. An Aspen boy was unfolding the flag, and Chad watched from behind the boy, overseeing the whole thing. Jack wondered, in a brief patriotic moment, if he should instate a rule that would reserve that right for American counselors.
The girls were on one side of the green facing the flag and the boys on the other. They were ordered by their age sections, which were named, idiotically, after trees, from the young Maples in the front to the fourteen-year-old Evergreens at the back. He looked out at Rachel from the flagpole; her face was glistening in the heat, her cheeks adorably pink.
After the pledge, he asked, “Are there any announcements?”
Chad raised his hand, then ran it through his messy hair while he announced the coed boat race on Saturday night. Jack resumed his place in front of the flag, and the campers waited.
“I don’t need to tell you all it’s hot out today.” He told them to drink a lot of water and stay in the shade. He told them to take it slow, take it easy today. He remembered Rachel telling him, “You don’t look a day over thirty-eight.”
He clapped his hands together. “Let’s eat.”
Jack walked somewhere in the middle of the pack to the d-hall, watching the boys and girls sloppily flirting, nudging shoulders and elbows with one another, some girls pretending to be annoyed by it, before they split into two groups to go to their separate dining halls. Rachel walked arm in arm with Fiona, ignoring her campers, wearing those short denim shorts that shouldn’t be allowed. He was careful to watch her walking for just a few seconds, her narrow hips swaying back and forth, her pert ass contained in the tiny shorts. He had a moment of ego-stroking disbelief that he got to be the one to sleep with her night after night.
At breakfast, Jack sat at a table at the front of the boys’ dining hall with the male activity and section heads.
“Looks great,” he said to the kitchen boy serving plates of powdered eggs and cubed potatoes.
“You’re too nice,” Chad said to Jack once the kitchen boy had gone to the next group. “I have to eat these shit eggs one more time, I’ll be sick all over this table.”
Jack waved his fork at Chad. “These shit eggs buy you an extra few bucks in your paycheck.”
Chad changed the subject: He had found a bong made from a plastic water bottle, duct tape, and a hollowed-out pen in one of the Evergreen boys’ bathroom stalls. Jack was supposed to crack down on this sort of thing, but the truth was, the rebellious kids were from the richest families and had been going to Marigold forever; their parents sent them there summer after summer so they didn’t have to deal with them. Unless the board caught wind of it, you turned a blind eye.
“It wasn’t poorly done,” Chad said. “But I would have used an apple from d-hall. Less apparatus.”
“You still have it?” Brett, the head of swimming, asked.
The kitchen boy came to refill their coffees.
When he left, Brett asked with his mouth full of potatoes, “You all see Rachel’s shorts today?”
Chad nodded, raising his eyebrows, and went back to his shit eggs.
“Hey,” Jack said, louder than he’d intended, then lowered his voice, “this isn’t a locker room.”
Brett put his hands up. “Just saying what we were all thinking.”
“Well.” Jack stabbed a potato cube. “Keep it to yourself.”
He spent the rest of the breakfast in silence, except for an occasional request for someone to “pass the ketchup” so he could disguise the taste of the powdered eggs.
—
Sometime after lunch, he got in his golf cart and took a ride to the lake. Chad was sitting close to Rachel on the dock, their feet dangling over the edge. A dozen canoes and kayaks were out, kids rowing them unimpressively in circles.
Jack parked his golf cart and walked down the dock.
“Hiya, Chad,” he said. “Rachel.”
They looked up, sunglasses covering their eyes.
“Hey, Jack,” Chad said.
“You guys got some counselors out there on the boats?” He surveyed the scene, listening to the giggles and the unruly splashes coming from the lake. “Doesn’t look like it.” This was important, this act of establishing authority at the appropriate times.
“There’s some CITs out there,” Chad said. “Not to worry.”
“CITs aren’t counselors,” Jack said in his camp-director voice.
Rachel stood. She was wearing a simple black bathing suit, still sexy despite being a one-piece, and her hair was wild from the humidity.
“I can go out,” she said, seeming unfazed by Jack’s presence. “We were just discussing strategy for the boat race Saturday.”
“Strategy?” Jack smirked. “It’s a boat race. You’ve got your boats. You’ve got your start. You’ve got your finish.”
“Right, but…”
“Just get out there,” he said, nodding toward the water. Then he stayed standing at the edge of the dock and watched them approach an empty canoe on the shoreline. Rachel walked to the front of the boat and sat on the bench at the bow as Chad, ankle-deep in muddy water, pushed the boat out of the muck. She craned her neck toward Jack, briefly—had he been too much of an asshole just then?—and he began to nod in recognition of her, but as Chad lumbered in, she turned around and faced the water, picked up a paddle, and rowed.
—
Jack went to the staff lodge that night. Rachel shared a chair with Chad at the table nearest the AC, one butt cheek on him and her other leg dangling, her toes tapping the ground. They were giggling as Jack pulled up a chair, sat across from them, and began to shuffle the cards sitting on the table. Eight other counselors, guys and girls, sat at the round table.
“Five-card draw,” Jack said. “Who’s in?”
Both Rachel and Chad played. Jack won two of the four rounds. The first was a lucky hand. Chad won the second round only because he had somehow landed a full house; the guy had no poker face. The third, Jack stayed in, and everyone else backed down, and he collected without revealing his hand, nothing but a pair of threes. The fourth hand, only Rachel and Jack were left in a showdown. Her face stayed dispassionate as she placed her hand on the table faceup, showing a straight.
Jack had three kings. He’d thought he had her.
“Can’t win ’em all, Jack,” she said, and scooped up the chips.
“Good thing it’s not real money.” He winked, because even though they all kept tallies of their wins and losses, it was accepted knowledge that everyone went in on a staff party at the end of the summer and called it even.
“Good thing,” she said. She whispered something into Chad’s ear; he kissed her on the cheek, and she stood and waved to the group. “I’m going to bed, guys,” she said, and made toward the back door.
Usually she went back to her section with the other Hemlock counselors at the end of the night, then snuck down to Jack’s cabin after everyone was asleep.
He counted to thirty in his head. “Ya know what? I’m beat, kids.”
Outside, he caught her halfway up the hill and grabbed her elbow, entirely unconcerned with being seen. This was, he was learning, part of the fun of it—he felt like he was invincible, like he was getting away with it, over and over.
She started before she turned. “You scared me,” she said, eyes wide, then looked around. “Not a good idea for you to follow me.”
“We’re fine,” he said, gesturing at the dark, empty camp and then tracing his fingers down her arm. “I’ll see you later?”
She let out a loud yawn. “I’m exhausted, Jack.”
“We can just sleep if you want,” he said.
She shook her head. “I’m really not in the mood.”
“Of course,” he said, nodding emphatically. “Next time, then.”
She frowned; Jack couldn’t tell, as he searched her darkened face, whether she was regretting her answer just then or regretting that anything had happened at all.
—
And so she did not come to his bed that night or the next. By Saturday, the heat still had not broken.
At the boat race, Jack welcomed everyone, and then Chad set the ground rules (“No horseplay. No going past the buoys. No going before my whistle. No standing in the boats.”), and the kids went out in coed teams: a girl and a boy from the same section in each canoe.
Jack stood on the dock, wearing his Camp Marigold polo and cheering for the kids. Al Billings walked over and stood next to him.
“Some heat we had this week, huh, boss?” Al said.
“You’re tellin’ me.”
After they exchanged a few more pleasantries, Al lowered his voice. “I wanted to ask you—well, Lucy wanted to ask you, really—are you seeing anyone?” Lucy was Al’s wife.
Jack looked over Al’s shoulder—he hoped imperceptibly—at Rachel standing on the shoreline in her bathing suit and shorts, hands cupped around her mouth as she cheered on her girls.
“Well,” Jack said, “it’s complicated.”
“Recent breakup?”
“Not quite,” Jack said. “Just going through a rough patch.”
Al nodded. “A long time since I’ve been single,” he said. “But if you change your mind or things don’t work out, Lucy’s friend has a daughter, recent divorce. A bit younger than you. Very pretty.”
“Thanks, Al,” Jack said. “I think this is just a bump in the road.”
—
That night, Jack decided to get beer for everyone as a thank-you for doing what they could with the heat that week and for making the boat race happen without a hitch; it also might loosen things up between Rachel and him. He drove to the nearest gas station and picked up two cases of Natty Light. He didn’t care if it tasted like water; it reminded him of high school parties after football games and of the early nights of his and Laura’s marriage, when he would drink three, four, five while watching a game on TV in the basement, and she, pregnant and glowing, would lay her swollen feet on his lap.
“The party’s here,” Jack said, entering through the downstairs door, lifting one of the cases. The glistening teens and twentysomethings cheered from near the AC. It was like the first time he had come into the lodge during staff training, but then they were cheering just for him. Now it was for the beer. For a second, Jack felt like a corrupter, like a creep, but then he reminded himself: They’d be having fun anyway, without you. Jack caught Rachel’s eye, and she quickly turned her head. Chad, who had his hand on her waist, was looking in another direction.
This time they played Kings, which got everyone drunk fast. As Jack drank, he felt himself leaning too far across the table, talking too loudly, pointing fingers at people who weren’t drinking enough. He kept reaching into the case of beer next to him. Rachel sat across the table from him, drinking steadily. Her chair was next to Chad’s, and their knees were touching slightly, but she had a bored look about her and seemed moved by neither man’s presence.
She eventually got up without a word and walked to the bathroom down a darkened hallway off the downstairs room. Jack stood. “Gotta piss.” He caught the bathroom door before she closed it. He shut and locked it behind him, turned her around, and pinned her against it, thrusting his tongue into her mouth.
“You’re drunk, Jack,” she said when he pulled back. But then she smiled as if to say she didn’t mind.
“I’ve been wanting to fuck you for days,” he whispered into her ear, then licked it.
“This is interesting,” she said.
He slid his hand up her dress and between her legs, and she fell into the touch. He worked furiously, panting. At the end, she let out a sigh and then stood straighter, as if suddenly remembering where she was.
“You’re so beautiful,” he said, putting his arms around her and nuzzling his nose into the side of her face.
“Stop, Jack,” she said, straightening out her dress.
“I’m serious,” he said, using one hand to move her chin so she faced him. “Watching you just then was the most beautiful thing I’ve ever seen.” He didn’t mean for it to sound like a line. In that moment, he meant it.
She moved the hand away and walked to the mirror above the sink to check her reflection. She ran cool water from the faucet and splashed it onto her face.
“Am I missing something?” he said from the door while she cleaned off her eye makeup with a paper towel. She stopped with the towel between her fingers and looked at him in the mirror. “What the hell is your problem all of a sudden?”
When she turned around to face him, he saw her sad, pitying face—still pink from the orgasm or maybe from the heat. Right then, he knew it had ended, that he had ruined it at the very moment he had shown he was angry, and hurt. He wanted to believe that this had to do with her age and nothing to do with him, but he knew that wanting what you couldn’t have and not wanting what you could never really stopped. He’d taken it that one step too far, and now he was no longer a confident older man but a lonely one.
“I just…” She bit her lower lip and shifted her weight unsteadily. “I can’t sleep at your house every night, Jack. I don’t want anything serious. I’m nineteen.”
He stood against the door.
“Jack, I’m really drunk.”
“What makes you think I do?” he said, feeling his body shaking.
She shook her head. “I have to pee.” She watched him until he had no choice but to leave.
—
He walked out of the bathroom, got back to the table, and drank another Natty Light. The game had ended, so he sat there drinking while the others were laughing with their heads back and jaws hanging loose. A few were leaving, and he mumbled good nights as they passed him, offering quick, shifty nods. Rachel appeared who knew how much later from the bathroom and walked upstairs. Chad got up from the poker table and dutifully followed.
Soon after, Jack followed too, bringing his case of beer with him and splaying himself out on one of the lounge chairs. Chad and Rachel were sitting next to each other on one of the couches.
Jack slurped from can after can, wiping his brow with the back of his hand and pretending not to watch Chad and Rachel talk and inch closer to each other. Soon it was only the three of them in the upstairs lounge. Rachel looked distraught and wasted, and started falling asleep on Chad’s shoulder.
“You all right, Jack?” Chad said at one point.
“Fine,” he said.
“All right.” He jerked his head toward a dozing Rachel. “I’m gonna walk this one back. I think we’re the only ones left.”
Jack belched. Chad shook Rachel awake, took her arm, and led her out. Jack counted to twenty and followed, taking a beer with him.
“I need to go to bed,” Jack heard Rachel whine.
Chad said, “I’m taking you there,” but he was leading her toward the woods behind the performing arts building. Jack started to walk down the slope toward his cabin but stopped at the edge of the forest. He hid behind a giant sycamore and watched Chad and Rachel move into the woods.
They walked ahead a little longer, and Jack kept a close but respectable distance, fifty feet or so, just close enough to make out the outlines of their bodies under what he figured had to be a full moon ahead.
Soon the crunching of leaves beneath their feet stopped, and he could make out their two bodies against the base of a tree. He stood still, his breathing shallow and almost silent. He could see the silhouettes of their writhing bodies: Rachel’s head moving left and right against the tree, her entire figure anchored to the trunk save for the arched small of her back, which Chad held with one hand. His other arm was outstretched and steadied against the tree’s base, the hand landing just next to her lolling head. Her hands roamed from Chad’s head to his neck to his shoulders and lower back and ass, and her hips moved forward and back as Chad held up the folds of her dress.
Jack could hear Rachel whimpering and Chad grunting. Soon the grunts began to quicken as he thrust into her faster and faster until finally he let out a low, drunken moan.
Afterward, Chad moved his face into Rachel’s neck, but she pushed him away. She tucked her hair behind her ears and brushed dirt off the back of her dress. She said something to Chad and began to walk ahead of him, toward the edge of the woods. Chad buttoned his pants and followed.
And then, Rachel stopped. She held herself still, and Chad, probably thinking she was waiting for him, put his arms on her shoulders from behind. She shrugged them off and said something else, and then he dropped his hands at his side and stood like a soldier at attention.
Jack savored the moment. He walked toward them slowly, deliberately, suddenly sober. He was breathing heavy now, filled with purpose, an old man in charge.
He looked into Chad’s eyes and then Rachel’s.
“You’re both fired,” he said, and he let those words hang in the air. He watched them fall onto Chad’s and Rachel’s stunned faces—Rachel’s incredulous, crestfallen, beautiful face. Chad began to open his mouth, but Jack did not let him speak.
“Pack your things,” Jack said, already walking away.
—
Jack got back to his cabin and surveyed it, austere and modest and his. He turned on his fan, dropped onto his bed, and immediately fell asleep, sound and alone, on top of his sheets.
In the morning he found himself in the previous night’s clothes, the sheets soaked with sweat. He turned on his transistor radio—today, the heat would break, the man said—and put on clean boxers, made himself coffee, and looked out onto the still-quiet camp. Today he took his coffee cup and walked around the back porch, which faced his vegetable garden.
His garden. He had somehow forgotten about it, neglected it over the last week. For a moment, he worried the heat had killed everything.
He walked down the few steps to the garden. Miraculously, his cucumbers were still growing in greens of all shades. The peppers too were fleshy and full, and there were little baby peppers growing from new stems on the same plants. He went inside to get his colander, then returned and pulled the greener cucumbers and the redder peppers from their stalks.
