“So, anything you want to tell me?” Jack asks, leaving me to assume the rest of the question, which I’m not going to do.
“Not that I know of.” I plunge the sponge into the soapy water and get to work on the propellers. A couple of bubbles float out of the bucket and Moose tries to catch them in his mouth. He winds up falling off the dock with a big splash.
Jack chuckles at him and we both watch as he swims to shore so he can resume his post as bubble catcher. “Where were we?” Grandpa Jack picks up where he left off. “Oh, right. Anything happen between you and that lovely actress while you were up at the cabin?”
“Nope,” I lie. No good can come from telling my grandfather anything personal. He doesn’t understand why I’ve chosen to live alone, and he certainly doesn’t condone it.
“Hmph. Well, you’re no fun, But I knew that.” He hooks one thumb through his belt loop and stares off into the horizon.
“I see you decided to take your own advice, though,” I tell him, referring to the redhead I saw him with earlier.
A smile crosses his face, causing it to wrinkle a little more. “Savannah’s quite the looker, isn’t she?”
I don’t answer on account of not wanting to be rude. “Is she going to be my new grandma?” I tease.
“Ha! She’s a tourist.” After a long pause, he adds, “A really fun tourist.”
“You’re a wily old coot, do you know that?” I get started scrubbing the doors.
“Speaking of tourists, any idea where Harper went this afternoon?” Nice segue, Grandpa.
I freeze in place for a second. “Did she go out?” I’m trying to keep my voice casual, but I’m not sure if I’m succeeding.
“She borrowed the Toyota.”
“Maybe she had to run into town for something,” I answer, hoping like hell she hasn’t gone to Brett’s. I saw him drive off with the kids earlier.
“She looked pretty excited,” he says. “I think maybe she might have been headed to the Steel Trap or something.” The Steel Trap is Gamble’s excuse for a nightlife. Call me crazy, but eight bar stools, six tables, and an old jukebox that doesn’t play any music after the eighties, doesn’t a nightlife make.
My stomach flips at the thought. “I think it’s a little early to go out drinking, Grandpa Jack.”
“Depends on what’s going on in your life. Seems to me Harper has earned herself an extra cocktail or four.” Sounds like Evie has caught him up on all the Hollywood dish.
“That she has,” I tell him.
“I’ve been thinking about Shelby lately.” Grandpa Jack changes the subject with all the grace of a rhinoceros on roller skates.
Icy fingers of dread crawl up the base of my neck. I will not engage with him on this subject. “You can think about whoever you want to,” I tell him. “That’s the nice thing about thoughts, they stay in your head.” Hint, hint.
“I saw her mom in the market the other day.”Andhe’s still talking. “She said Shelby’s moving home from Minneapolis this summer.” I don’t respond. “Looks like the big city doesn’t suit her after all.”
“Hand me the hose, will ya?”
“Did you hear what I said?” he demands hotly. “Shelby Mayfair is coming home.”
“Why is that any of my concern?” I finally turn to face him. “Shelby is my past. I couldn’t care less if she was moving to Mars.”
“You loved her once, Digger.”
“I was a kid. Plus, I learned my lesson with girls like her.” I don’t like feeling bitter, but that’s the only emotion Shelby invokes in me.
“Not every gal is like your mother, son. It full-on broke all our hearts when Donna left us to go pursue her dreams.”
“While I’m sure itwashard on everyone,” I tell him, “Moira and I were the ones who lost our mother. It was only a few years later that Grandma died, then Dad. It seems to me that my sister and I have had about all the loss we can take.” I don’t mention Moira’s husband, or I might cry like a baby for all my sister has had to endure.
Grandpa Jack walks right over to me and wraps his arms around me. Once upon a time, I felt safe and secure in his strong embrace. Now I just feel sad. One of these days he’ll be gone, too. That’ll leave me as the old man of the family. And that is not a circumstance I can make heads or tails out of.
“You got dealt a bad hand, son,” Grandpa Jack tells me. “But to succeed in life, you can’t sit around counting the kicks to your teeth. You can’t wallow. Every time you’re knocked down, you have to stand up and get right back to fighting.”