Chapter Five
The Gift
I didn’t have time to ponder my love life after all. My demons and skeletons all came busting up out of the grave before I was ready. And it wasn’t even my doing.
But before it all blew up, I did get one day’s reprieve, as Walt didn’t show up for work the morning after my date with Shea. He’d phoned my mother to say he had some business to handle regarding his home renovations, but would be in the following day. I’d woken up that morning, bracing myself to see him again, only to be relieved that I wouldn’t have to. I did, however, get a call from Shea later that evening, and I wasn’t ready for that either.
He couldn’t stop thinking about me, he said, then in the same aggressive fashion I’d experienced on our date, proceeded to seduce me over the phone. Lying on my bed, his voice in my ear, telling me in explicit detail what he’d like to do to me, my hand ended up in my sweatpants. We climaxed together, then had cozy pillow talk afterward. He was looking forward to taking me to his cousin’s engagement party, he said. Then he asked how I felt about getting a room together for that night. In my post jerk-off bliss, I agreed, but regretted it later when I was no longer drunk on phone sex.
It wasn’t that things were moving too fast exactly, because how could they be when we’d only had one date, and the nature of the relationship was purely casual, as agreed upon? That meant sex of course, and Shea made quite clear he was already itching for it. So why the hell was I hesitating? What kind of guy would turn his nose up at that offer? But Shea’s sexual intensity, combined with my tangled feelings over our shared past, had me wracked with indecision.
The following morning, when I started my daily chores, I was surprised to discover that Walt was already there; he’d arrived at the crack of dawn. Apparently he was serious about trying to work off his hours as soon as possible. As well as his willingness to work hard, he’d taken initiative and gone around to all the staff to find where he was most needed. I didn’t even see him until after noon, chopping wood, a sight that stopped me in my tracks.
The white tee shirt offset his dark hair. The shirt was damp with sweat, stretched tight over his back, muscles shifting as he swung the axe. Faded jeans that managed to be baggy while still showcasing the impressive outline of his thick ass and strong legs.
“Hi, Walt.”
Lowering the axe, he turned around, frowning silently at me for a moment before simply going back to his wood chopping.
“You all right?”
“Yeah,” he muttered, then split a log in two. “You need something?”
“No, just checking in. What are your plans for the rest of the day? Had some guests leave this morning so a couple of the cabins need cleaning.”
He kept his back to me, lining another log up. “Yep. I know. Gonna do that next. Your sister already showed me where the linens and cleaning supplies are.”
“Oh. Okay. You’re good then.”
“Yep.”
Well, this is different. Where was that chatty, taunting, obnoxious man I’d met two days ago? And worse, why did I kind of miss him? This quiet, sullen version of Walt was unexpected. I wondered if this was normal. Shea did say his moods could shift easily. But I sensed there was more to it than that. The glimpse of his face when he turned around. He seemed troubled, sad or angry or both.
“Have you had lunch? My mom made some sandwiches for the staff.”
“Already ate.”
“Okay. I’ll see you later.”
“Yep.”
Shaking my head, I left him to it. I passed Emmet on my way to the motel, and he nodded politely. “Hi, Jude.”
I grunted and moved on.
Emmet and I were back to mostly avoiding each other after our spat the other day, and I was pleased. It was the way I liked it. The difference was he’d taken to politely and humbly greeting me when we passed each other on the property, even looking me in the eye. Maybe the guy had a conscience after all. Or maybe he was just afraid of losing his job by pissing me off again.
I spent the rest of the day in the motel, cleaning guest rooms, changing lightbulbs and fixing a leaky pipe in the basement. By the time I went down the beach and home to my cabin, I was beat, and just wanted to crack a beer and put my feet up. But as soon as I got in, my mother called.
“Emmet quit.”
“What?”
“Emmet Barker,” she said. “He quit.”
“Oh. Did he say why?” I scowled as I got a beer from the fridge, looking out the window, where the sight of something on my lawn made me put the beer down and whisper, “What the...fuck?”
“He said he’s got a job out of state. But I heard he had a huge fight with Walt earlier.”
“Oh. Really?” I stepped outside, slowly approaching the thing in my back yard. “Mom, can I call you back?”
“Sure, but find out what happened. Lindy said it was a screaming match, then he quit a couple hours later. Will you talk to Walt?”
“Sure. Call you back.”
I slipped my phone in my pocket and stared at the tall metal pole that now stood in the center of my back yard. With Bucky the beaver’s decapitated head fixed on top. It looked like a giant, macabre Pez dispenser. “What the fuck?” I whispered.
“Do you like it?”
I whirled around to see Emmet standing at the gate of the fence that surrounded my yard. “Emmet. You did this?”
“Yeah. Can I come in? I wanna talk to you.”
Hesitant, my eyes trailed over him. He looked different tonight, like he’d gone home and showered, his dark blond hair fluffy, tee shirt and jeans that looked clean for a change. “What’s going on?”
“That’s what I wanna talk about. Among other things.” He pointed to the weird Bucky lollypop. “And to see what you thought of this. It’s a present.”
“A...present. For me?”
“Yeah. An apology, I guess. I make sculptures out of odd things I find at the dump sometimes, got a few of them at my place. Lindy said you were bummed out about losing the beaver, so I saved the head from the woodpile.”
“Oh.” I side-eyed the beaver, then looked back at Emmet. “Well, come in, and uh... thanks.”
He opened the gate and walked over, staring up at his creation with a smile. “So what do you think?”
“It’s um...” An abomination. “It’s very...” Vlad the Impaler. “Original.”
“Yeah?”
“And thoughtful. Thank you. But what is going on? My mom said you quit.”
With a heavy sigh, he sat on my bench swing, hanging his head. “Can’t work here anymore. I’m lucky though. My uncle lives in Myrtle Beach, and he’s offered me a job at his golf course.”
“So you’re moving to South Carolina? Just like that?”
Shrugging, he looked up at me. “Don’t really have much to lose. My family can’t stand me. Been dating a girl from Landing but she’s out of my league, and we both know it. Puts me down all the time and I just take it. Then...then he shows up.”
“Wally Cook?”
“Wally Cook,” he confirmed.
I frowned. “Yeah, he’s doing community service for the summer; it was Wally who totaled the beaver. It’s not a permanent arrangement.”
Shaking his head, Emmet sighed. “It’s okay. I needed the kick in the ass. It just reminded me I’ve always done this. Gotten attached to people who treat me like shit. A fresh start will do me good. That’s why I’m moving. That, and I can’t spend the summer around him. He hates me too much. It won’t work out, and I don’t want to be the cause of more trouble for you.”
I glanced at Bucky, then shook my head, raising my hands. “Okay, slow down.” I went and sat beside him. “I’m happy you’ve got this...self-reflection thing going on, improving your life and all. But you’ve said barely three words to me the past year, and come on. We’re not friends. Why are you here? And bringing me gifts.”
“I’m trying to apologize.”
“For what?”
He hung his head, shoulders hunching. “For what I said to you the other day. For how I’ve been the past year. But mostly...for school. Tripping you and throwing food at you and...whatever the hell else I did. I was a fucking asshole. And you didn’t deserve it.” He looked directly at me, gray-green eyes glassy. “I’m sorry, Jude. I really am.”
“Thank you.” I cleared my throat, scowling up at Bucky’s smiling head. “This is...unexpected. Can I ask what brought it on?”
“Been wanting to apologize for a while. Feeling guilty. When you talked to me the other day though, I just...got caught off guard and my head went back in time or something. All sorts of stupid shit coming out of my mouth. But then this morning I ran into Wally and...shit. Really drove it home.”
“Yeah. Well, you can probably imagine, it’s not exactly a thrill for me having him here.”
“Nah?”
“Nope.”
“He being rude or something?”
“It’s not that, it’s...well shit Emmet, you know. We have a past. Least he doesn’t seem to remember me, though.”
Emmet chuckled and looked at me. “What?”
“Walt. Wally. He doesn’t remember me.”
Shaking his head, Emmet said, “That’s impossible.”
“Well, that’s what I thought, but I was thirteen last time I saw him. I guess you stayed friends with him after he left our school, but I never saw him again. Until he started here.”
“Of course he fuckin’ remembers you. He remembers why he hates me, and that involved you. Well, that and because I’m the one that got him sent to juvie.”
“What are you talking about?”
Emmet blinked at me, confusion evident in his expression. “You didn’t know?”
“I heard he went to juvie, his brother told me. What do you have to do with it? Or me for that matter?”
“Oh, boy. Well...” Emmett paused, sat up straight and took a deep breath. “Wally broke my nose. We were always fighting other kids, but that day it was my turn to get a beating. Because he found out about you.”
“What about me?”
“I...wasn’t supposed to tell. Tell anyone at school about what happened. What his father told me one day when I went to his house. About how you...grabbed Wally’s...you know. His dick.”
My face flushed, but I wasn’t sure if it was rage, embarrassment, or just confusion. “His father told you that?”
“Yeah. Me and Wally were hanging out, and his dad said, Walter, did you tell Emmet what happened? Made him talk about it. But later, when we were alone, Wally told me not to say anything to anyone. Made me promise. But before I left their house, his dad pulled me aside. Said he didn’t want you controlling the story. Didn’t want kids at school thinking his boy was a fag.”
My brows rose.
“Sorry. His words. Not mine.”
Stunned, I stared straight ahead. “So it was you. You did what Mr. Cook asked.”
“Yeah. I didn’t like you much. Sorry.”
I huffed. “Well that was obvious. But I’d go farther than that. You hated me, Emmet. And I never even knew why.”
“I was immature. And an idiot. Wally was just so cool and...I always wanted him to like me best. But he didn’t. He liked you best.”
I raised my eyebrows again and felt light-headed, at the surreality of having my entire life’s story rearranged in an instant. Emmett continued.
“I know how it sounds. I’m extremely embarrassed and ashamed. I hate myself for it.”
“He didn’t like me best. He didn’t like me at all. He betrayed me.”
“He did like you, though. Before all that happened, anyway. You and Wally used to talk on the phone a lot, right?”
I shrugged, remembering those late-night calls about nothing that thrilled me to my core when I was thirteen. “So?”
“If it was just the two of us, just me and Wally hanging out, he always wanted to call you. He’d even make me leave so he could call you. It used to piss me off. He never called me on the phone.”
“Well if he liked me, he had a damn funny way of showing it! He completely screwed me over the first chance he got!”
Emmet flinched.
“Sorry. This is just...bringing up a lot of shit, and it’s confusing as hell. All these years I was sure he was behind the bullying. Now you tell me Wally ordered you not to start rumors about me?”
“Yeah. Wally told me not to tell anyone what happened. But then down the road he found out I blabbed anyway. And that everyone at school was giving you shit about it. Boy was he pissed. He beat the fuck outta me.”
“And that got him sent to juvie?”
He nodded, fidgeting with a frayed thread on his jeans. “My mom wanted to sue the Cooks. Not that she cared about my broken nose, but she knew they had money. In the end, my mom and Mr. Cook came to some agreement. Wally had been getting in trouble for fighting a lot anyway, so he got sent to juvie as part of the deal. He hated me for that. And for what I did to you. He still hates me. Saw him this morning. Tried to apologize. He wasn’t having it.”
“Maybe you should have made him a wooden head on a pike.”
Emmet frowned at me. “I only had the one head.”
“I’m joking.”
“Oh. Right.” He laughed.
Well, this explained Walt’s sour mood today. I was shocked by this information, but I quickly began to focus on one specific detail. Walt remembered me, and had been working extremely hard to pretend he didn’t.
What the fuck. I had to find Walt. I needed to confront him and confirm this. Right now. I started toward the gate. “Good luck in South Carolina, Emmet. And thanks for the gift.”
“Okay. Tell your mom I’m sorry for the short notice. But I gotta get out of here.”
“Understood. Good luck.”
“Thanks,” he called out, but I was already walking out of the yard. “Again, I’m sorry, Jude! For everything. I hope one day you can forgive me.”
Running down the beach, I cut through the boat launch and toward the rec center, searching. I saw guests milling about, Gil drinking from a garden hose, but no Walt. Then I spotted the red truck parked in front of the motel. Kelsey behind the wheel. Walt walking toward it with his bag slung over his shoulder.
Oh no you don’t. “Walt!”
Pausing, he glanced back. “I have to go,” he shouted.
I jogged to reach him, breathing heavily when I finally did. “We need to talk.”
“I have to go, Jude. Can it wait until tomorrow? Some stuff for the hotel is being delivered tonight and I need to be there to sign for it.”
“I just had a very interesting conversation with Emmet.”
Walt flinched, but said nothing. Shoulders stiff, his pretty brown eyes regarded me apprehensively.
“Did you hear me?”
He winced and jerked back, almost like he was expecting a blow. “I heard you. But I gotta go.”
He turned away and I grabbed his arm. “Hang on a minute!”
His breath caught and a soft sound escaped, almost a whimper as he tugged his arm from my grip. “Julien, please! I have to go!”
Running from me, he hopped into the truck, slamming the door. I saw him bury his face in his hands before Kelsey turned the truck around and drove off.
I stood in the dusty lot, watching them go. He’d called me Julien.
A second later, the motel office door opened, my mother’s head peering out. “What the hell is going on now?”
“I don’t know.”
“You fighting with Walt?”
“I don’t know.”
“Well, figure it out okay? With Emmet gone, we need him more than ever. Least until I can find a replacement.”
The tired strain in my mother’s eyes pained me. She deserved a son who was a grownup, who could help her carry life’s loads, not add to them. My mother worked too hard and had been through too much to have to deal with drama from her nearly thirty-year-old child. “I’ll sort it out, Mom, I promise. Don’t worry about a thing, I got this.”
“All right. Thank you, honey.”
My mother went back inside, and I turned toward the dust cloud kicked up by Kelsey’s hasty exit. Wally Cook was still a liar. Wally Cook remembered me. And based on his reaction, he was not pleased I’d figured this out. But an opportunity for closure had been dropped on my lap. A chance to finally, finally put the past behind me and move on. Walter Hughes Cook owed me this closure, and he didn’t get to dodge it simply because it made him uncomfortable. He couldn’t run from it, and he couldn’t hide. Because I had my own vehicle. My license was not suspended.
And I knew where he lived.