Chapter 4
As Sage carefully painted her fingernails later that evening, she reviewed the day that had been basically a complete disaster from minute one. Of course there was the forced-volunteering which still grated on her nerves, and then, as if life could get no worse, it was the text she had received from her mother not thirty minutes before.
Aunt Anna cannot have you right now. You know that. She is dealing with the divorce and moving. Make the best of it, Sage. This is where you are this summer. Period. Deal with it.
It was amazing how incredibly hard it was to keep the tears at bay. Yes, she knew about Aunt Anna’s troubles, but Aunt Anna always had troubles. That had never prevented her from spending time with her before. Sage sniffed the hot, stinging back from her eyes as she concentrated on applying the soft pink polish. Why did her mother insist on being so unreasonable?
Probably because she didn’t grasp how completely unreasonable this place really was. Sniffing again, she carefully raised her wrist and swiped at her nose. A nice mani-pedi at LaToure Spa would feel so good right now. Alas, that was three months away if she made it that far, which at the moment was anything but a given. She hated being pathetic even alone, and pathetic was exactly how she felt.
However, she had learned that her feelings were the least of anyone’s concern. Feelings were to be squelched and hidden if they got in the way of life—her family’s, her friends’, hers. So what she needed to do was breathe them down, square her shoulders, lift her chin, and just get through this. She only wished three months didn’t seem so much like an eternity.
“So,” Luke said when they were back at Jaycee’s long after dark-thirty, “I guess I’ll see you at church tomorrow?”
“Yeah. Of course.” Jaycee shot him a brilliant smile. “Why wouldn’t you?”
Well, for one thing he wasn’t sure of anything anymore. He shrugged. “No reason. Just wondering.”
“Cool. Well, thanks for tonight. I needed that.” And then, quickly she crossed the console and kissed his cheek. “See you tomorrow.” With that she was gone, out, and striding up the walk.
“Yeah. Tomorrow.” Luke watched until she got in the house, and he put the car in drive for the short journey up the road to his own house.
They had warned her about the church thing the night before at supper, and Sage was determined to get her everything-is-absolutely-perfect act over the shattering pieces of her life. So she got up early, showered quickly, and went to get ready. Pulling out her nicest white Chanel dress suit and hanging it there, she began the arduous task of making herself beautiful. Foundation, two tones of blush, four complementing eye shadows. Eye liner. Mascara.
Undergarments.
Perfume.
Hose.
Heels.
The dress.
And then she started on her hair. A severe high bun would have to do because anything more sophisticated with actual curls and waves was just out of sanity’s reach this morning.
She was just applying the final touches to her soft pink lipstick when the knock sounded on her door.
“Sage, honey?” It was Mrs. Lawrence.
“Come in!” Sage called brightly, and when Mrs. Lawrence opened the door, surprise jumped to her face.
She was still in her bathrobe, her hair a mess of dark tangles. “Oh, my. Um, I was just wanting to make sure you were awake.”
With a smart, sassy smile, Sage flipped on the bright bulb of her awesome awesomeness. “Of course. I didn’t want to inconvenience anyone in the bathroom so I got up early. I know how things can get around here.” Somehow she took the edge off the end of that statement at the last possible second.
“Oh.” Mrs. Lawrence lifted her chin and then slipped a small smile on her face. “Great. Well, we’ll be leaving in about an hour. There’s breakfast if you want. Just cereal though.”
“Okay.” Sage fought to keep the brightness on her face. “I think I’ll just wait for later if you don’t mind. I don’t want to damage the masterpiece.” She fanned her fingernails up by her face and struck a pose.
Mrs. Lawrence battled to keep the smile on her face though it partially fell from her eyes. “Okay. That’s fine. I’ll just go and get ready then.”
“Fab-oo. I’ll be ready in 30.”
Clearly wondering what else there would be to get ready, Mrs. Lawrence nodded again and ducked back out.
The second the door closed, Sage let the bright-act fall from her. She should have been in Hollywood. She was way too good at this. Turning back to the mirror, she scowled into it. “Mirror, mirror on the wall, why can’t Mom see how much I hate this?”
The late night did nothing for Luke’s getting ready ability the next morning. Dragging himself out of bed, he grabbed a pair of jeans and a blue plaid shirt out of the closet before taking his gray sports coat from the back of the desk chair. Standard church attire. Down the hall he padded and into the bathroom. At the mirror, he scoffed at himself. No wonder he was single. That look would scare anyone away.
He thought about Jaycee’s comment about Rachel the night before as he climbed into the shower. She was wrong. For one thing, Rachel was nice, but she wasn’t someone he’d ever spent ten minutes with. For another, she wasn’t what he was looking for. Not that she was bad—for someone else, just not for him.
Turning under the water, he let it hit him square in the face, hoping that would drill the sleep out of him. No. Jaycee was wrong. About a lot of things actually. He turned again and reached for the shampoo. Him for one. Why couldn’t she see they would be good together? Why was friendship all she ever wanted from him? Why did she have to kiss him on the cheek and say, ‘See ya’ like it was easy to pick him up and drop him off wherever she wanted to?
Okay, he was being a little dramatic, and that wasn’t exactly attractive. Worse, he couldn’t let her ever see how dramatic he sometimes got about the situation because frankly, she would probably laugh him right out of the county if she knew. Rinsing off, he sighed. No. Jaycee Lawrence had no interest like that in him at all, and maybe that was for the best. If her taste in guys ran to Rory Harris, then he didn’t even want to be in the running for that prize.
He cut the water, reached for a towel and went to the mirror where he ran his forearm over it to clear it of the fog. “Face it, Baker,” he said to his own reflection, “she’s just not into you.”
And while that hurt, it was the truth, and it was time to face that truth and move on. Maybe Rachel was free Friday night…
At the small church, Sage followed the kids in, sandwiched between the parents. One look on the other side of that door and she knew she was going to need some fantastic acting skills for this one. The lobby was about as big as her bedroom back home, and the people in every corner of it, turned, looked at them, and then looked again.
Fear pummeled into her like a mega-ton wrecking ball. How many of them knew? About her? About the situation? About… them? Panic reached up and dragged the air right out of her lungs, and her head swam from the sudden lack of oxygen.
Maybe there wasn’t a hush, but she heard it cross the room just the same, right before she heard the whispers that suddenly accompanied the curious glances their direction. Lifting her chin was the hardest thing she had ever done, but she did it anyway. She was Sage Wentworth, and some poorly, dressed, small-town wanna-bes were not going to make her feel like dirt.
“Oh, Gregory, Emily,” an older woman who looked somewhere north of 70 said, greeting them with an outstretched, wrinkled hand. “We’re so glad you could join us this morning.”
Then her gaze slid to the children, and her face registered the extra. Sage wanted to disappear, but she breathed that back and fought not to shrink back.
“And who is this beautiful young woman?” the lady asked.
“Oh,” her dad said and cleared his throat. Sage wanted to look at him, but she didn’t. She couldn’t. If she did, the hesitation and awkwardness would surely yank the tears right out of her heart. “Mrs. Cameron, this is my…” He reached back for Sage and pulled her forward in front of him. If someone was going to take a bullet, it was going to be her not him. “…my daughter.”
“Your…?” The lady, Mrs. Cameron, tilted her head as if the information wasn’t registering correctly. “Oh. Well, I didn’t know you had another…” Then her words stopped, and she looked at Sage with eyes that clearly said very different words as she held out her hand. “Well, welcome, Miss…?”
“Wentworth,” Sage supplied as she took the lady’s hand. “Sage Wentworth.”
“Sage?” Mrs. Cameron seemed to stumble on the name. “Sage. Well, that’s a lovely name. A little untraditional perhaps, but that’s to be expected with the younger generation I suppose.”
How she kept smiling, Sage would never, ever know.
“Well,” Mrs. Lawrence said, breaking into the pleasantries as she herded the others to the interior door and away from Mrs. Cameron, “we’d better get inside.”
Nothing in Sage wanted to go up those brick stairs and through that next door. Nothing. But she pursed her lips together and fought to get the smile there as she allowed herself to be led to her doom.
Luke sat five rows from the back. He was supposed to be an usher today, to help out with the collection, and he was glad. It was tough to party all night and look church ready the next morning. He didn’t go to sleep through the sermon. He wouldn’t dare. His grandmother would skin him alive if he did anything so disrespectful. However, it was that and only that keeping him awake.
Pastor Steve’s sermon went on and on and on, and Luke willed himself not to look at his watch. Next to his parents, that would surely be noticed and noted and used against him the next time he wanted to go out the night before church. So he sat, insisting that his eyes stay open like there were toothpicks holding them up.
Finally the sermon was over, and time to pass the plate had come. He stood and smoothed down his plaid shirt under the sports coat as he headed for the back. The others, all older men, gathered and divvied up the baskets. Moving felt very, very good. He wondered if there was a church where you could stand, walk around, and exercise during the sermon. That might actually help him pay attention.
“Luke, you take that side,” Trent Guthery said, indicating the far side from where they stood.
Luke nodded and headed that direction as everyone sat and the music started. He waited for the other men to get into place, and then he walked down his appointed aisle, carefully keeping abreast of the other three spread throughout the church. At the front, he handed the basket to the first gentleman and turned for the choirs’ offering basket. Gathering it up, he turned back and handed that basket to the third row person. That pattern had been determined to take the least amount of time.
Standing, waiting for the first basket to get back to him, he glanced across the church—full of people, all singing in various pitches to the song the choir was currently leading. Then just as the second basket got to him, his gaze tripped over to and then gripped onto someone in all white. He wasn’t sure if it was the white or her that he noticed first, but he swallowed just the same. Barely remembering what he was supposed to be doing, Luke transferred the basket to the next person and stepped forward to wait for the other one.
Just more than halfway back she sat, back completely straight, looking like she was posing for a portrait that would hang in Buckingham Palace. Sanity and air escaped from his consciousness. And only when he pulled his gaze from her face, knowing he was both staring and that he shouldn’t be, did he realize who she was with and in the next second who she was.
As both of those tore through him, Luke put his gaze down, fighting to keep it there. On the carpet. Where it might be safe. Breathing was impossible. Thinking was worse. He took the basket, came to the row just in front of hers and handed it off. Like it was pulling him with it, his gaze came back up and fused to her. Why could he not just look somewhere else? Why was his whole being so magnetized to that sight?
It took him a full second to realize the other basket was being handed to him, and somehow, he got it to the correct next person without spilling the change everywhere, and then he was by her, and then beyond her bench, back to life that would never, ever be the same again.
The songs were old and the whole thing was a huge waste of time, except of course, for the judging part of it. Every time Sage stood, she felt the gazes of those around her, and she truly hated every one of them. Worst of all, she was a sitting duck once they got out. She couldn’t run to the van. She couldn’t ask to go with her friends. She couldn’t do anything other than absorb the knowing and unknowing looks darting her direction.
By the time the service was over, her nerves and will to be strong and not let it bother her were in tatters. If getting out was just an option. But it wasn’t, and it wouldn’t be. Part of her whispered that it would be like this every weekend from now until August, but another part of her told that part to shut up because she didn’t need to hear it right now.
When the final song ended, the others turned to follow her father out, and she did too, praying to the God Who she hoped was listening that He would set this place on fire so she could get out without anyone else asking any questions.
“Well, Gregory,” a woman about her father’s age said as he turned with her. They continued up the aisle in front of her, talking.
Behind her, Ryder broke for the door, and she shrugged out of his way. She didn’t dare look back at Jaycee and Mrs. Lawrence. By the scowl that had been on Jaycee’s face all morning, she knew better. Instead, she swallowed the lump in her throat, lifted her chin and followed the crowd to the door. It would really have helped if breathing didn’t make her feel so much like crying, or if she could have figured out a way to just quit breathing. But neither were happening. Step by arduous step, she followed the crowd and somehow got to the back.
“Bulletin?” the guy standing there in the plaid shirt, jeans and sports coat asked. Who wore something like that out in public?
Sage tipped her head slightly at him in question because she didn’t really trust the white paper he was holding out to her. “Bulletin?” she asked, knowing she sounded like a complete idiot the second she said it. Then she jumped out of that. “Oh, no. No.” The smile hurt, like it might split the carefully glued on mask in half. “I don’t need one. Thanks.”
Talking was a worse idea than breathing, and her head had started that swimming thing again.
However, the guy smiled at her as he let the paper drop. “You don’t remember me.”
That yanked her up short. “Remember?”
His smile dimmed as shyness overtook his features which were partially hidden under dark-sandy blond strands of hair that hung down over his forehead. “I’m Luke. From yesterday at the charity community meal thing?”
“Good morning, Luke,” an older man said, stepping past Sage and reaching for a bulletin which Luke gave him.
Luke nodded at the man. “Good morning, Mr. Larson.”
That forced Sage to take a step to the left rather than to the right and past him, and with the foot traffic continuing to her right, she was now trapped right in front of him.
With no other plausible option, she reached down and turned on the charm as she looked back up at him, smiling and blinking just so. “Oh, yes. Of course. Luke. Jaycee’s friend. You look… different.”
What did that mean? Great, Sage. That was brilliant.
“Oh, yeah, huh?” He lifted his elbows from his sides, looked down at himself, and handed the out next bulletin. “It’s kinda hard to pull off wearing spaghetti sauce to church.”
Sage glanced back at the person getting a bulletin even though she didn’t see them. “I hear that.” She looked down at herself. “Give me Chanel any day.”
He glanced past her again to hand the next bulletin out as he laughed. “Morning, Ms. P.”
“Well, good morning, Luke.” Ms. P, the cook from the day before gave Luke a hug first and then turned to Sage, clearly thinking she didn’t know her until she saw her. “My. My. My. Don’t you clean up all nice, Miss Sage.”
Not fully knowing how, Sage accepted the hug, hoping it wouldn’t wrinkle her suit. “Well, thank you.”
Ms. P backed up and settled her eyes on Luke after they took only one more trip down Sage. “Now, listen here, you need to stop by my house this week. We need to look at the menus for the summer. I’m thinking about changing a few things up.”
Sage realized the foot traffic was gone and she was in the way, so she smiled politely at Luke and said, “I’ll just be…” She pointed out the doors as if he wouldn’t understand otherwise, and carefully she stepped past them.
However, she only made it to the doors where she met up with Pastor Steve coming the other direction, and there on the top step, he stopped her. “Well, Sage! It’s so nice to have you here this morning. I’m so glad you could come with your family.”
Oh, dear heavens. Please don’t do this here. But what could she do? Now, everyone standing in the lobby was looking up at her, wondering, whispering, and asking. “Well, I’m glad they invited me, Pastor.”
“Yes. Yes. So am I. So am I. Well, I hope you will join us again. You are surely a welcome addition to our humble services.”
“Thank you… for that… Sir.”
He turned to go back into the church, leaving her to face the crowd who was rapidly putting pieces together as their stares became longer and less shielded.
Taking the railing lest she do a digger onto the lobby floor, she lifted her chin and stepped purposefully down the brick-laid stairs. Down. Down. Down. Until she was level with all of them, but that didn’t help. She still felt their stares, their questions, their understanding.
Fighting to keep her feet from running, Sage let her gaze slide across the crowd, looking for a friendly face. However, her mind asked who she was kidding. There wasn’t a friendly face here. Not a single one.
Luke hurried with the clean-up portion of being an usher. He didn’t even really want to talk to her again necessarily, just see her again. That would be enough. “If that’s it,” he said to the head usher.
“Oh, sure. Go on. Thanks, Luke,” Trent said.
Hurrying, he headed out the double front interior doors and down the three brick steps, scanning the dwindling crowd. Then he spotted Jaycee standing, arms crossed in the dimmest corner on the far side. It was then that he saw Sage as well, across the lobby, talking with her father and one of his friends. Clearly that wasn’t an option, so he angled his steps over to Jaycee.
“Morning,” he said as if nothing at all was out of the ordinary.
Across the way, Sage laughed, and Jaycee’s scowl dropped another two octaves. “I know I shouldn’t say this here, but I really, really hate her.”
Luke put his hands on his waistline as he glanced over at Sage, trying to make it be just that. Wow, she was hot and gorgeous and dynamic and beautiful all rolled into one. If Jaycee was going to be jealous, there was plenty of material there to work with. He turned back to his friend. “Eh. She’s got nothing on you.”
Had he wanted to be reduced to cinders, that look would have done it.
“What?” he asked. “Come on, Jayc. She’s all image, all flash, no substance. You can tell that by looking at her.” He put his hands on Jaycee’s arms. “You, on the other hand, are deep and complex and intriguing.” And he pulled her into his embrace.
There she sniffed and pushed up her glasses. “Do you really think so?”
“I know so.”
The thoughts of Sage, however, didn’t leave Luke even after the Lawrence family did. He couldn’t get her out of his thoughts, and that bothered him. What kind of a friend goes crushing on that friend’s sister? Especially when said friend knows how said sister feels about said other sister? He was really glad they were going to his grandmother’s for lunch. A day of kicking back with the family and forgetting everything else was just what he needed.
“Honey, you need to eat,” Mrs. Lawrence said when they had gotten their food at the little restaurant that should have been closed down for all the health violations Sage could see without even trying. “You didn’t eat breakfast either.”
A hunger strike. That was a great idea. Sage shrugged. “I guess I’m just not very hungry after that wonderful meal we had last night.”
“Ugh,” Jaycee breathed next to her and bit into her bread in a very unladylike manner.
Sage glanced in her sister’s direction but chose to say nothing.
“If she’s not going to eat, can I have her fries?” Ryder asked.
Mrs. Lawrence grimaced. “Ryder, it’s not polite to take food off of other people’s plates.”
“Why not? We do it all the time.” He bit into his own fry and continued to eat as Mrs. Lawrence looked first at Sage and then at her husband, clearly begging for help.
He shifted in his chair, holding a fry above his plate. “You know, I’ve been thinking. We haven’t been out to the lake in a while. Why don’t we do that today? We could get the stuff, and go spend some time together, just the four… uh, five of us.” His glance around the table asked for all of them to rescue him.
“The lake!” Ryder said as if it was the Super Bowl. “Yes. Can we fish too?”
Her father glanced at her and then smiled. “Of course.”
“Did you know that girl is Gregory’s daughter?” Luke’s grandmother, Virginia Cameron, was saying to his mother when Luke walked into the kitchen. It already smelled heavenly.
“Well, of course,” his mother said. “Don’t you remember when she was here before? She had to have been like… what? Five or something?”
“Well.” His grandmother turned to accept the kiss he planted on her cheek as she stirred the potatoes. “It’s just a crying shame that he ever went to California in the first place. Leaving Emily like that. What did he think he was going to find out there? It’s California after all.”
Not wanting to interrupt or to be a part of this conversation, Luke went out to the living room where he found the rest of his family hunched over a game of dominoes. Hannah, his now-in-college sister sat on the couch, and he gratefully collapsed there with her. “Hey, there, Hannah-banana! I didn’t know you were coming.”
She beamed a smile at him as he gave her a hug. “Hey, they said fried chicken. Where else would I be?”
The headache wasn’t getting any better, and Sage really couldn’t tell if it was from the not-eating or the not breathing or just what. But by the time they got home, all she wanted was to curl up under the covers and sleep for three months.
“Thirty minutes,” her father said as they each got out of their respective doors of the van. “Ryder, we’ll need to get the stuff out of the garage.”
“Got it,” the boy said and bounded into the house to change.
Sage crawled out, feeling like the next step might kill her outright. She searched for an excuse, something to get her out of this, but she couldn’t find one. In the house, she went straight to her room, closed the door, and leaned back on it. How those tears could be so close to the surface, she had no accounting for. They hadn’t been there like that for a long time. With a sniff and a sigh, she took two steps and dropped onto the bed. Oh, how wonderful it would feel to just lay right here and shut the world out forever.
On the little table her cell phone beeped and just like that she was upright, grabbing for it. Sanity! In two taps she had it on and the text pulled up.
Headed to Bloomy’s wish you were here.
Patelyn.
Oh, me too!!!!!!!!! She typed back. Infinity of exclamation marks would not have captured the desire.
Went to Cloe’s party last night. Everyone was asking about you.
The want to be there instead of here crashed over Sage in great waves. I bet it was fab.
Oh, and you’re never going to believe… Mac and Ben hooked up last night.
MacKenzie and BEN GRIFFIN?!!!
The one and only!
I bet Mac is on Cloud 9!
Haven’t gotten her to stop talking about it all day. That’s why we’re going, so she can tell me and we can shop for something for their date next Friday.
Sage could hardly stand it. One of her best friends was falling in love, and she was not there to witness it. Tell her she’d better text me with the deets. This is so obnoxiously UNFAIR of her to do this NOW!!!!
I know, right? I told her you’d be torqued, but you know, Mac. What the heart wants is what the heart gets.
“Not always,” Sage said to the empty room.
The knock jumped her out of the other world into this one. “Uh. Just a second!”
“Sage,” Jaycee said, and the ice in her voice was hard to miss. “You about ready?”
“Ready?” she breathed, finishing up the text and then looking down at herself. “Uh, n… yeah. Yes! I’ll be right there.”
“Well, hurry up. They’re about ready to go.”
“Oh. Uh. Okay.” She tossed the phone onto the desk and went to work on the dress suit, wondering what one was to wear to the lake in backwoods nowheresville.
“I heard you went with Jaycee to the bonfire last night,” Hannah said in that I-know-all-about-your-secrets voice she used when she wanted to needle him. They had survived dinner and were back on the couch as the dominoes game resumed.
“So?” Luke shrugged.
“Come on, little bro,” his sister said. “I’m gone. I’m not blind. I saw you after church talking to her today.”
That memory brought up another one of a beautiful young woman in white, but he squelched that thought the second it entered his mind. “What? Now I can’t talk to a girl without you sending invites to the wedding?”
“Oh, come on. I know you’ve got a thing for her,” Hannah said.
“Yeah, well,” he scratched his sideburn, “in order for that thing to work out, she would have to have a thing for me, which she doesn’t, so I think that’s pretty much a moot point.” He heaved a sigh and decided right then and there it was time to stop mooning over Jaycee Lawrence. “Besides, for your information, I’m thinking about asking Rachel out for Friday.”
That slammed Hannah to a backing-up stop. “Rachel Murphy? Why?”
Luke shrugged. “She’s nice, and according to Jaycee, I might have a chance with her.”
Hannah lifted her chin. “According to Jaycee. Oh, Luke, you’re making my heart hurt for you.”
“Ha. Ha. Thank you for your concern.” He ducked, regrouped, and brought his gaze back to hers. “So how are summer classes?”
The lake. It had sounded like a bad idea. It turned out to be much worse.
Sage carried a floppy chair across the rocky, uneven sand of the area near the water as every drunk redneck within a sixty-mile radius cavorted on the sparkling water beyond. They were everywhere. Families, up and down the expanse, and all the way around in every direction. Disparate smells wafted to them from the campfires, and Sage fought the urge to be sick. She did not need to know what they were cooking. The smell was enough to do her in.
The little kids racing around. The noise. The shouts from the water-skiers on the lake. Not a single thing she liked about this experience. Putting that chair down and fighting to get it righted, she worked to block it all out, not in any way sure she could make it through this.
“Nice of you to do your part,” Jaycee said, hauling the two chairs she was carrying and the one on her back over to where Sage stood. With that, Jaycee let the one chair slide to the ground and started snapping the others out.
“Here’s the cooler,” their father said as he brought the blue and white plastic thing over. “Once we get it all unloaded, Ryder and I are going to go across. If anyone wants to fish, you’re welcome to come.”
“No thank you,” Mrs. Lawrence said. “I plan on having a nice long siesta followed by a couple hours of a really good book.”
“Okay.” He leaned over and kissed her. “Suit yourself. Jayc? Sage? You guys want to come?”
“Come?” Jaycee asked with sarcasm dripping from the word. “Uh, no. Thanks, Dad. I think I’ll just stay here and work on my tan.”
“Sage?” His soft eyes found hers, pleading with her to love this whole idea.
It took her a second and a half to find her voice. “Me? Wh…? Uh. Oh. Fishing? Uh, no. Um, I think I’ll just… stay here… with Jaycee and work on my tan too.” Her eyes cut from his over to her sister’s who looked like she’d rather eat raw fish than to agree to that plan.
With a shake of her head, Jaycee stalked off to get her chair out without another word. Their father’s gaze slipped with her back to the vehicle before coming back to Sage’s. “Are you sure you don’t want to come?”
‘Sure’ about anything was asking a whole lot. “Uh, yeah. I’m sure.”
It wasn’t fifteen minutes of sunning when Sage realized that maybe she should have taken them up on the offer to go fishing—as absolutely horrid as that sounded. She was kicked back, enjoying the warm rays of the sun when suddenly the air around her fell into a shadow. Arching one eye open, she found a tall, nice-looking guy standing there. Both eyes came open, and she glanced over at Jaycee who was lying on the long lounge chair next to her, eyes closed.
“Um, can I help you?” Sage asked.
“With what?” Jaycee asked, and Sage wasn’t sure how to answer that.
However, he didn’t give her the chance to figure it out. “I’m sorry to bother you,” the guy said, and even Mrs. Lawrence came awake from the other side of Sage at that. “But my buddies and I are playing some volleyball. We were wondering if you’d like to come join us.”
That brought Sage full awake, and she sat up. “Volleyball?”
“Yeah, come on. It’ll be fun.” He put out his hand. “I’m Pete, by the way.”
“Well, Pete by the way,” she said as if that was his full name. A second and she shook his hand but barely. “I appreciate the offer, but I’m not really a sports-y kind of girl.”
“Oh, well, that’s okay. You could come watch.”
Her gaze slid over to the others watching them, and then she realized this was some kind of a dare or something. She smiled sweetly at Pete, feeling sorry for him. “Not now but thanks.”
“No?” he asked, clearly hoping he had misunderstood. “Not even for a little while?”
She looked back over at the guys. Four of them. One of her. “Not now, but thanks for asking.”
With that, he shrugged and jogged off, going right past Jaycee who watched him leave then turned to her sister, glared at her, shook her head, and put the other way, closing her eyes for emphasis.
What? Sage wanted to ask. Four guys and her? That wasn’t smart no matter who you were or how many people were on the beach. Anger nipped at her spirit as she put her head back again. How could every single thing she did be wrong?
“John, Felicia, we’ve got steaks if you all want to stay for supper,” Luke’s grandfather said as the clock hands headed into the five o’clock realm.
Part of Luke hoped they agreed; part of him wanted to go home and take a real nap. Lounging with Hannah-the-all-knowing was getting him nowhere because she was watching and surmising about last night and his whole life, which he really did not need right now.
His father looked over to his mother. “Probably not. I’ve got to go to Raleigh tomorrow.”
“Yeah,” his mother said. “I need to be getting home soon too. We’ve got the community garage sale next weekend. I’ve got to get the stuff packed up to take up there on Tuesday.”
Luke fought not to groan. A whole day of packing and then set up and clean up bookending two days of sitting there, praying someone would take their castoffs. Not his idea of a good time.
“Ooo,” Hannah said as she flipped through a magazine on the other side of the couch. “The community garage sale. Fun. Too bad I’m going to be knee-deep in biochemistry this week.”
“You’re knee-deep in something,” Luke said, “but it ain’t chemistry.”
“Speak for yourself.” She shot him a look. “Not my fault the rest of us flew the coop already.”
“Good news. We caught supper!”
Sage should really have been smart enough not to look up at them, but her eyes betrayed her before her brain could think it through. Not five feet from her stood her father with a whole line of very dead, very smelly fish.
“Ugh, Dad!” Jaycee was the first to react, almost falling off of her tanning chair. “That’s disgusting!”
“What?” He lowered them as if he was hurt.
“You should have seen the one I almost caught!” Ryder said, bursting forward. “It was this long!” He put his hands out.
“Oh, yeah?” Mrs. Lawrence said, clearly as disgusted as the two girls. “Where is it?”
“It got away at the last minute. But it was huge.”
“The one that got away,” Jaycee said, pulling up and shaking her head. “That’s a new one.”
Well, at least she was sarcastic with everyone, Sage thought sullenly. Maybe it wasn’t just her after all.
“We’re not really going to cook that, are we?” Mrs. Lawrence asked, the skepticism pouring from the words. She scrunched her nose. “I mean… here? Now?”
“I thought we could run up to the outpost store and grab some wood,” her father said, and suddenly Sage was cheering on her stepmom. “We could build a fire, do the fish, roast some marshmallows.”
“I’m not…” Mrs. Lawrence yawned and stretched. “Don’t you think we should be getting home? Tomorrow’s Monday.”
“Yeah, Dad,” Jaycee chimed in. “I’ve got to get the stuff ready for the garage sale, and it’s going to be late when we get home as it is.”
His face registered his displeasure, but he acquiesced to the whining. “Fine. I’ll just put these on ice and we can have them tomorrow night.”
Oh, joy. Something to look forward to.
Back home, Luke gathered up his laundry and headed downstairs. If he didn’t get it done now, it would surely be next week before he had another chance. At the washer, he dumped in everything but his whites and reds. No sense doing more loads than necessary.
“So what’re your plans tomorrow?” his mother asked, coming in to get something from under the little sink. He swiveled his shoulders around, surprised at her presence.
“Oh, you know, probably helping some damsel in distress drag stuff down from the spiders in the attic.”
His mother smiled as she brushed past him. “You know me so well.”
“Yeah, well.” He put in the detergent and softener and punched the buttons. “I haven’t lived here 18 years for nothing.”
The second Sage was back in her room, she grabbed her phone like a man dying of thirst at an oasis.
Help me!!!! She typed the words and sent the message to Patelyn. In seconds a message was back.
Still that bad, huh?
Today, we went to the lake.
That sounds like fun.
They went fishing!
For reals? Like real, actual live fish?
Well, they weren’t too live when they got back to us.
Ewww!
That’s what I said!!!
“Sage! Honey, can you come here and help us with supper? You really don’t have to hole up in your room all evening.”
She looked up, sighed and typed. Gotta go. Get me OUT OF HERE!!!
With one brush of her blonde hair from her shoulder, she went to the door where she found Mrs. Lawrence, arms folded, looking like a lecture was imminent. Thankfully, she did uncoil when Sage came out. “Sage, sweetheart, you don’t have to feel like you have to stay in your room all the time. Come out. Join us. Come on, help us with supper.” She leaned in. “I promise… no fish.”
The smile hurt as did holding back the grimace. “Yay.”