Charlie nearly chokes on his water. He sputters droplets all over the table.
“You don’t strike me as a prude, Charles,” she says.
“I’m not. I wasn’t expecting that answer. You do you, Angela, or I guess you do him. I think it’s great.” His eyes shift to me as he tries to telegraph his shock.
“Ooh. I see an opening.” Angela rises to her feet. “I’ll catch up with you later.” She’s drawn to Herb like a heat-seeking missile, or like she has a glass of tonic water and he’s a bottle of gin.
“I didn’t understand why a woman like Angela would come to a place like this until now. Camp is the ideal hunting ground for her.”
“It’s best not to date other campers,” I say.
“Oh? Why is that?”
“Because it ruins the vibe for everybody when the relationship inevitably ends.” I gnaw on the corncob and push the intrusive thoughts from my mind. This is my happy place, and I refuse to give it up, not for the Prick, not for LandStar.
Not for anybody.
Man, I really wanted to nail that hero activity, if only to show Courtney that I don’t need lessons on heroism. I’m perfectly capable of putting others’ needs ahead of my own. Stupid expensive shoes.
I remove the shoes in question and jump in the shower. I should’ve done this straight after my unexpected dip in the lake, but I didn’t want to miss the conversation in the cafeteria. Sometimes people let details drop that could be useful in my ‘investigation.’ Thankfully I only have one message from work and it’s from Jeannie asking me to send pics. Unlike everyone else at my office, she means actual pretty pictures of the lakeside setting and not evidence to use against Courtney and the camp.
This isn’t a vacation though. My entire future is riding on what I accomplish here these next two weeks.
I check the schedule for the evening’s activities. S’mores at the main firepit are happening in ten minutes. Everybody loves s’mores. It could be the ideal opportunity to sneak into the office and search for information. While everybody else is busy getting their fingers sticky, I’ll be using mine.
Despite the late hour, there are remnants of daylight, so I forgo the flashlight I packed and saunter toward the office trying to appear casual. As I round the corner of a cabin, I spot Courtney outside the office door, chatting to a couple campers I haven’t met yet.
I’ll have to try the office another time. It won’t be easy. There always seems to be someone lurking in the area. Courtney is too popular with her campers. They aren’t content with her joining in their fun and games; they want to be around her twenty-four seven, which makes my job more difficult. Maybe I should schedule an ice cream truck. There’d be a line a mile long and nobody would venture far with a melting ice cream cone. That would give me plenty of time to root through the files.
Could I expense an ice cream truck? At this point, I’m fairly confident my client will pay for an entire ice cream company if it means getting his grubby hands on the land. I have to admit, I’m beginning to admire her moxie. Nobody says no to James Riggieri. Even the partners at the law firm are loath to tell him he can’t do something, which is how I ended up with this assignment in the first place. If it goes to shit, they can point the finger at the senior associate, nothing to do with them. If I fail, I’ll be out of a partnership and a job. Not loving those stakes.
Suddenly Courtney’s moxie seems less admirable and more frustrating. It would be bad enough to lose out on the partnership, but to lose my job…
I’ve never been fired before. I can only imagine how that would go over at my parents’ anniversary party in August. Knowing my parents, they’d disinvite me to avoid the shame of their less-than-superhuman eldest child. I suspect that’s part of the reason they’re riding me so hard about this promotion. They don’t want it for me; they simply want to brag to their friends about yet another Thorpe accomplishment. So far, I’m the dud. If they can claim the youngest partner in my firm’s history, then they’ll feel like they haven’t failed as parents.
“Hey, the melting marshmallows are over yonder,” Courtney says when she spots me. The other two campers make themselves scarce at the mention of marshmallows.
I freeze like a deer in headlights. “Me?”
She strolls toward me. “Not a s’mores fan?”
“I’m not a dessert person in general.”
“Wow. That’s a tragedy of epic proportions. What kind of monster doesn’t like dessert?”
“I thought this is supposed to be a judgment-free zone.”
“Not when it comes to your lack of a sweet tooth. We are all free to judge the shit out of you for that.” She glances toward the orange glow in the distance. “You said you play baseball. How’s your throwing arm?”
“I said I played baseball, past tense.”
A tiny wrinkle appears between her eyes. “How past?”
“High school.”
“What position?”
“Pitcher.”
