“It was a few nights before you got here. I was nervous, Taylor.”
“About what?”
“Seeing you. I went out. Got drunk. Too drunk. And I was an asshole.”
“Wait. You were nervous about seeing me, so you slept with some girl you just met?”
He inhaled deeply. “I wasn’t just nervous. I was terrified. I was scared you might not want anything to do with me. So I went out, trying to get that all out of my mind. I met her, and honestly, I wasn’t thinking. It was just a hookup. A one-night thing. Haven’t you ever had a one-night stand?”
I shook my head no.
“Well, I’m sorry. I’m being completely honest. She was hot, and she was flirting with me, and it made me feel better. And I’d had too much to drink.” He winced at the memory. “She came home with me. And then…”
“You got her pregnant.”
“Maybe. I still don’t know if I believe that I’m the only person she’s ever done that with.”
“Why, Matt? Is sleeping with girls you just met a thingyoudo?”
He shook his head. “No. It’s not.”
“Then, I would take her at her word. Imagine what that must have been like for her? Coming here? Finding you with me?”
He nodded. “I guess.”
I let out a sigh. “What are we going to do?”
“I don’t know. I guess just wait, for now.”
“How long ago was it?”
He dug his phone out of his pocket. Swiping through the calendar, he counted. “Nine weeks or so, I think?”
I shook my head at the realization that just nine weeks ago, Matt was putting his hands, his lips all over that girl in the same bed I now slept in every night. I swallowed. “Then she’ll have to make a decision soon.”
“Yeah. I guess so.”
Matt sat down on the floor next to me. He pulled his knees into his chest and rested his head on them. “Fuck,” he whispered.
I put my hand on his shoulder.
“I’m so sorry,” he mumbled.
So many feelings collided in my head, I couldn’t respond.
Then, there on the floor, in the darkness, Matt Thompson began to cry.
Chapter twenty-eight
Present
Dottie offers to drive us back to my car in Bluff Oaks, making small talk the whole way. She’s able to intuit my nervous energy in the way I keep checking my cell phone. I keep the mood light for Brett’s sake, but even she's not buying it. I can tell, watching her chew her thumb skin in the kind of silence that comes when the adults suck all the air out of the room with the weight of their carefully selected words. I recognize the behavior from my own childhood. Brett’s already aged well beyond her years from having dealt with her father’s illness by herself with her mother gone.
Once we’re delivered to the car, I thank Dottie for the ride and for her hospitality. I lean over and give the old cook a hug, offering a final plea on behalf of Brett. “I know you need to sell camp, and I get it,” I begin. “I just wanted you to know that there are probably hundreds of kids like Brett,ourkids, Lisa’s kids, Callie’s kids too, who are going to need this place. When life got tough,thiswas my place. It would be a shame to take that away from the next generation.”
Dottie sighs. “You’re right; I know.” She shakes her head sadly. “I just can’t keep it.”
“I understand. But maybe a buyer will come along who would be willing to maintain it as a camp.” I shrug. “Something to think about.”
