A Week at the Beach (10 page)

            “What now?” I asked with a steadier breath.

            “Can you paint?” he grinned and pointed at the storefront we’d stopped in front of.

            I turned and studied the window.  “Paint your own pottery?  I think I can do this.”

            He led the way and leaned forward to open the door.  Before he opened the door, he turned back to me and said, “Are you sure this is safe?  You don’t have some kind of freak childhood pottery accident to tell me about, do you?  I wouldn’t want to risk life and limb just to paint a piece of ceramic.”

            I gave him a face that said I wasn’t amused.  He opened the door and held it for me.  As I walked past him, I punched him in the gut causing him to double over to catch his breath.  When he stood up again, he was laughing and rubbing his stomach.

            “Hi!  How can I help you?” the girl behind the counter asked.  She looked to be about sixteen, with long straight blonde hair.  She smiled at me and I smiled back.  She turned her smile towards Nick, but suddenly became flustered when she took him in.  He smiled at her and a blush immediately formed on her cheeks.

            “I can’t take you anywhere,” I mumbled as the girl cleared her throat and pretended to fix something on the counter.

            “What?” he said with a grin.

            I rolled my eyes.  “How does this work?  We pick something out, paint it, and then what?”  I jumped in and saved the girl from the awkward moment.  She looked up at Nick, but then quickly turned her attention to me.

            “Yes ma’am.  You paint the pieces, we fire them then you can come back the next day, or for a few extra dollars we can send them to your home.”  She managed to get through her answer without looking at Nick once. 

            “How much does it cost to do this?” I asked.  I felt bad for mooching off Nick for lunch, so making him pay for the pottery seemed too much. 

            “Don’t worry about it.  It’s my treat.”  Nick said sweetly from across the store.  He’d wandered off during the girl’s initial explanation.  “Just pick out something that you want to paint and I’ll pay for it.”

            “I’ll pay you back when we get back to the beach house,” I added politely and smiled at the girl.

            Nick turned and gave me a stern look, “I said I would pay for it, Cami.  Don’t be difficult.” 

            I was about to say thank you and flash him a smile, but he spoke again before I could open my mouth.

            With a mischievous grin, and a quick look at the girl next to me, he said, “Besides, I can think of some ways you can pay me back.  No money need change hands.”

            This time it wasn’t just the sales girl who blushed.  I could actually feel the heat of embarrassment radiating from both the girl and me as we stood there staring at Nick’s wide grin.

            “That was uncomfortable, thank you!” I said sarcastically a few minutes later when the girl had left to answer the phone in the back.  “That poor girl was as red as a lobster when you made that comment.”

            Nick laughed, “She wasn’t the only one.”

            I swatted him across the arm.  “Don’t do that again!”

            He laughed some more.

            “What should we paint?” I asked and looked around for something that interested me.

            “What about these turtles?” Nick picked up two ceramic turtles.

            “No, too boring!  What about these surfboards?”                

            Nick shook his head, “No, that’s just a flat piece of ceramic.  It’s not worth the money just to paint a flat piece.”

            “What about these?” I picked up two figurines.  Each was a sculpture of a beach goer, one male and one female, dressed in bathing suits and carrying various beach accessories.

            “They’re cute,” Nick shrugged. 

            “How about you paint this one,” I handed him the girl figurine, “and I paint this one.”  I took the boy figurine for myself.  “We’ll paint them for each other and then have them sent to each other’s address.”

            Nick looked confused, “You want me to paint this one but give it to you?”

            I smiled and nodded, “Yes.  You paint that for me and I’ll paint this one for you.”

            He grinned, “Okay, so is it alright with you if I put little turquoise dots on the ankles of this one?”

            I smiled at him.  “You can paint it however you want, as long as you understand that I’m going to do the same.”

            “Is that a challenge, Ms. Harris?”

            I took my figurine and sat down at a table across the store from him.  When he started to follow me, I stopped him. 

            “I don’t think so!  You sit over there!” I pointed at a table on the other side of the store.  “I don’t want you peeking at my designs.”

            “Seriously?” he asked with a sad look.  “Are you really not going to let me sit with you?”

            I shook my head at him.  “No.  You have to sit over there.”

            He huffed and stomped off to the table I had pointed him towards.  With another loud huff, he collapsed into his chair.  I pretended not to notice, but had to lower my head so that he couldn’t see me smile.  We each sat at our tables, working silently on our figurines.

            After five minutes of silence, Nick slammed his paintbrush down on the table.  “Are you at least going to talk to me while we paint?”

            I laughed at him, but didn’t look up.  “What do you want to talk about, Nick?”

            “What are your sisters like?”

            “They are very different from each other,” I said with a smile then added, “and very different from me.”

            “What are their names?”

            I still wasn’t looking up at him, but I raised my eyes enough to see that he was bent over his figurine painting as he asked.

            “Victoria, or Tori, is the youngest.  She’s the baby and never fails to remind us of that every chance she gets.  Allison is the middle child and she does not fit the mold of the middle child myth.  My parents always say that somehow, Allison and I switched personalities without their permission.”  I talked and painted at the same time.

            “What do you mean?” Nick asked in a genuinely interested tone.

            “The middle child is supposed to be docile, a peacekeeper, and a people pleaser.  Allison is bossy, she’s demanding, and as a child she was very mean-spirited.  Actually, she’s still kind of mean-spirited.”  I smiled thinking about my sisters.

            “How is she mean?”

            I sighed, “When I was thirteen, and she was ten, she told me that my clumsiness was because my brain was actually smaller than average and because of that I wasn’t able to balance myself like other people could.”

            I didn’t look up as I waited for his reaction.  I expected him to laugh, but to my surprise, he was silent.  Curious to know what he was doing, I looked up.

            Nick was bent over like he was working hard on his painting.  I almost wondered if he’d heard me, but just before I asked, I noticed his shoulders shaking just slightly.

            “It’s not funny!  It was really mean and it took me a long time to get over it.” 

            My outburst didn’t help.  He lost control of himself and started laughing loudly.  “She was only ten.  How could you possibly have believed her?” he said between giggles.

            “She tested at a genius level!  You don’t know how smart she is!”

            He laughed even harder at that. 

            “She has a way of saying things that makes you believe that she’s right.  She’s very convincing.”  I continued explaining myself as he laughed.

            “I’m sorry,” he said when he’d finally stopped laughing.  “I didn’t mean to laugh at you, but that was a funny story.  Your sister sounds mean, but creative.”

            I rolled my eyes at him and went back to painting my figurine.

            “What are your parents like?” he asked with a steadier voice.

            “They’re great.  My dad is an accountant and my mom does the books for my grandfather’s construction company.”  I talked and rinsed my brush.  “Well, it used to be my grandfather’s company but he died last year.  My uncle runs it now.”

            “So both your parents worked when you were growing up?”

            “Technically, yes.  My mom did most of her work from home so that she could be there for my sisters and me.  She only went into the office to do the paychecks.”

            “Where did your parents meet?”

            Nick was staying focused on his art as he asked me questions.  Having finished my painting, I sat and watched him without him knowing.  He looked adorable sitting hunched over a tiny figurine.  Occasionally, a little crinkle would form on his forehead as he worked.  Every time the crinkle appeared, I smiled.

            Not wanting to raise suspicion about my silence, I answered his question.  “They met at the University of Virginia, which is where both my sisters are at.”

            “So, how did they end up in New York?”

            “It’s where my mom is from.  She told my dad that if he loved her, he’d move back to New York and marry her.”

            Nick laughed quietly, “And he did?”

            “Yes, he did.  He said it was the best decision he never had to make.”

            Growing up in a house with parents who loved each other as much as my parents did was something that I’d always taken for granted.  It wasn’t until I got to college that I realized how rare that was.  Based on Nick’s earlier reaction to the question about his family, I was guessing that he didn’t have a similar experience as me.

            “He never had to make the decision because there was never a question, right?” 

            I smiled.  “No.  He said he knew she was the one and if she wanted him to move to Africa with her, he’d do it.  He’d follow her anywhere.”

            Nick looked up at me and smiled.  “They sound nice.”

            “They are,” I said and smiled back at him.

6.

After we finished our figurines, we filled out the paperwork to have them sent to each other.  I still wasn’t ready to get back on the bike, but there wasn’t anything else left to do in the little village of shops.  We rode back towards the beach house, but neither of us was in a hurry to get back.  When I’d told Nick about Darren and the skinny blonde I’d left him with in the house, he’d laughed.

            “It’s probably best if we give them a few hours alone in the house.  Darren can be a little overzealous with his entertaining.”  Nick said with a wide grin.

            “By overzealous do you mean loud or exhibitionist?” I said hesitantly.

            Nick laughed, “Both.”

            We left our bikes on the edge of the grass and walked towards the small sandy beach we’d stopped at. 

            “I was just wondering.  How did you and Darren meet?” I’d taken my shoes off and was carrying them in one hand as we made our way to the water.