“Harrison! Besner! Will you three cut it out!” Will Francis, their swim coach, yelled. “You’re messing up the whole team!”
Ellie swam into Luke and came up looking frustrated until she saw it was him. “Hey cutie! What the heck are you doing?” she said, her nose clip making her sound all stuffy.
“Waiting for you to pay attention to me.”
“What? You don’t get enough of me the rest of the day?” She smiled at him, breathing a little hard from the exertion.
“I could never get enough of you,” he said seriously, but then splashed her in the face.
“Hey!”
He dove away and swam hard for the far end but she caught him mid-pool and they came up in each other’s arms laughing. She tickled him as the other swimmers passed around them.
He squirmed, laughing out loud and reached to tickle her back but she slipped from his grasp and swam away. He caught her and said, “Oh, you’re not getting away that easily.”
“Dammit Harrison! Now you’re messing with my star. Will you let her swim please?” Coach Francis stood there with his hands on his hips and the whistle dangling from his lips. “Twenty more laps for you today, Luke. Now get moving.”
“You got me in trouble,” Luke said to Ellie, but grinned. “Now you owe me.”
She pushed him away and laughed. “We’ll see, you Goofy Goober.” She dove under the water and resumed her training. He followed after her.
After practice, they were walking home when John said, “Hey! Let’s go check out the creek. It rained a bunch last night and I bet it’s full.”
Instead of going through Luke’s fence at the back of the tennis courts, they turned right and followed a path into the woods. The trail gave access to the pool and tennis courts for the neighborhood which existed on the other side of the creek. They passed a couple and their two children loaded down with towels and floats, all headed for the pool. The little kids kept running ahead of the parents and the dad would yell at them to ‘Wait up!’ Ellie reached out and grabbed the little girl, tickling her as she squirmed in her arms. She squealed with delight.
“Ellie! Stop!” the little girl yelled as she laughed.
“Thanks, Ellie,” the dad said.
“No problem Mr. Stinson.” To the little girl she said, “Mel, you listen to your Daddy, now. He’s smart.” And she smiled at the little girl.
“Ok, Ellie. I will. I’m a good girl.”
“I know you are sweetie,” Ellie said putting her down and giving her a big hug. “I’ll come play with you soon, ok?”
Mel’s face lit up and she yelled, “Yea! Ellie’s gonna play with me! Ellie’s gonna play with me!” She did a little dance in her swimmies and started to take off again, but then seemed to remember she wasn’t supposed to. She stopped and looked at her dad and then walked up to him taking his hand. “Sorry, Daddy.”
“It’s ok, Mel. Just stay close to me, alright?”
She nodded her little head and waved at Ellie as they continued on their way to the pool.
“You haven’t babysat for them in a while,” Luke said.
“I know. I think he lost his job or something. They haven’t been going out much. I love Mel and Robby. I like to just go and see them every once in awhile for the fun of it.”
“I hate babysitting,” Jimmy said. “What a waste of time.”
“Who’ve you ever babysat?” John asked.
“Nobody. I just think it’s a waste of time and I know I would hate it.”
“My little brother’s ok sometimes,” Luke said. “He used to crap his pants and I hated cleaning that up.”
“See,” Jimmy said. “I’d hate that. Baby crap, what a load of shit.”
Luke noticed Ellie wasn’t saying anything. He turned around and found her stopped in front of a tree looking at a sign hanging on it.
“What is it, El?” Luke yelled back.
“Come and look at this!” she said.
They went back and Ellie pointed at it.
“It’s a lost dog,” Jimmy said. “Do you know it?”
“No,” she said, “but I’ve seen like five lost pet signs in the last two weeks.”
“So,” Jimmy said.
“Maybe they’re not lost,” she said seriously.
Jimmy wasn’t getting it and said, “What? Somebody’s scamming people, hoping someone finds a real dog and calls them.”
“No, Jim,” Luke said. “It’s not a scam. These people really don’t know where their dogs are.”
“Do you think it’s him?” Ellie said quietly.
“I don’t think so, El,” Luke said moving next to her. “He’s probably gone now. We haven’t heard anything from him in months.”
“I know-it’s just weird. All of a sudden, these cats and dogs go missing.”
“It could be a coincidence,” John said. “It’s summer. People let their dogs outside more and they just run off because no one is paying attention to them.”
“Just like Bentley?” she said, a little anger edging into her voice. “What are you saying? I didn’t pay attention to my dog?”
“No,” John said quickly, “I’m not even talking about you.”
“But you make it sound like these people don’t care about their animals. They just got lazy and the dog ran off, right? Well, I wasn’t lazy. I was cold and somebody took Bentley and then cut his head off!” She was shouting now and on the verge of tears.
“Alright-alright! I didn’t mean anything Ellie.”
Luke touched her arm. “Hey,” he said softly. “We get it, ok? Nobody would ever say you were bad to Bentley.”
“But you guys aren’t taking this seriously,” she said, pointing to the sign.
“We just don’t want you to get all worked up about it. It doesn’t mean we don’t get what you’re saying,” Jimmy said.
“Well I am worked up about it.”
“We know,” John said, sarcastically.
“Shut up, John,” Luke said.
“Jeez!” John said. “Alright, Ellie. I’m sorry.”
She looked at all three of them and then said, “You know, sometimes it’s hard hanging out with just boys.”
“We know,” Luke said, smiling. “We can be pretty stupid.”
“Speak for yourself, dumbass,” Jimmy said, a grin spreading across his face.
She finally smiled and said to Luke, “Well-you’re not stupid.” And she leaned up against him resting her head on his shoulder.
“What?” John said. “Does that mean I am?”
They ignored him and started walking again, Ellie and Luke with their arms around each other and her head leaning on his shoulder.
“You know,” Jimmy said, “you two are so cute sometimes it makes me want to barf.”
“Me?” Luke asked.
Jimmy just gave him a look. “Come on. Let’s go see the creek.”
They went deeper into the woods and Luke could hear water rushing in the distance.
“Do you hear that?” John asked. “Come on!” and he started to run. They all chased after him and as they came up to a foot bridge they could see the creek filled to the top of its banks. The water was rushing past under the bridge just a few inches below their feet.
“Man!” John said. “It’s rockin’!”
Luke watched Ellie pick a stick up and throw it upstream into the creek. It zoomed past them under the bridge in a matter of seconds.
