“I’m their niece. My name’s Leigh.”
“You were water-skiing Monday.”
She nodded.
“I saw you.”
A blush warmed her face. “I hope you didn’t see me fall down.”
“You had on a white swimming suit.” He looked at what she was wearing. “Not this one, but it was white like this one. There was more to it.”
“Oh.”
“This one here’s better.”
“Thanks.” She swallowed hard. “About these baskets. I’d like to buy this one.”
“I’m Charlie. Charlie Payne. That’s P-a-y-n-e, not like a hurt.”
“Nice to meet you, Charlie.”
“You said your name was Leigh. What’s your last name?”
“West. Like the direction.”
He nodded. He smiled. He had extremely white teeth.
“My money’s up in the cabin. Why don’t you come along and get out of the sun?”
He nodded.
Leigh turned away and started walking. She glanced back. He was following, but staying a distance behind her as if wary of getting too close. “Do you live on the lake?” she asked.
“Over at the other side.”
The eastern shore, where the only homes were those creepy-looking shacks.
And not many of them. Leigh had suspected that he came from there. Still, having it confirmed made him seem even more alien. He was from a different world, a place that seemed both mysterious and somewhat sinister.
She didn’t feel threatened, though. Nervous, excited, but not threatened.
She climbed the shaded path, the breeze cool on her damp skin. Though she didn’t look back again, she was certain that Charlie must be studying her. The feel of the fabric taut across her moving buttocks kept her aware that she was nearly naked.
Maybe he was getting turned on.
Or maybe his people didn’t dress this way and he found it offensive.
No, he’d said that he liked the bikini.
At the top of the slope, she followed an offshoot of the path to the cabin. Charlie’s footfalls stayed behind her. She climbed the wooden stairs, opened the screen door of the porch, and held it wide.
Charlie stopped.
“You coming?”
“I better wait here.”
She thought of her parents’ strict rule about not having boys in the house while they weren’t home. Well, this isn’t their house. Mike and Jenny had imposed no such restriction.
“It’s okay,” she said. “Nobody’s home.”
“Mom, she don’t want me going in folks’ places.”
“What she doesn’t know won’t hurt her.”
His eyes narrowed.
He doesn’t trust me, Leigh thought, annoyed. “Suit yourself.” She turned away.
“Guess I can wait on the porch,” Charlie said.
She held the door open for him and watched him approach. He had brown, curly hair starting at his navel and spreading downward like a triangle to the waistband of his low jeans. Leigh stayed in the doorway while he climbed the stairs. He turned sideways to avoid touching her as he stepped by.
He looked around the porch.
Leigh gestured toward the swing suspended by chains from the ceiling. Obediently, he went over to it and sat down. The chains groaned and creaked quietly.
“Back in a second.”
Leigh carried the basket into her bedroom and tossed it onto the bed. With trembling fingers, she opened her shoulder bag and found her billfold. She took out a ten and two ones. Then she hurried into the kitchen. The lower shelves of the refrigerator were loaded with cans of soda and beer. She hesitated, then folded the bills, tucked them under the elastic at her hip, and took out two cans of beer.
She had swung the refrigerator door shut and started out of the kitchen before she changed her mind. Mike and Jenny might not approve of her serving beer to Charlie. On top of that, she didn’t want Charlie getting the wrong idea. So she put the beer away and took out cans of black cherry soda instead.
She opened them and carried them out to the porch. Charlie’s hat was on his lap. His brown hair was plastered to the top of his head and stuck out, unkempt and shaggy, around the ears.
“Would you like a cold drink before you go?” she asked.
“Don’t want to put you out none.”
“You’d better take one,” she said. “They’re already open, and I can’t drink them both.” She handed one of the cans to him.
“Thank you.”
He was sitting near the middle of the swing, an arm draped over its back. Leigh considered asking him to move over, but that seemed a bit too pushy. Besides, if she joined him on the swing, it would make looking at him awkward. So she stepped away and leaned sideways, shoulder against the door frame.
“Your mother makes the baskets, and you sell them to people around the lake?”
He took a drink and nodded.
“Are there enough people around to make it worthwhile?”
“Don’t need much.” His gaze flicked downward, then back up to Leigh’s face. “There’s four lakes. Did you know there’s four of ’em?”
“No.”
“Wahconda, Circle, Goon, and Willow. There’s channels. You can get from one to the other. I sell on all of ’em. There’s places like Carson’s where you’ve got folks coming and going all summer. That’s where I sell the most.
“New folks all the time, and they like Mom’s baskets. They got money, too, a lot of ’em. Made sixty-five dollars off just one lady a couple weeks back.”
While he talked, his eyes kept straying down Leigh’s body. Then he would look elsewhere fast as if he feared being caught.
“It sounds lucrative,” she said.
He lowered his gaze to the top of his soda can. “That lady didn’t want just baskets.”
“What else did she want?”
“Well, she liquored me up.”
Leigh was suddenly very glad she’d decided against the beers.
“Then she went grabbing at me, but I made her quit. Mom, she give me a good switching.”
“How did your mother find out?”
He shrugged. “Smelled the liquor on me. I told her I made the lady quit, but she hided me anyhow. It didn’t count I sold five baskets. See, I went in her place and got a snoutful and put myself in the path of temptation.” He didn’t sound resentful against his mother, more as if he had strayed and deserved the punishment. “She’d likely switch me,” he added, “if she found out I was here.”
“Well, I hope you’re not planning to tell her.”
“I don’t guess I will,” he said, and looked up at Leigh with wary eyes.
“Don’t worry, I won’t liquor you up and grab you.”
The red of a blush showed through his tan.
“Your mother sounds pretty strict.” Sounds like a regular bitch, Leigh thought.
“She just don’t want me doing wrong.”
“Does she let you date?”
