It's All in Your Mind (17 page)

I parked the truck in a short spur off the driveway, next to a stone wall shaded by a stand of oak trees. As Joel and I started unloading equipment, I explained, "Mr. Redfern built the house around an antique barn frame. He's put on several additions, and it's now something like six thousand square feet." I rummaged around until I found the small hand clippers. "The wall of the basement is granite trap
rock. Inside there are antique timbers, ceiling boards framed with original chestnut beams, linseed-oiled pine floors and an enormous rock fireplace. The rocks all came from this property."

"You've been inside?" Joel's eyebrows shot up in surprise, and for the first time I noticed his eyes were as green as the well-tended slope of lawn in front of Mr. Redfern's house.

"It takes all day to do this property. The Redferns have been kind enough to offer to let me and Papa use the bathroom. It'd be a long drive home or to a gas station. And," I added with a smile, "the woods are not an option."

"Spare the trees
—got it."

When we finished unloading the equipment, I handed Joel the small clippers and began giving instructions. "See that slate walkway leading to the front door? Use these small clippers to trim the grass along the edges, and don't dig down and make a groove. The Redferns entertain a lot, and the ladies with high heels might get a heel stuck in a groove, and trip."

"Got it. No grooves."

"And be sure to clean up all the clippings."

Joel nodded.

"I'm going to start mowing. When you're done edging the walk, start raking the grass where I've cut it and then I'll cut it again in the other direction. That'll take us all morning. During lunch, I'll fill you in on what else needs to be done."

"Yes ma'am." Joel saluted me with the clippers.

I heard my father's words tumble out of my mouth. "Be careful with those clippers. You could lose an eye."

"The no-cyclops rule." Joel grinned. "Got it."

It took all morning to do the front lawn. I
signaled to Joel to stop for lunch, and we headed for the truck. As we grabbed our lunches, I said, "Let's sit on the grass in the shade. It'll be cooler than in the truck."

"Sounds good," Joel said.

I leaned against the stone wall. A slight breeze cooled my face, a wonderful relief from the heat and humidity. I closed my eyes and savored the smell of freshly cut grass, the sounds of birds' clear whistles, buzzy trills, and long warbles.

"Lemonade?"

I opened my eyes. Joel held out a cup for me.

"Thanks." I gulped the cold drink, not realizing until then how thirsty I was.

"I hope I didn't wake you," Joel said. "You looked so peaceful. Wait, that sounds as if you were dead!" He laughed.

I elbowed him. "Fortunately, I'm not dead, just tired. But a good kind of tired. You know?"

"Yeah." Joel pointed to himself. "Me, I'm way past tired. I'm exhausted. But I know what you mean. When I caddied, it was fine when I was actually lugging a golf bag around the course. But I spent half my time sitting around waiting for someone to ask me to caddy. Then I stood around watching guys hit the ball. I'd get really tired, but it was because I was bored. Sweating-tired beats bored-tired any day, in my book."

"That's good," I said, "because the back lawn is nearly twice as big as the front lawn."

Joel clasped his hands to his heart and pretended to faint.

"You can't get out of it that easy." I reached over and tickled Joel's ribs.

"Aieeee!" Quicker than a blink, Joel grabbed my hands and pulled them off his ribs. He sat up, still holding tight to my hands, and said, "No fair. I'm the most ticklish being on the face of the earth. If we're going to work together, we've got to have a no-ticking rule." He tried to look serious, but the corners of his mouth twitched.

"I
—" I started to say something, but as I looked into his dark green eyes I saw a sweet tenderness in his gaze. I was unexpectedly pleased by this. How could that be? This was known-him-forever, help-me-with-homework, freckled-face Joel. He was just a friend. Nothing more. I was in love with Nolan.

"What?" Joel let go of my hands, and cocked his head to one side.

"A ... a no-tickling rule is a good idea." I hoped my face was pink enough from the heat to hide the blush I could feel creeping into my cheeks. "Um ... I guess we should finish lunch. I'm starved."

"Oh, yeah, food." Joel plunged his hand into his lunch bag and pulled out a sandwich made of thick bread stuffed with at least an inch of what looked like thin slices of ham. "Thanks for reminding me," he said with a grin. "I hate it when I forget to eat."

"I never have that problem," I said, glad Joel was kidding around. Apparently that light I thought had passed between us was all in my imagination. The heat probably had something to do with it. In any case, the rest of lunch was easy and relaxed, and our conversation centered on the work we had ahead of us in the afternoon.

Maybe it was because it was getting hotter than the inside of a volcano, but the back yard seemed bigger than ever. We mowed, raked, trimmed shrubs, and pulled weeds until we were ready to collapse. Joel and I both took more than one bathroom break. Joel was truly impressed with the inside of the Redfern's house, especially when I told him Mr. Redfern had done a lot of the work on it himself. He was even more impressed when Mr. and Mrs. Redfern insisted we stop work and come inside for a few minutes to cool off.

"Your father wouldn't want us to overwork you," Mrs. Redfern said with a twinkle in her eye.

"It's ninety-two degrees out there," Mr. Redfern, as he whipped up a couple of root beer floats for us in their spacious kitchen.

"And that humidity!" Mrs. Redfern exclaimed as she offered us a plate of her oatmeal raisin cookies.

The snack was just what Joel and I needed to recharge ourselves for the rest of the work we had to do. When we finished the root
beer floats and cookies, we thanked the Redferns and started back to the yard.

"Now you say hello
to your father for us," Mr. Redfern said.

"And tell him to get well soon," Mrs. Redfern added.

"I will," I said. "And thanks again."

Out in the back yard Joel said, "The Redferns are nice people."

"The best," I said. "If only all of Papa's customers were like them."

Joel nodded.

For the rest of the afternoon Joel and I cleared underbrush and bramble from the edges of the wooded area of the property. It had to be done by hand so not to destroy the woodland flowers. It was hot, sticky, scratching work, that seemed to take forever, but finally we were done. We loaded the truck, hopped in, and unrolled the windows all the way to catch what air we could.

Joel turned on the radio. As soon as a song was finished on one station, he flipped to another.
Sixteen Candles. Chapel of Dreams. Oh, What a Night
. He sang along with all of them, word for word.

"Do you know the lyrics to every doo-wop song ever written?" I asked, as I pulled off the turnpike.

"I can't quite figure out what the phrase is that the Flamingos sing after 'I only have eyes for you.' I've played it over and over, I've played at a slower speed. It always sounds like 'duh-moche-a-mo.'"

"If that's the only part you can't figure out, you're an expert." I stopped at a light on the
Post Road. "And maybe it
is
duh-moche-a-mo."

Joel let out an exaggerated gasp. "You're the only person who ever thought that! Everyone else thinks I'm nuts."

"Does 'everyone else' have a better idea of what they're saying?" The light turned green and I went left.

"No."

"Well, then. You must be right."

"I like the way you think."

"Uh, oh."

Joel laughed. Suddenly he turned up the radio. "Listen to this."

"It's Pat Boone singing
Love Letters in the Sand
. So ...?"

"Sand. Beach. I'm broiling. Let's go!"

"Go?"

"For a swim."

"A swim?" Another stop light. "You're forgetting one thing."

"And that is
...?"

"Swimsuits. We don't have any," I said. "And don't even mention skinny
dipping!"

"Skinny
dipping? Moi?" Joel said. "We can go in our clothes."

"Our clothes?"

"Is there an echo in this truck?"

I thought for a moment. "It
would
be nice to cool off ...."

"We're only two blocks from
Chatfield Town Beach, and I always carry my beach pass with me ..."

"All right, then." I turned down
Waterside Lane, and held my breath as I guided the truck over the narrow wood bridge spanning the creek that separated the beach from the road. Joel flashed his pass to Mr. Keyes, who waved us on with a nod and a smile. I drove to the far end of the parking lot, and we walked past the rock jetty to a part of the beach heavy with the sharp blades of beach grass that kept most people away. I was glad to have my dungarees and work shoes on as we hiked our way to the water. We sat in the cool damp sand and removed our shoes and socks. Joel peeled off his shirt. "Last one in is a rotten egg!" he shouted as he ran into the water. But running through water in dungarees, as I discovered, was no easy task.

"We'd better not get in too deep," I said. "We'd sink to the bottom in these wet clothes."

"Good idea," Joel said. "Drowning was not on my list of things to do."

We decided to go only up to our waists, then drop down until the water came up to our necks. The cold water came as a shock at first. But I got used it. We dogpaddled around until we forgot that we'd ever been hot and sweaty. We leaned back and floated as best we could in our wet, heavy clothes. A few thin clouds marked the soft surface of the powder blue sky. With my ears under the water, I could hear only the sound of a distant motor boat. Time did not move as we drifted in peaceful silence. 

But then a couple of families arrived, driving a herd of children into the water. Their squeals and shouts and splashes broke the hypnotic state we were in. We stood up and headed toward the water's edge, where we picked up our shoes and socks.

"Let's go over and sit on the jetty to dry off a little," Joel suggested. "It'll be easier to get our socks and shoes on."

"Good idea."

We found a flat rock and sat down. I wrung the water from my hair. Joel flipped his wet red hair back and ran his fingers through it. It glistened in the sunlight. We chatted easily about the work we did at Redfern's. After a few minutes my feet were dry enough to put on my shoes and socks. My shirt was fairly dry, but my dung
arees were still soggy. They clung to my legs, heavy and cold, even though the air was warm. "Next time we'll have to bring swimsuits," I said, "so we can actually swim."

"That's just what I was thinking," Joel said.

The wet dungarees chafed my legs as we walked back to the truck. I found a rag to brush the sand off the bottoms of our shoes. It would be easier than trying to sweep it out of the truck later.

Even with the swim, we got back to my house earlier than I had working alone for the past two weeks. Papa was puttering with his tomato plants when I pulled into the driveway, but he stopped and came over as soon as he saw us. "Did you fall in a creek?"

"We went for a dip at the town beach," I said. "Even in our clothes, it felt so good to cool off!"

"Young people!" Papa chuckled and shook his head. "Let me help you unload the truck. It's time to do a little maintenance on the mowers."

Without making a big deal of it, Joel made sure he did most of the heavy work of unloading the truck. Though I told him he'd done enough for one day, he insisted on staying and helping us remove the accumulated grass from the underside of the movers with an old flat-head screwdriver, finishing by spray-cleaning with a hose. Then he and I changed the spark plugs and replaced the oil of one mower, while Papa sharpened the blades of the other by hand with a file.

When we were all done, Papa said, "Nice work, you two. Thank you!"

Just then Mama stuck her head out the screen door, and called, "Supper in ten minutes. Joel, can you stay?"

"I'd love to Mrs. Skalbe. But my pants are still kind of wet. I don't want to ruin your chairs."

"Ach, you can wear a pair my pants," Papa said.

"Okay, then!" Joel said. "Thanks."

I dashed upstairs and freshened up a little, then put on a pair of shorts and a clean top. When I got to the kitchen, I tried not to laugh when I saw Joel in a too-big pair of Papa's pants just barely held up by Papa's red suspenders.

Joel arched an eyebrow and hitched his thumbs behind the suspenders.

My held-back laugh spluttered through my lips.

"You look pretty sharp there, young fella." Papa winked. "Maybe you can start a new fashion at the high school."

"That would be a first for me," Joel said. "On the rare occasion I buy new clothes, they're guaranteed to go out of style within ten minutes."