Chapter Text
Eric laid on his back in the rear seat of his father’s car, watching the lights from passing vehicles and street lights cross the ceiling. Ever since his iPod ran out of batteries a few hours earlier, he’d had nothing to do but listen to his parents’ music and look at the passing scenery. There hadn’t even been much to look at since the sun set. He let out a deep sigh.
“One more mile to the Sagamore Bridge. We’re making great time!” Coach announced from the driver’s seat. He must have looked in the rear-view mirror and noticed that Eric wasn’t visible, because he added, “Sit up, Junior. And you’d best be wearing your seat belt.”
Eric sat up straight and pulled the shoulder belt across his chest. Great. One less thing to entertain himself with on hour who-knew-how-many of a nearly day-long road trip to Cape Cod. Massachusetts!
Instead of vacationing on Tybee Island like they always did, this year Eric’s parents decided that it would be best to “expose Eric to a different culture” up North. He knew what they really meant. They wanted to get him away from the small-town Southern jocks and bullies. As though small-town Northern jocks and bullies would be any different.
The jocks at his new high school had made quite clear what they thought of his figure skating. Apparently competing at the Southern Junior Regionals wasn’t a “real” sporting achievement — even if none of them had ever so much as qualified for a regional tournament themselves.
After Eric failed to medal at the regionals, Coach sat him down and told him it was time to think seriously about his future and leave figure skating behind. If Eric was going to be honest with himself, he knew he’d never make it to the Olympics. Still, he couldn’t help but suspect that his father’s insistence that he leave the sport had less to do with his skill levels and more to do with figure skating’s perceived sissiness.
It wasn’t fair. He felt alive on the ice! If his father hadn’t had to give up football after the knee injury that ended his career, then why should Eric have to give up the thrill of speeding across a rink?
Eric’s mother twisted in her seat to look at him. “Dicky, I know this has been a long drive, but it will all be worth it when we get to the beach house.”
Nowhere was worth almost an entire day trapped in the car with his parents, Eric thought to himself.
A normal person would have made it a two-day trip, maybe stopping for some sightseeing along the way but oh no. Coach Richard Bittle was too stubborn to do in two days what he could manage in one (horrible) day. They’d left before sun-up and driven through the day and half the night, stopping only for rest stops, gas tank refills, and drive-through food that they ate in the car to optimize their travel time.
“Town of Sandwich, here we come!” Coach cheered as they passed a sign welcoming them to Sandwich, Massachusetts, population 20,675. Sandwich. Who in the world names a town after something children eat for lunch, Eric wondered bitterly.
After a few more stops and turns, Coach pulled into the parking lot of a building that looked far too industrial to be a beach house. “Is this it?” Eric asked skeptically.
“No, no,” Coach explained as he pulled into a parking spot. “This is the rental agency. We’re just stopping here to pick up the keys to our cottage.”
“Are you serious?” Eric cried out. “They won’t still be open! It’s nearly midnight! We’re going to spend the night in the parking lot,” he moaned.
“It won’t be a minute.” Coach unbuckled his seatbelt and opened his car door. “They gave me a PIN number for their mailbox. I just need to enter the secret code to get the keys stored inside. It’s all very high-tech.” He slammed the door shut and jogged over to a row of mailboxes outside the building. Sure enough, a minute later he returned to the car holding the keys aloft triumphantly.
As Coach drove the last few blocks to their beach house, Eric detected a smell in the air growing stronger and stronger. It smelled like salt and fish and something else he couldn’t quite put his finger on. It wasn’t unpleasant, but it wasn’t home.
“And here we are,” Coach announced as he pulled into the driveway of what Eric hoped was, this time, their beach house.
Eric bit back a mutter of “Finally” as he unbuckled his seatbelt, stepped out of the car, and looked around. “Where’s the beach?” The way his parents had talked about this vacation the last few weeks, he’d expected to be staying right on the beach, or at least with a clear view of it. The street they were on looked decidedly suburban.
“It’s across the street and three blocks down.” Coach pointed off to the left and behind them. “An easy walk.”
Three blocks carrying their umbrella, chairs, cooler and other beach supplies didn’t sound all that easy to Eric.
He shook his head and then gazed up at the house. Cottage? Shack? Matchbox! It was easily less than half the size of their home in Madison: a single-story house covered in faded gray bits of wood that seemed to have been haphazardly thrown together.
“Oh Richard, it’s adorable,” his mom sighed in delight.
“Why’s it so weather-beaten?” Eric asked.
“That’s the authentic Cape Cod style,” she explained as his father led the way into their home for the next week.
“They don’t believe in paint in Cape Cod?” Eric muttered under his breath as he dragged his suitcase behind him.
If the outside of the house was colorless, the inside was an explosion of red, white, and blue. Practically every wall was covered with model ships, captain’s wheels, anchors, or ugly shell art. The kitchen didn’t appear to have been updated since the early 1980s. Worse, it had an electric range!
His room appeared to have been decorated for a much younger child. Friendly pirates smiled at him from the wallpaper and the matching bedspreads on both bunks of the bunk bed. Eric dropped his suitcase at the foot of the bottom bunk and then wandered out to check out the backyard.
A creaky screen door in need of patching led out to a small porch with a charcoal grill and two plastic lounge chairs. A small outdoor shower, surrounded by wooden fencing, stood to the left of the porch. Eric leaned against the railing and looked out at the postage stamp-sized yard… full of dried-up pine needles where grass should be. “Wow, I can’t wait to walk on that barefoot,” he remarked out loud.
“New neighbors?” A lightly accented voice called out from the right.
Eric looked to his right — and up — at the speaker. A dark-haired boy — no, man — stood at the second-floor balcony of the much larger house next door. A light shone on him from a tasteful outdoor sconce, giving him an almost unearthly glow.
Eric flushed. “Oh, um, yes! We’re the Bittle family! It’s nice to meet you…” He paused to allow his neighbor to introduce himself.
“You’re a little late for the usual arrival time,” the neighbor remarked instead.
“And what makes you the expert on my house’s arrival time?” Eric asked, planting his fists on his hips.
The man shrugged. “My parents and I have been staying here for the past month. I’ve seen three… or was it four? Other families come and go.” He leaned against his own porch railing, looking down on Eric as if in judgment. “When you didn’t arrive by supper, I assumed no one was staying next door this week.” He sighed. “That would have been nice.”
“Excuse you!” Eric may not have wanted to spend the week in Cape Cod, but that didn’t mean he’d put up with someone else wishing he wasn’t there.
The neighbor held up his hands defensively. “I just meant it would have been nice to have a week without another set of strangers trying to get a look at me and my family.”
Eric scoffed. “And what makes you think that I care one ounce about you or your family, Mister…” he faltered, realizing he didn’t know his neighbor’s name, before finishing triumphantly with “Mister Man! Goodnight, sir!” He stormed back into the beach house.
Unfortunately, the swinging door failed to slam satisfyingly behind him. Feeling robbed of a sufficiently dramatic end to the conversation, Eric pushed the door open again and shouted “I said good night!” to the neighbor before forcibly pulling the swinging door closed.