It’s my favorite.” She pours some in the lid.
“Here, try it.” I sit on top of my navy blue sleeping bag and take it from her.
It smells like chocolate but… sweeter.
“Don’t trust me?”
“I do,” I respond defensively.
I take a small sip.
It’s pretty damn good.
“What is it?”
“It’s Milky Way hot chocolate.
I put caramel and mocha in it.”
“That’s actually my favorite ice cream.”
“Weewy?” Her words are muffled by the marshmallow plugging her mouth.
I laugh at her.
She sucks in the marshmallow and giggles uncontrollably.
I lose my laughter at the sound of hers.
I’ve heard Nyelle laugh before, but this light, girly sound is different.
It’s one I remember so distinctly.
This laugh is one of my favorite childhood memories.
“What?” she asks.
“Are you okay?”
“Uh, yeah,” I say, snapping out of it.
“Still waking up.”
“We shouldn’t have to wait too much longer,” Nyelle explains, lying back on the dock, pulling her sleeping bag up to her chin.
“What are we looking for exactly?”
“Shooting stars, but lots of them, and brighter.” After a few minutes of sitting and waiting, I’m fricken freezing.
So I slip into my sleeping bag and lie next to Nyelle, resting my head on my gloved hands.
We lay there in silence.
The sky is speckled with countless stars, despite the large moon low in the sky.
“I was hoping to see you tonight,” I say without looking at her.
“You did see me tonight,” she says with a small laugh.
“I meant at the party.” She’s quiet.
I look over and find her eyes are still, like they’re steadied on a single star.
“I thought about it.
But most people annoy me, and after I drink, I tend to let them know it.” I laugh.
“So no parties for you?”
“I’ll go, but one a month is my quota.”
“Have you met your quota this month?” I ask, still watching her.
Her profile is soft lines, accentuated by the fullness of her lips.
I’ve never really noticed her lips before—always too caught up in her eyes.
“Nope.
Not yet.” She darts her eyes toward me, then back up at the sky.
“Then… next weekend, go to a party with me and my friends?” I suggest.
I’m hoping that if it sounds less like a date, she’ll show up.
I’ve been trying to figure out how to make sure Rae gets to meet her anyway.
“Where?”
“Not sure yet.
This weekend is still happening, so I’ll tell you when I see you at Bean Buzz on Thursday.” This is my way of guaranteeing I see her again this week.
“Um… okay.” I return my focus back to the sky with a smile on my face.
We’re quiet again.
I can hear the water lapping against the dock.
It’s sedating.
Waiting eventually makes my lids heavy.
“There’s one!” I open my eyes.
Nyelle’s arm is extended, a finger pointing.
But I’ve missed it.
“We’re only going to see the brightest ones because of the full moon.” We don’t see another one for five minutes.
I watch it move across the sky like a single headlight traveling down a highway.
I want to call out, “Padiddle!” But that would sound stupid.
It just accounts for how tired I am.
“I love looking at the stars.” Her voice is quiet and distant, like a memory.
“They can take away your pain if you let them.
And when the sun comes up, all that sorrow disappears.” When I take in all the stars in the sky, I can’t help but think that’s a lot of hurt.
“What about the shooting stars?” Nyelle turns her head with a jerk at the sound of my voice like she forgot I was beside her.
“You wish on them, for another chance to get it right.”
“Do you believe you can do that? Just start again?”
“Every day,” she says in a whisper, staring at the stars.
Two bright streaks rush across the night sky, crossing each other directly above us.
“Now we each get a second chance,” I say.
“Do you know what you want to do differently, now that you get a do-over?”
“I need to think about it,” I lie, not ready to be that honest.
“Do you?”
“Yeah, I do,” she answers.
When I look at her, her eyes are closed and her chest rises with a deep inhale, like she’s wishing it this very second.
A slow smile emerges on her lips right before she opens her eyes.
She angles her head toward me, still smiling.
I can’t look away from the light caught in her eyes.
I search them for whatever it is she’s not saying.
I want to ask her what she wished for, but when she redirects her attention back to the stars, I lose my nerve.
I turn away and stare into space.
It occurs to me, as I watch another meteor gliding along the tree line, that tonight the sky is full of second chances.
Nyelle continues to call out each sighting.
But after a while I give in to the weight of my lids and everything fades to black.
“Want to have sex?”
“What?” My eyes flip open.
I blink quickly, trying to appear alert.
“What did you say?”
“I knew that would wake you up.” She starts laughing that giggly laugh that I love.
I’ve missed hearing it.
It’s real—and full of life.
I smile back at her.
I prop myself up on my elbows and look around.
The horizon is lightening behind the trees.
“Sorry.
I didn’t know there would be so much waiting.”
“Yeah, they’re not exactly celestial fireworks.”
“I don’t get why they call it a meteor shower then.” I yawn, sitting up to stretch my arms over my head.
I can hear birds chirping and the rustling of early morning.
“Want to go canoeing?” I start to ask if she’s serious.
But then she stands up and starts toward the lodge, where a green canoe is leaning against the side of a small hut, hidden under leaves and pine needles.
Of course she’s serious.
“Let’s do this,” I exhale, slowly standing.
My body is stiff from lying on the dock in the cold for—I check my phone—the past hour.
Nyelle is already pulling the boat toward the icy shore when I reach her.
“I’ve got it,” I tell her.
“Why don’t you want to look for an oar?” I tip the boat upright and drag it to the shoreline.
Scooping some of the leaves out of the bottom of the canoe, I try to assess what kind of condition it’s in.
It’s old and sun-worn.
But I can’t find anything wrong with it.
Then again, it’s difficult to really check it out with years of leaves plastered to the bottom.
“I found this.” Nyelle holds up half of a wooden oar.
“And this.” In her other hand is a child-sized faded orange life jacket.
The kind that feels like it’s choking you, not saving your life.
“You really want to do this?” Nyelle pulls the life jacket over her head and tosses me the oar.
I catch it with a laugh.
She looks ridiculous, but undeniably cute at the same time.
I push the boat on top of the ice that’s already starting to form around the lake.
As soon as she gets in, the boat cracks the surface and floats on the water.
I push it in a little farther before jumping in.
I bend over the side and shove us off the thin ice.
“Which way?” I ask, practically falling out of the boat in order to row.
Nyelle points toward the sunrise.
We clear the ice and glide alongside the dock, slowly veering toward the golden hues.
We’re about fifty feet from the end of the dock when icy water begins soaking into my boots.
I pick up my foot and look down at the saturated leaves.
The water continues to rise above the leaf line.
“We’re leaking,” Nyelle says matter-of-factly, lifting her feet out of the water and setting them on the crossbar.
“No,” I correct her.
“We’re sinking.” I try to whip us around in the direction of the dock.
But I might as well be using my hands.
If only I could paddle as fast as my heart’s pounding.
In less than a minute, my feet are completely covered in freezing water.
The more that seeps into the boat, the slower we go and the faster we sink.
“We’re going to have to swim for it.
We’ll be underwater before we get there.”
“Bet you’re wishing you had one of these awesome life vests right about now, aren’t you?” Nyelle laughs.
How could she possibly think this is funny? But she does.
When I look across at her, she appears completely amused.
I ignore her and paddle faster.
The bath of ice water is beginning to make the muscles in my calves cramp.
I press my lips together to keep them from trembling.
Nyelle’s smile falls when she notices.
“Cal, you’re freezing, aren’t you? And here I am thinking this is the funniest thing ever.
I’m so sorry.”
“It’s okay,” I assure her.
“It’ll be funny after it’s over.
Right now, it just sucks.” I try to conjure a reassuring smile, but my teeth end up chattering instead.
Nyelle starts unlacing her boots.
“What are you doing?”
“Taking off my boots.
They’ll be like cement if I try to swim in them.” She has a point.
I abandon the oar, pull off my gloves and struggle to untie my cold, wet laces.
Nyelle fastens her boots together, removes the child’s life vest from around her neck, and replaces it with the boots.
She sinks her feet in the water and gasps.
“Holy shit.
How are we not skating on this lake right now?”
“Give it another week and we will be,” I say between chatters.
We both eye the twenty feet we have to swim to the dock.
“This is going to suck,” I say in a breath.
“No doubt.” Nyelle wraps the vest under her arms, leans over the side of the canoe, and glides into the water.
There isn’t much of the canoe left above water at this point.
Trying not to submerse my head beneath the icy water, I do the same—minus the life vest.
The air is sucked from my lungs upon contact, and my muscles tighten into knots.
I kick and swing my arms overhead in a crawl.
I don’t feel like I’m making progress, probably because I can’t feel anything.
I focus on Nyelle to make sure she doesn’t go under.
Her hand reaches out in front of her, stretching for the ladder at the end of the dock.
I give her the last push she needs to grab it, and she pulls herself up.
I hold on to the side of the ladder as she struggles up onto the dock.
Her entire body is shaking uncontrollably.
I climb up after her and blink hard when she peels her drenched jeans down, exposing white lace underwear.
I understand what she’s doing, but I’m still not prepared for it.
I run, or pretty much stumble, to the truck.
Nyelle, thankfully, left the keys in the ignition.
I hop in and start it up, cranking the heat on full blast, giving it time to warm up.
When I return to Nyelle, her clothes are in a sopping heap on the wooden boards, and she’s curled up in a ball inside her sleeping bag, shivering so bad I can hear her teeth colliding.