From the Ashes

After about a half hour of swimming around in the gorgeous water near the dock, I climb out to put my towel down by the edge of the structure and lay on my stomach. My arms are crossed over the edge of the dock, my chin resting on top of them as I smile down at Roman and Sage, who are still treading water in front of me. Sage swims over to drape his arm over the edge of the dock beside me, and Roman holds onto the wood right in front of me. The sun feels glorious as it warms my back, the water slowly evaporating from my skin as my hair starts to sun-dry in the heat.

“Will you cut that out?” I hiss with a smirk, swatting at Roman’s head as he periodically shoots tiny jets of water at me from clasped hands. He wiggles his eyebrows at me as I dunk my hand in the cool water to splash him. He grasps my hand, giving it a light tug as he threatens to pull me in towards him. I give a garbled laugh in protest.

“Leave poor Allie alone,” Sage croons in mock defense as he drapes an arm halfway across my shoulders.

“I’ll throw you both in.”

“Tough words, sugar,” I add with a pat on his cheek. My eyes move down to catch a shape on the farther part of his shoulder, and my hand moves down to investigate.

“What’s on your back, Rome?” His hand snatches mine as he gives me slight smirk, and Sage falls silent.

“I’ll show you later,” he says in a lower voice. I tilt my head at him with narrowed eyes and a half-smile, and he returns my look with a full smirk now.

“Okay?” I chuckle.

“Allie,” Roman says my name, pulling himself up slightly out of the water with both hands on the dock against my arms. I prop myself up with a raised eyebrow as he leans his face right in front of mine.

“Yeah?” I say flatly.

“You’re too dry.”

That surmised, he swiftly grabs me by the arms and drags me into the water against him. My laughing screech is choked by the water as I kick and pull away from Roman under the water, his limbs bumping against mine. I surface in a sputter of curses to see Roman sitting innocently on the edge of the dock, dripping wet as his feet dangle in the water. He reaches behind him on the dock for his shirt and pulls it over his body, still streaming with water. He shakes his soaking black hair like a dog as I swim over to hang on the dock.

“Asshole,” I say with a flat tone, holding onto the dock as I dip my head back in the water to smooth my hair out.

“Charming,” Roman smirks as he matches my tone.

We all end up on the dock to soak up some of the sun, lying lazily across the structure to admire the beauty of the lake, or stare up at the listless clouds in the azure sky. When we get too hot from the sun, we dive into the refreshingly cool water, and climb back up on the dock to start over again. My eyes repeatedly find their way to Roman’s back whenever it’s turned to me, and I wonder what lies beneath his shirt on the back of his shoulder. Roman catches me staring once in a while, and he just gives me a tight smile before I sheepishly avert my gaze.

“So my stomach’s starting to devour itself,” I say when our previous conversation dies down, all three of us lying on our backs to stare at the sky. Sage’s hand move to his stomach from the corner of my eye.

“I’m starving too,” he says. Roman agrees, saying that our shenanigans have worked up a pretty good appetite.

“We’ll bring lunch along next time,” he sighs, “We were so excited about it that we kind of forgot.” Sage chuckles as he sits up, and I clutch my own rumbling stomach.

“We better freakin’,” I groan with a laugh. I roll over and get up in stages, swiping up my towel and begin to use it to smack Roman in the head. “Truck. Drive. You. Home. Food,” I say with each thwack, and Roman bats it away as he sits up, his damp dark hair being tousled with every blow.

“I’ll leave you behind if you don’t stop that, you Neanderthal.” I play along with his suggestion, giving him a low-browed look as I point from him to the truck and back with a grunt.

“Her starvation is making her intelligence degenerate,” Sage says as Roman gets up to confiscate my towel once I go back to hitting him with it. I give Roman a savagely angry look when he captures me in the twisted-up towel, pinning my folded arms against my chest and holding me nose-to-nose with him. Returning my dark look comically, he holds the ends of the towel in one hand and flicks my nose lightly with the other.

“Cavemen get strapped to the roof,” he growls. I puff a gust of air up his nose, making him jerk back.

“Unga.” Roman laughs, keeping the towel around me as he swiftly crouches and lifts me onto his shoulder in the same motion. I protest with giggles as the three of us make our way up the steep bank to the truck, and Roman throws me into the pick-up.

“This is illegal!” I shout over the slamming of the doors, and the revving of the engine.

“What was that, darlin’?” Roman’s innocent voice floats from the open window, and Sage shrugs at me with a grin from the back window. I plop down cross-legged, draping my arm over the side of the pick-up, my back leaning against the covered part of the truck. I sigh and enjoy the view as we kick up dust and bump down the dirt road back from where we came, towards our cabins, and lunch.

The ride back to the cabins is horridly dusty, and far too long. My stomach is practically cramping by the time we pull into our property. Roman comes around to lift me out of the truck with a grin. I sneer at him for the hard, bumpy ride, but accept his help nonetheless.

Once in the lower cabin, we discover most of the family is still out boating on the big lake today, and we have the kitchen to ourselves. I stand at the stove stirring a pot of Campbell’s tomato soup as Roman stands beside me, the aroma from the sizzling grilled-cheese sandwiches in his frying pan driving me crazy with hunger. Sage pulls out plates, glasses, and drinks when the food is almost done. Not nearly soon enough, we’re all sitting at the huge dining table devouring our delicious meal. I sit in between the boys, only pausing in inhaling my food to wash it down with ice-cold milk. Roman leans back in his chair as he sips at a Dr. Pepper, only the crusts from 2 sandwiches left on his plate.

“Guess what’s tonight, Allie?” he asks, and I lean my head on my hand and my elbow on the table as I dunk a corner of my sandwich in my soup.

“What’s that, Spade?” I say, gnawing on the greasy hunk of toasted bread and cheese.

“The preliminary rounds of The Tournament.” I cock an eyebrow as my eyes flicker to Sage, who grins into his soup. My gaze flits back to Roman.

“The Tournament?” I ask in a bland voice, waiting for him to explain.

“Every Saturday night for the first few weeks, we host rounds in a fighting tournament at The Gazebo for all the kids our age from the other camps. Sage and I usually get pretty far, you’ll enjoy it,” he tells me, and I sit up straight to peer from Roman to Sage.

“A fighting tournament?” I say incredulously, a smile creeping up on my face. “What kind of fighting?” I ask. Roman shrugs nonchalantly.

“Free fighting. Sort of like cage fighting without the cage, or wrestling without all the rules. You beat on the other guy a bit, and you try to get him on his back.”

The thought of Roman fighting like that sends chills up my spine. It’s so... manly, I think with a snort, so feral.

“It’s sort of a big deal around here,” Sage adds, “The tradition was started a good few years ago when we were kids, by the older teenage regulars. We used to go to watch every year when we discovered it, and joined in when we were old enough. We love keeping it alive, and so do all the other kids, even though the original founders of The Tournament grew up and don’t come here regularly in the summers anymore.”

“The girls spice it up too, they add their fun to it with their support. You’ll see tonight. You’re gonna love watching us kick some scrawny ass,” Roman says with a lazy grin.

“Do the parents know about this?” I ask with a smirk, flicking Roman’s arm.

“Some do. Some don’t,” he replies.

“Huh. It does sound pretty interesting.”

In actuality... It sounds freakin’ awesome.