Why Not One More Night?

The rest of the week passed uneventfully. I’d adjusted to Black River faster than I had expected, and I spent every morning and every afternoon in Zach’s car listening to him and Trina bicker back and forth. Most days it was mildly entertaining, but it occasionally gave me a headache and became irritating. They were excellent at trading stories about people they both knew and then never explaining anything to me, or rehashing old arguments in my presence which usually ended in one of them finally demanding for me to decide who was right. It got incredibly awkward by the end of the week, so I was pretty thankful to have the weekend to myself.

Originally, Mason was supposed to come home from Hiram for Labor Day weekend, but apparently could not make it home for one reason for another, so instead of attempting to make the voyage back to my mom and Frank’s, I stayed at my dad’s. I spent most of Saturday and Sunday binge-watching Weeds for the millionth time and scarcely moving from my couch. On Monday, my dad forced me into spending time with him, which I would probably not have minded if the activity that he’d chosen was not fishing. Fishing was not my idea of a good time, and it was especially not my idea of fun to go do it at the hottest point in the afternoon. Still, my dad was determined to force me to spend time with him, so I had no choice but to join him in the car with his fishing rods and tackle box.

We drove a little until we came upon a small park, which was surprisingly barren for Labor Day. He selected a quiet spot by a semi-steep hill and set everything up, handing me one of the fishing poles he’d brought along with him. I had to admit that I couldn’t exactly remember how to do everything since I hadn’t fished since the Father’s Day we’d spent together when I was five, so he explained everything to me again quickly, albeit in an annoyed manner.

Unfortunately, fishing requires patience and silence, two concepts that I’ve never been comfortable with. I attempted to make conversation a few times, though Dad just shushed me and told me that I’d scare fish away. I gave up on fishing about an hour into the whole ordeal and sat on the hill behind him, just watching. I managed to find the one anthill on the whole slope and rest my ass on it, destroying their home and also provoking the displaced ants to crawl all over my legs. This of course caused me to shriek, and instead of understanding my reason for my high-pitched outburst as Frank would have, Dad told me to just brush them off and go take a walk elsewhere so that he could concentrate. Apparently there would be no bonding experience.

I took Dad’s advice and decided to start walking the trails of the park, kind of enjoying the freedom that came with being out from under anyone’s thumb. I walked for about ten minutes before I even spotted anyone else, and lucky me, it happened to be my favorite six and a half foot tall ride to school.

“Hey,” I greeted Zach breezily as I caught up to him. I silently thanked my dad in the back of my mind for having such a kickass basement of workout equipment – the only thing that he was really good for – because otherwise, I would have had to hide some heavy breathing.

“Oh, hey,” he said nonchalantly, looking down at me for a second and focusing his attention back on the two dogs he was walking. One was what looked to be a German Shepard puppy whilst the other was a small Chihuahua, two dogs that looked totally ridiculous walking together. “What’s up?”

“I got banned from fishing with my dad,” I replied, shrugging my shoulders. “Apparently trying to make conversation on a bonding outing is frowned upon.”

“I’d think that’d be the exact opposite, but I guess to each their own,” Zach said, sighing angrily as the leashes got tangled. “Goddamnit, asshole, stop it.”

“Well, that’s not very nice,” I told him, my small attempt at humor. I’d never actually spent any time alone with Zach, though we did share second period together which didn’t really count since there was no time to talk.

“The dog’s name is Asshole,” he explained. “Asshole’s the little one. He’s my sister’s. The other one’s mine.”

“What’s his name?” I asked, nodding in the direction of the German Shepard as we walked along.

“Roman,” Zach answered. “I just got him a couple of months ago and he went unnamed for a few days. He just kept walking around our yard aimlessly that whole time so I just started calling him Roman since he was always roaming around.”

“That’s actually really clever and adorable,” I told him, smiling. “So how’d Asshole get his name? I have a hard time picturing Trina naming anything Asshole.”

“I named him, too,” he responded. “That was a total accident, though. My parents for whatever reason decided I needed a dog at the beginning of the summer, so Trina decided that she had to have one of her own too, so they got her a Chihuahua per her request. She was trying to name him Bruiser like that dog in Legally Blonde, but he wouldn’t respond to it. But then she gets this stupid dog home and all he did was circle around people’s feet while they were trying to walk, so I’d always tell it, ‘Stop it, asshole,’ and eventually that became the only name he would respond to, so it just stuck.”

I laughed probably a little more than I should have. “That’s kind of awesome. I think if I tried to name anything Asshole my stepdad would probably have a heart attack and pass out at the impoliteness of it all.”

“My dad thinks it’s pretty funny,” Zach offered up. “So does my mom, but at first it was all, ‘Oh Zach, that’s so vulgar,’ and Trina hates it.”

“See, that sounds more like the Trina I know,” I said with a laugh. “What’s she up to today?”

“She’s having some of the other freshman girls over so that they can lay out by our pool,” he replied. “I was ordered to make myself scarce.”

“That’s kind of rude.” Again, I just couldn’t picture Shawn and I being anything like Zach and Trina. We shared the majority of the same friends and I was even still dating his best friend (though admittedly, Shawn had been a little wary of that at first but quickly got over it).

“Yeah, well, it’s probably for my own good anyway,” Zach commented, though he didn’t elaborate further. We walked in silence for a few more moments, listening to the wind rustle the leaves on the trees while Roman panted loudly. I was expecting to have to be the one to pick up the conversation again, but Zach actually did. “So what’s with the no driving thing?”

“I don’t know,” I told him with a shrug. “I can drive. It’s just the maneuverability that I have a hard time with. I’m just not good at it. But honestly, people on the road freak me out anyway so I’m not really in a rush.”

“It’s not that bad,” he said. “I passed the maneuverability on my first try. You just have to practice a lot.”

“Yeah, I can totally see that happening now.” I rolled my eyes. “My dad gets impatient about me asking a simple question about fishing, like he’s gonna take the time to teach me how to do that.”

“Well, what about your mom or your stepdad?” he hedged, again attempting to untangle the leashes and ultimately giving up. I looked at him questioningly since I hadn’t shared any personal information with Zach, so how could he have known about my parents’ divorce? He shrugged at me. “Trina told me.”

“They don’t really have the time,” I answered. “They’re both psychiatrists and they have appointments all day, they come home and we eat dinner, and usually have family time.”

“That sounds very structured,” Zach commented, “and boring.” He waved his hand at me in an almost passive manner. “Fuck it, I’ll teach you.”

“Really?” I asked, a little taken aback. “Are you sure?”

“Yeah,” he said. “I still have the cones and – ROMAN, CALM DOWN, GODDAMNIT, IT’S JUST A SQUIRREL – and we can set them up in a parking lot or something and you can use my car to practice.” His grip on Roman’s leash tightened as he tried to pull the dog away from the side of the path, shaking his head, annoyed. “How much experience do you actually have driving anyway?”

“Uh, like fifteen hours or so counting my in-cars,” I replied, trying to think back on the few times Frank had had time to take me after work.

“We’ve gotta get you some hours then,” he decided. “We can go after school a few times a week.” He glanced at me quickly and then away again as the dogs tugged at their leashes, excited at the sight of other dogs. “If you want, I mean.” He handed me one of the leashes. “Here, can you take Asshole for a couple of minutes? He’s getting on my fucking nerves. If those leashes tangle one more time, I’m gonna kill myself.”

“Yeah, sure,” I said, accepting the small Chihuahua from him and trying not let my face falter at that phrase. We walked on for a couple of minutes before he spoke again. “So what happened to your boyfriend coming to visit?”

“Does Trina tell you literally everything?” I asked with a small laugh. It was my turn to shake my head. “She’s got a big mouth.”

“When she’s in a sharing mood, she sure does,” he replied. “She said he goes to Hiram and that he was supposed to come see you this weekend.”

“Yeah, he was,” I confirmed with a nod. “He said he had some test on Tuesday and he really needed to study.”

Zach frowned and scoffed. “Did they manage to cram four weeks of material into one? No way he has a test he needs to study for.”

“He might,” I defended, frowning right back at him. “You don’t know that.”

“My buddy Chris is a junior at Ohio U, and I can tell you based on what he’s told me, that maybe there’s some kind of small quiz that he’d have to study for, which would take an hour at most, but no way is there a test that would require him staying there,” Zach countered. “So either he’s lying, or he’s just a lazy asshole and either way, that sucks for you.”

“I don’t recall asking you, for the record.” I narrowed my eyes at him, fighting the urge to just hand him back Asshole’s leash and turn around. “You don’t even know him.” Of course the thought that Mason was fibbing had crossed my mind, but I didn’t need that thought embedded in my mind any more than it already was.

“I’m just saying, it just sounds a little shady, that’s all,” he said, putting his free hand up in defense of himself. “We can drop it.”

“Good,” I said, “because we are.” Luckily, he did let the subject rest and we walked on for about another hour and a half, casually bullshitting about music and movies for the remainder of our time together that afternoon. After a while, my dad called and asked where I was and requested that I meet him by the car, so I had to regrettably hand Asshole back to Zach who immediately started to give Zach a hard time again. Before I left though, we made plans to drop Trina off at their house on Tuesday, grab the cones, and go practice and drive for a few hours. For what felt like the first time since I’d gotten to Homerville, I felt like I had something to look forward to.