Page 40 of The Falcon and the Foe

Cal turned around. “We’ve only been on the road for ten minutes. Why didn’t you go at Bea Arthur?”

“Because I didn’t have to go then.”

“Who’s Bea Arthur?” Aiden asked.

Cal gasped and clutched his heart. “Our educational system is failing you, I see.”

“We have another hour or so until we arrive at the campsite.” I looked at the boys through the rearview mirror. “There’s a rest stop in about thirty minutes.”

“But I can’t wait.” Mason fidgeted against his seat belt like it was a straitjacket.

“Me, neither.” Aiden also broke out into the gotta-pee shimmy.

“You have to go, too?” I asked. Was this a twin thing? “You’ll need to wait. We have one designated rest break.”

“Better pull over,” Cal said to me. “The last thing you want is a van that reeks of urine.”

“We have a schedule.”

“The trees and dirt will still be there.”

“There goes our five-minute lead.” I got off at the next exit and pulled into a Burger King. Cal escorted the twins, along with two other scouts, to the bathroom.

They returned seven minutes later. Cal had two fresh cups of coffee in each hand. He handed one to me.

I gulped it down. This was going to be a fun—but long—weekend.

* * *

Back on the road.Minus the five-minute head start, we were now five minutes behind schedule. That was manageable. We’d still beat any kind of rush hour, especially once we got further away from the towns.

The kids talked amongst themselves. It created a curtain of cacophony that gave Cal and me a modicum of privacy.

“You know, I’m not the stick in the mud you like to think I am. I like to stick to a schedule.”

“I never said you were a stick in the mud. You’re uptight, but you’re not boring.” Cal had a smile on his face that sent a curl up my spine. “So, how’d you get into scouts?”

“I was a scrawny kid. Teased. They called me Twig Boy. My dad signed me up for the scouts to build character and confidence. I liked being in the outdoors. I thought I was going to be a park ranger or something when I was younger.”

“And now you’re in operations.”

Funny how that happened. I tried to trace my journey to this point in life. “I remember the first time I built my own campfire as a scout. I meticulously found the driest kindling and assembled the base. My fire lasted longer than anyone else’s, even the scout leader’s.”

“You sound like a budding arsonist.”

I smiled at an incoming memory. “Remember you had that idea for a bonfire at the Spring Carnival?”

“Yes. And I stand by it. It would’ve created school unity.”

“A large fire at an event attended by predominantly small children.” I shook my head. It must’ve been really fun inside Cal’s brain.

“You have to admit, some of my ideas were golden.”

“I would admit that, but I don’t like to lie.”

Cal glanced over his shoulder to do a quick check on the kids, then turned to me. A heavy silence crept out between us. A familiar silence that made the hairs on my arm stand up.

“So Josh got an eighty-eight on his math quiz today.”

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