Page 75 of Summer People
CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT
libby
Our day startsdown at the docks. Fisher gets out of the truck to pick up packages, telling us to stay put. There’s no way I can sit here and do nothing while he works, so naturally, we don’t listen.
“Hi, Bob!” Sutton yells.
“I thought his name was Cank,” I mumble as we walk over to chat.
“Ah, Libby,” the older man calls. “Glad to see you’re doing okay since your accident.”
“Wasn’t an accident.” Sutton cups her mouth and does that loud whisper thing again. It’s pointless but absolutely adorable. “Someone cut her wires.”
Cank’s forehead creases with concern. “Who would do that?”
I shrug. “Fisher’s working on figuring that out. I’m still betting it was the goat.”
His face morphs into a scowl. “Betty would never.”
“Betty is a boy, and his name is Fred,” Sutton says like Cank just made the most ridiculous error.
“Betty is a goat,” Fisher growls, then shakes his head. “I mean the goat is a goat. And I thought I told you to stay in the car.”
Betty is a boy whose name is Fred? That makes so much more sense, if I’m honest, since Betty is very clearly a male goat. Sutton is clearly the smartest on the island. With a huff, I frown at Fisher, who’s loading packages into his truck. “What are you doing?”
“Delivering the mail,” he grumbles, like it’s obvious.
It would be if he was the mailman.
“But why?”
“How do you think you get your mail, Princess?” His tone is teasing this time.
I shrug. “I thought you were being nice. I didn’t know this was another one of yourjobs,” I sing. Oh, now that I know he’s the person I’ll be annoying with purchases, a whole slew of ridiculous orders crowds my mind.
“While he’s dropping off this mail,” Cank says to me, “could you run into the grocery store and ask Doris to add bacon to my order this week?”
I shudder at the mere thought of dealing with Doris. That woman despises me. And she’s mean.
But I’m nothing if not neighborly, so I paste on a smile and head toward the truck. “Will do.”
“Will we be seeing you at the Fourth of July parade?” he calls after us.
Sutton spins and walks backward, grinning. “Yup. We’ll be riding Putt-Putt.”
“I said no,” Fisher grumbles from the back of the truck. “Does no one listen to me?” With a grunt, he hops down and stalks to the driver’s side.
Sutton and I giggle as we strap ourselves in.
“Cank asked?—”
Fisher’s phone rings, cutting me off.
He creeps along the path, nodding in a silent request for me to answer it. I think. Grimacing, I pick it up and put it on speaker.
Before Fisher even says hello, the line crackles, and a nasally voice says, “Oh, Fisher, I need you.”
My skin crawls. This womanneedsFisher?
