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What began as a storm in September of 1965, by December had become intermittent rains and high waters along the Stepping Stone River. Some flooding of the Hot Kettle Plains and, it was reported, the displacement of Troop 42 who were pitched up there with now-soggy tents and socks. Nativity plays were shortened or cancelled altogether due to lack of rehearsal space, or any electricity at all. The weather over that particular winter on New Penzance was erratic, sometimes downright strange. Thunder was frequent, but lightning rare, and day and night the air fizzled like a migraine. All the birds were quiet in the morning, then loud at night. It was yet to snow, at least, and there was hope that the work would be done in good time before the frost. Yet, inevitably, repairs across the island were met with grim downpours, halting progress, and leaving everyone inside with their sandwiches and flasks.
Randy Ward, however, was caught short, with no flask and no sandwich and no coat on his back, just a coil of rope and compass.
And that was how he ended up at Becky’s front gate.
The rain poured off the red slatted roof and made mulch of the flowerbeds in the front garden. He knew to tread careful, slow and light, so as not to be found flat on his ass, a moron amid the mulch. An impromptu rapid raced towards him down the path as he fought upstream. He already felt a fool, really, showing up unannounced and in such a state. But there really was no other option. With each step he grew soggier, but resolute, for there was a light in the upstairs window, warm and clear.
A thundercrack rattled overhead, and shook him where he stood. He walked faster, if he could, until he was skipping towards the door, where he knocked, hard, to be heard over the weather.
She wasn’t in. Couldn’t be in. As a rivulet of cold rainwater made passage down his spine, an icy feeling seized him. She’d find him in an hour or two, or two days or more, frozen solid in her front garden like a new and pathetic gnome. Might he knock again? Or would it seem too desperate? But he is desperate. Growing colder by the minute, the rope in his hand rubbing red raw against his palm, he was too numb to feel the pain yet, but just cold enough to feel afraid.
Maybe he could shout, or call at least. He summons the weak and anxious tethers of his voice, to cry, “Beck–”
The door opened. A crack. A creak. Then her face, warm enough to banish this cold from him, and kind.
She, in her turn, was surprised. Then, reminded of a stray dog, or a paper flyer for an amateur opera dropped listlessly in a puddle, her heart wilted. He saw the melting in her face, and in her hands, which fluttered around the doorframe.
He made no attempt to move, or explain himself. He was an overly shy girl scout whose cookies were going unsold. He was a trick-or-treater in a new neighbourhood. He mouthed around stories and found none.
“Come in! What are you doing?” She might’ve said more, but this was the first he heard. And so he did what she said without hesitation.
It was a relief, he thought as the door shut behind him and he dropped his burden, that he was close-by. He knew Becky’s house: the last house on the road with its white picket fence and yellow postbox, and the green bike parked outside, and the stained-glass robin redbreast laid as a diamond on the door, and the beds of (usually very well-maintained) pansies beside the steps. The nicest house on the island, well-watered and well-timbered, with a neatness in repose that could only be charming. He had been here before, invited back for tea, cake and finger-pastries. He had seen how, in the late afternoon, light poured like honey through the bay windows. He had seen how moonlight made her cosy. They had first kissed on the stoop when he walked her home on Halloween. She was dressed as Frankenstein’s Bride, and her white makeup left a smudge on his skin like he’d been eating beignets. (She was even sweeter, he knew.) He’d only just been round for Thanksgiving, where they’d foregone turkey for a couple of chicken thighs with carrots and peas. He’d asked then if they were going steady, and she said what a silly phrase, and kissed him again and again.
He had first come to this house on that day they spent looking for Sam Shakusky. He was upset and tired, and she told him that he’d better come and have some lunch, or they’d be no use to the search party at all. At the time, he protested. Why waste an hour on a grilled cheese and a glass of orange juice? But, after the grilled cheese and the glass of orange juice, Randy Ward could feel his fingers again, and found that the beating of his heart was not killing him, and that he could take full breaths without choking. And all the while, Becky sat not far from him, eating biscuits from a tin.
“These were my grandmother’s favourite. She told me that things always turn out okay.”
When he tried one – a shortbread finger – he assumed things would be okay, too.
So, caught short in the rain, he found Becky’s house, in the hope that the same would be true again.
“You’re soaked right through!” Becky had fetched two clean tea towels from the kitchen, one for his hair and face, and the other he used on his arms and in an attempt to make some progress on his clothes, which were dark and heavy with the weather. “This rain… knocked another telephone line right out last night.” She gave him a sympathetic look. “Did a number on you, too.”
“I’m okay…” His jaw shook as he talked. Even his eyelashes had clumped together in the wet.
“Well, I’m glad you found me,” she said, taking the tea towel he was using on the back of his neck, “here,” and using it to comb his hair through, wringing the water out. He dipped so she could reach. “Almost caught your death.”
“It’s just a bit of rain,” Randy muttered.
Becky gave a laugh, incredulous, but not unkind, and leaned into his shoulder. “Randy Ward! Remember last time you got caught in a bit of rain up at Fort Lebanon? You were sneezing for three weeks, and you only quit after a diet of chicken noodle soup and brioche. So quit acting so brave, hm?” She gave his ear a light pinch as she pulled the towel away, and he emitted a solemn ‘ouch’, rubbing at it, watching her with a small, tight-lipped smile as she made for the stairs. “Come on, up you get.”
She ran him a bath, as she might have done for the stray dog. She was lucky her boiler was still running hot. Jed the pilot was telling her his plumbing got busted on the third day of the storm. “Cold showers every morning,” he quipped, taking a handful of letters from the pigeonhole, ‘An’ if I want something hot I go boil it on the stove.” She told him that they say cold water is good for the metabolism. “Metabolism, huh? All I know, Becky,” and in a low voice, he said, “it makes my balls shrink.” And she hooted.
She thought of it again as she drew the bath, snickering into the heel of her hand.
“What’s funny?” Randy was stood behind her, shivering more shamelessly now, with the promise of something hot and steaming awaiting him.
“Oh, nothing… it’s just lucky I’ve got hot water.”
Randy didn’t understand the humour, but he was thankful. Becky had a few soaps and oils which she looked through. “D’you like lavender?” Randy nodded. So she added the lavender. “Come, now, give me your clothes I’ll hang them up by the fire.”
Her tone was helpful and plain, but the question made Ward start. “What now?”
Becky turned to him, blinking. “Your shirt is dripping wet, Randy.”
“No, it’s okay. I’ll leave it outside the door,” he said, unthinkingly backing into the doorhandle. “Ouch…”
“Are you shy?” Her voice was playful, probing.
“Just cold.”
“Well, alright. I’ll wait in the hall.”
She knew, of course, that his aversion was embarrassment, not coldness. Despite ‘going steady’ as Randy put it, Becky had seen no more of the man’s body than his neck, his knees, and on rare occasions his forearms in short-sleeved shirts. And, in fairness, he had seen no more of hers than her arms, her neck, and just a little more on that evening she wore a low-necked dress – but, even then, she noticed that he tried very hard not to look. Their bodies were strangers to one another, but Becky was patient.
His shyness was chronic, deep-rooted. The number of people to have seen Randy Ward’s naked body was a very small number indeed. Even, then most – like Becky – could attest to only some knees or a shoulder or two. Fewer still have gone the whole hog. One of these was of course Mrs Ward, who still remembered with fondness washing between those rolls of baby fat in the tin bath upstairs before powdering him up.
Ward was sixteen, afraid of his having a body at all, let alone one that changes, and one that wants, when he took his first girlfriend up to Chockshaw Heights, perhaps in the intention of making her the first beside his mother to see a lot more. She took one look at his nipples, which were pinker than she thought a boy’s should be, and laughed him back into his shirt, and back down the hill.
So, forgive him if he waited until Becky had left the bathroom to undress himself. He was but a man.
Meanwhile, Becky took a seat on her bed, with the bedroom door open, and a view of the bathroom door across the hall.
The first squelch of wet fabric hitting the floor. A shirt, sodden. Then a pause. The door was nudged a fraction again, and a hand emerged with more. Splat. The hand’s wrist was naked. There were shorts on the floor now. She watched as, one by one, his garments were peeled away in private, and then revealed to her. A peep show in reverse. Two socks. A jacket. The clink of a belt. His vest, which hadn’t been spared. Then the door closed. She carefully patted across the landing to collect the soggy pile, and heard the shifting of the water in the tub as he climbed in. She stayed to listen to his body settle, then retreated downstairs.
She hummed a tune from the radio; a song she didn’t know the name of. Each garment was delicately handled, spread before the fireplace: the shirt nearly translucent before the flame, and two socks like empty stockings. They had a mulchy, earthy scent to them. She liked when Ward smelled of his work.
Her task done, she made two cups of tea and settled down before the fireplace and, before long, she heard Randy on the landing, then coming down the stairs, before he appeared around the door.
“Hello.”
“Hello.”
He was wearing her dressing gown, ill-fitting though it was. “I hope you don’t mind?”
“No, I don’t mind. I made tea. I hope it’s still hot.”
The robe was cornflower blue, like Ward’s eyes. He shuffled, unsure of himself, to the settee, where he sat with crossed-legs.
“How was the bath?”
“Life-saving. Thank you.”
“Good.”
“I left it for you in case you wanted to hop in.”
“Thank you.”
Ward took up his tea, shifted in his seat. It was still hot enough, and he was grateful for being warmed from the inside, too. “Do you think I’m going to get sick?”
“Oh, almost certainly,” Becky replied, “But I have a lot of chicken noodle soup.”
She had a small decorated Christmas tree in her sitting room, around which she had wrapped a thin silver tinsel which, upon close inspection, revealed itself to be just tin foil.
“What are you doing for Christmas?” Randy asked, trying to emulate Becky’s manner, which was cool and calm, as one is with someone they care for, with someone they love.
“If the weather holds, I’ll get Jed to fly me over to see my Ma for Christmas Day.” If not…
“Fingers crossed.”
“What about you?”
“I’ll go see Mom and Dad. I’ll be getting the ferry out a few days before. Hopefully.” If not…
Becky was giving him a queer look.
“What?”
Her eyes were sly, her mouth thin and curled.
“Becky…” he chuckled.
“You know I can see your nipples in that.”
“Oh?” He flushed pink, first on that chest and then on his face, and his tummy winked in that peculiar way that told him to be embarrassed.
“I like it,” she added, then took a sip from her cup.
And so he wasn’t all that embarrassed. He took a sip from his own cup.
“I might jump in that bath now, before it goes cold.” And with that, Becky was up, shaking herself free from an atmosphere that had grown sweetly amorous. Ward, hotter now than he thought it wise to be, sat back further on the settee. The fire crackled. Outside the window, the wind rattled and the rain slashed and the riverbanks were sure to burst again. “Aren’t you coming?”