June, Reimagined (34)
“Come on, Peanut.” He started walking down the deserted road.
June stumbled to catch up. “Where are we going?”
“Can you keep a secret?”
FOURTEEN
June stood on the bow of a gigantic ship. The snow was gone from her hair now, just a slight dampness remained. She had never seen anything like this in her entire life.
The galley that Knockmoral would burn to the ground in just a few days was adorned with an ornate dragon’s head at the front, a wide belly with a mast, and a rounded stern that came together to form a fish tail. June ran her hand along the carved details of the dragon.
“You actually built this?”
Lennox climbed on the boat. “Well, I had a little help from a few hundred other people, but yeah, I built it.”
The details were astounding. The side paneling was painted red and white. The rim of the boat was gold, decorated with stenciled axes and shields. A platform of different blues to mimic the high seas cradled the base.
In the welcome warmth of the barn’s portable heaters, June was eye level with the dragon’s blue-and-white neck, its head a scaly crown of fiery red. It even had teeth in its open jaw. She couldn’t believe that after working so hard on it, they would burn something so beautiful to the ground.
A horned helmet sat on the floor of the boat. June picked it up and placed it on her head. It was too big for her and immediately went lopsided. “Not a very ferocious looking Viking, am I?”
“Aye, but that’s the most lethal kind. You look like a bonnie wee lass, but inside you’re a warrior.” Lennox rubbed his arm. “I think I have a snowball bruise. Where’d you learn to throw like that?”
June warmed further when Lennox called her a “bonnie wee lass.” Her toes began to thaw. Feeling returned to her fingers. “My brother taught me,” she said. “He had a wicked arm. It felt like catching a bullet when he threw you a football.”
If Lennox noticed June’s choice of “had” and “threw,” he didn’t let on. Speaking about Josh in the past tense still felt unnatural, made it sound as if her brother was no longer Josh, when to June he was ever-present, always infinitely himself.
Lennox righted June’s hat, but it fell lopsided again. “You need a bigger head.”
June took it off and stood on tiptoes to place the helmet on Lennox’s head. It fit perfectly. She stepped back to admire him. “You look like your dad in that helmet.”
A shadow fell over Lennox, and he took the helmet off. “What the hell do you know about my da?”
“Nothing.” June stepped back. “I just saw a picture of you two in an Up Helly Aa book that Hamish showed me, that’s all.”
Lennox turned his back, his whole body tense. June shouldn’t have said anything, but it just slipped out. She would take her words back if she could. Anything not to ruin the moment. Lennox stood at the far end of the boat, what felt like miles away, and she wanted him back, as much as she hated to admit it. Lennox was addicting. And like any addict, she was willing to bargain for a taste.
Confession time, she heard Matt say in her mind. I want to tell you a secret, but you have to promise to tell one in return. Truth is only fair when it’s even.
The first time Matt had said those words, they were in high school, and unbeknownst to her, he had just found out his parents were divorcing, after his dad was caught having sex with a woman he worked with.
“My mom kicked him out of the house. I don’t think he’s coming back,” Matt said. “Your turn.”
June attempted to remain stoic, though inside she couldn’t believe what Matt had just confessed. “OK,” she said. “Remember when we went on the Demon Drop at Cedar Point, and I said I didn’t feel good afterward, and I rushed to the bathroom? I peed my pants.”
Matt had laughed. “I thought you smelled that day.” And then he said, “Promise me, we won’t fuck each other up with lies. We’ll always tell the truth, no matter how bad it hurts.”
June had agreed. Back then the idea of keeping anything from Matt Tierney seemed impossible. Confession time, June . . .
“You were right about me,” she said now to Lennox, the words out of her mouth before she could take them back. “When we first met. I did leave a mess back home. A pretty bad one.”
June sat down on the wooden floor of the galley and hugged her knees to her chest. Talking about Josh made June want to feel small and contained. Then maybe her secrets, and her tears, might not all come out at once.
Lennox came to June, just as she wanted, and when he sat next to her, stretching one long leg in front of him, she felt his closeness like the sun’s reappearance from behind a cloud.
“I was a bloody wanker that night,” Lennox said.
“Maybe. But you were still right.” June rested her chin on her knee, fighting her instinct to run from the conversation. But then Lennox’s leg brushed hers, sparking on contact, like static popping but without the pain, only the warmth. She couldn’t run from that now. Didn’t want to. “My brother died almost three months ago.”
June saw Josh in her mind: his mousy brown hair and brown eyes, his long arms and skinny legs, the dimple on his left cheek. Most days it was hard to reconcile that all of Josh could fit into a silly football now. It felt unfair that no matter how big the life, we all reduce to the same small pile of ash.