Well Met(22)

What was with this guy? The day we’d met he’d been the straightest of straitlaced people, but lately it was like he’d been letting himself go. His hair was massively in need of a trim, and if I’d thought he looked scruffy the weekend before, now he looked like he’d given up on shaving entirely. And why was he skulking in the back with booze? He was a teacher, for God’s sake.

He looked up and our eyes met. I started like I’d been caught at something, which I guess I had been. He frowned at me and stowed the flask in the back pocket of his jeans. Then he folded his arms firmly over his chest, his gaze more of a glower in my direction. I quickly turned back around.

The energy in the group was charged with excitement, and it was easy to see why as I looked around. Wearing long skirts and practicing accents in a high school auditorium felt like planning an overly elaborate Halloween costume. But here in the woods, away from traffic noises and the hum of industrial air conditioners, the only sounds were the chatter of the kids around us and the wind rustling in the treetops. It was easy to imagine we’d stepped into another century.

“Different kind of rehearsal today!” Chris’s voice rang out in her usual sunny tones, and everyone quieted down and turned their attention to her. “This is going to be our home from now until the end of the summer.” She threw her arms wide as if she could embrace the trees. “We open in two weeks, and we have volunteers working hard to put this place together. So what we’re going to do today is take a walk around the site and get to know it. It’s all basically one big circle, with lots of side paths. Feel free to explore for a little while, and then we’ll get to work.”

“Work?” I turned to Stacey, my eyebrows raised. She bumped me with an elbow and directed my attention back to Chris, who was still smiling, way too pleased with the idea of work on a Saturday morning.

“We leave the heavy lifting—literally—to our stage techs and volunteers, but there’s plenty we can get done this morning. A couple of the sets are constructed and ready for paint; that’s why we asked you to wear old clothes today, remember!”

I had forgotten about that, but thankfully it was laundry day, so I was wearing a stretched-out T-shirt and an old pair of jeans. I craned my head around for my niece. What had she worn today? God, I’d be useless if she ever went missing. I spotted her curly brown hair toward the back with the usual friends, and thank God she was actually wearing paint-appropriate clothes. She’d listened better than I had, apparently.

Once the meeting broke up, we split into smaller groups of five or ten to explore the paths snaking through the forest. Time to see where we were spending the rest of the summer.

Simon didn’t join any of the groups. He slipped out of the clearing as soon as the meeting was over, striding with intention down a side path. Off to drink probably, judging from the flask. I frowned again as I trailed after Stacey. Simon and I weren’t friends. I didn’t know him well at all. But something seemed so off about him today I couldn’t help wondering if he was all right. And why no one else seemed to notice. He seemed relatively well-liked among cast members who weren’t me. Why wasn’t anyone checking on him?

I shook off the thought as we moved deeper and deeper into the woods. The main trails were paved for the most part, but halfheartedly so, like roads that had been abandoned long ago. Side paths weren’t paved, but a thick layer of mulch had been laid down. I coughed as our footsteps stirred up dirt and dust.

“That’ll get better,” Stacey said after I coughed for the third time. “It’s always a little dusty when they first put a new layer of mulch down. But by the time we open, especially if we get some rain, everything will be tamped down pretty well.” She twisted her mouth up a little. “Be prepared, though. Faire is really dirty. The long hot shower at the end of the day is going to be your best friend for a long time.”

“Along with taking off that outfit.” Because I couldn’t imagine anything in the world feeling better than that.

Stacey laughed. “That too.” She led me off the main path, and somewhere in the middle of the woods, she threw her arms wide at the edge of a clearing. “Here’s the tavern!”

I turned in a slow circle. “Uh-huh.” I probably looked as unconvinced as I sounded. It was a clearing in the woods. Nothing else. “Where exactly is it? Don’t tell me we have to build it ourselves.”

“God, no. The guys are coming in over the next few days to build the bar. They’ll put in the tables a day or two before we open.”

“So people hang out and drink?” What were open container laws like out here in the forest? I’d spent most of Jake’s law school career working as a cocktail waitress and backup bartender, so now that the talk was turning more toward the tavern part of tavern wench, I felt a lot more in my element. “So what are we serving? Beer, wine? Liquor?”

“Not liquor.” She shuddered. “Believe me, beer and wine are enough. I don’t want to imagine shots.”

“But we’re gonna have all this cleavage.” I gestured at my T-shirt, which currently contained nothing of the sort. I needed the outfit to make cleavage happen. “I figured body shots were a must.”

Stacey giggled. “This is a family-friendly Faire, remember?” She gestured again toward the invisible bar. “We’ll have kegs with some beers on tap. Some bottled imports, usually some ciders and mead too to mix it up a little. A few kinds of wine. That’s about it. We try to keep it pretty simple.”