Tea - Chapter 19

Chapter 19

The long day that Sophie and Miles were only looking forward to because of its coffer-filling implications started at eight in the morning. The rarely used outdoor education resources the camp owned needed to be set out and in some cases set up before the school arrived at nine that morning. Jabari, Paul, Sergio, and Christopher were the only ones not working with the group of eighty students so the set up was done with a solid (and paid) half an hour before the busses rolled into Ontonogan.
Once their charges arrived there was nothing for the staff to do other than dive right into their routine. As they went through expectations and staff introductions Miles realized that they were in league with any troupe of professional actors. From the first words out of their mouths to the last goodbyes the following day the Ontonogan staff would pretend to be something else. The enthusiasm and happiness they paraded for their guests, though they truly enjoyed their jobs when they were given a moment to reflect, was for the most part a farce. No one was as excited as they pretended to be over programs they had presented to blurred faces dozens of times already.
That being said, Miles did have fun that day. The full time involvement afforded him no time to mull over the complications that had fraught his life in recent months. They were good problems to have, for sure, but occasionally it was nice to forget about them and concentrate instead on getting a group of fifth graders through the challenge course.
Miles had almost forgotten what it was like, at that late point in the season, to only see Sophie at meals or across the way during the day. He did not care for it and told Sophie as much at dinner that evening.
“I’m afraid that there’s not much I can do for you, love. In a couple of months we’ll be stumbling over one another every day.”
Miles smiled and they continued talking about their groups between bites.
The Underground Railroad simulation followed dinner that night. The students were treated to a half-hour break to gossip in their cabins while the staff set up props, donned costumes, and found hiding places.
Miles and Sophie hid in the closet of the room that the simulation began in, which was by then their customary location. They heard the kids file in and Dennis begin the usual story. At the pre-determined key phrase in the tale everyone on staff jumped out of their hiding places in the room or stormed through the doors to ‘capture’ the kids and start the simulation.
After the activity was finished a short campfire finished the evening at around a quarter to ten.
“Well, there’s fourteen hours,” Miles sighed with satisfaction after weaving an arm between Sophie’s hip and elbow. They were walking up staff row, which had been in a festive mood ever since the campfire party. With almost exactly one month left everyone seemed resigned and relaxed. Normally after working all day everyone would shuffle to bed in anticipation of the next day and the group after that and the group after them; but the clientele was thinning out as the season waned, so even though the hours had been logged, the feeling of running in a hamster wheel was no longer an issue. People seemed eager to fit in or discover anything they may have missed in the previous five months in northern New Hampshire.
So instead of veering off the road and up familiar sagging steps Sophie and Miles kept their bearing until they walked into the lounge.
The gang was all there, as the saying goes. Miles wasted no time grabbing a pair of glasses and splitting a bottle of Coke between them. A good amount of the space left was then taken up by generous splashes of the whiskey that was kept in an apple juice bottle in the back of the fridge. He handed a drink to Sophie, who wrinkled her nose at the ratio in her glass. She took a long swallow nonetheless after an obligatory clink with Miles. Before long they were playing against one another, partnering with Jabari or Emma at the dart board.
During the course of the game Miles stepped back mentally from his immediate focus at the corkboard. The TV was on, but muted, and neither Miles nor anyone in the room could have said for sure what was on that evening. Instead, the football-sized boom-box that sat on the half-wall that divided the deep halves of the living room and kitchen was trying its damndest to fill the room with Counting Crows or U2 or whatever was on the only station that played enough of what everyone could agree on to keep its coordinates locked into the tuner. The only thing competing with the music was conversation. The people in the two rooms seemed more like the friendly group of wide-eyed newbies they had been in December than the cliquey, burnt-out people they had become. Miles thought that if the last month could end on that kind of note then maybe the drudgery and petty squabbles that had brewed in the middle of the season could be mellowed out in the long run.
“Miles! You’re drifting!” Emma brought Miles back to the task at hand. He threw his three darts and managed to close out 17 with one of them.
Merriment aside, half the group had worked for fourteen hours that day, and after barely an hour a happy exhaustion beat out the revelry and like a murder of crows lighting from a telephone wire staff deserted the lounge for their beds.
“We’ve only got that geometry-building a dome, whatever that thing is, and some group games,” Miles said, trying to make even less out of very little.
“We’ll be done before two, unless they make us stay over for some reason.”
“We’ll catch up on our sleep then.”
“That’s a plan, then.”

Miles awoke before Sophie but after a quick glance at the clock across her shoulder nudged her into consciousness.
“Already?” She asked.
“Just until two.” Sophie nodded in acceptance and followed Miles in their morning rituals. They walked to the dining hall clutching one another for warmth as much as companionship for as long as they could, breaking seal on the old oak doors two minutes before they would have been exactly on time for breakfast.
“Can we not eat scrambled eggs and bacon for a very long time after we get to Chicago?” Sophie mumbled as they walked through the buffet.
“No sausage, either,” Miles chuckled. “Cheer up, Beautiful. Not that much longer to go, now.”
“What are you so chipper for, then?”
“I’m with you. I’m not even trying to be cheesy; you’re just great.”
“Shut up,” Sophie smirked. She elbowed Miles’ ribs discreetly. The move caused bangs that were not quite long enough to always stay put behind Sophie’s ear to swing free. Reflexively, Sophie tried to swish the errant hair back in its place but unfortunately the hand in charge of that task already holding onto a tray of food, which clamored to the floor.
“Bullocks!” Sophie cried, and dropped to her knees. Miles dropped beside her and swept the sullied food back onto her tray. He took the liberty of kissing Sophie’s cheek while they were out of view. Sophie looked at him incredulously for a split second before she burst into laughter.
Miles snickered with Sophie and helped her up. “You go to some great lengths to sneak a kiss, precious girl.” He squeezed her shoulder softly and they went back to the beginning of the line to start over again.
They made it to the staff table with plenty of time to eat and still wearing smiles. Miles mentally stepped back from scene once again. No one else at the table looked to be anywhere near the spirit he and Sophie were in. No one seemed particularly unhappy, excepting Paul, who seemed more hung-over than anything. The lack of feeling is what struck Miles. The people sitting at the table with him, Gerri, Jabari, Emma, and everyone else, would leave New Hampshire with some funny stories, some pictures to go along with the tales, and a new shirt or two, but that was about it. None of them would be able to remember the last names of everyone they were sitting with five years down the road. By that time half of their first names might be difficult.
Miles was glad to be getting something lasting out of his experience in New England. He looked to his surprise lover beside him and smiled again. He hoped to make great things happen; come back to New Hampshire to relive old times, keep in touch with Scott and Kyra and Jabari and Emma, but Miles knew that even if that did not happen he would have something more than pictures and trinkets to take away from Ontanogan.
Before Miles gathered enough wool to knit a sweater he was called to duty. After shuffling his group out the doors Miles would not have been able to go into much detail about the morning’s activities; he went into auto-pilot and stayed there until the exhaust of departing busses revived him better that any smelling salts on the market.
After cleaning cabins and program areas with all the speed apathy could muster everyone working the group signed out at two in the afternoon.
“You see? Just like I promised,” Miles joked on the way back to his cabin.
“Do you want a cookie?”
“I want your cookie,” Miles chided.
“Oh my God, one track mind!”
“Well it has been almost two days.”
“I can’t wait until we’re married and never have to have sex again,” Sophie teased, squeezing Miles’ arm hard.
“I know you can hold out longer than I can, but I don’t think you could hold out that long.”
“You’re right. But that’s because you know it’s not a race.”
“If you don’t break the ribbon first I wouldn’t feel right crossing the finish line. You know that.”
“I know. I love you, Miles.”
“I love you too, Sophie.”
When they reached the cabin their roommates were not there to greet them so they took advantage of the privacy and made good on their kidding.
“If we go to sleep now, we’ll be up all night,” Sophie lamented, even though she was barely awake after their tryst. Miles pulled her closer until she was talking to his collarbone.
“So what do we have to do tomorrow?”
“Nothing, I guess. Will you go to sleep if I do? I don’t want to trap you in bed all afternoon.”
“Sophie, in my mind, I’m stealing time with you from whatever holy prankster is dangling you in front of me. Most of the time I’m too excited to see you curled up against me, peaceful and naked and trusting and happy, to fall asleep. That doesn’t mean I’m not having the time of my life.”
“Well, even though you are an ass, I’m no carrot. Shut up before you make me cry.” Sophie bit Miles’ shoulder gently before kissing his lips.
True to Sophie’s foreshadowing the two woke up at around eight in the evening, mostly because of hunger. “Do you want to get up?” Miles asked. They were both staring at the ceiling; Sophie had spilled back onto Miles in almost the same position she had fallen asleep in. Hunger was half of the reason Miles wanted to get out of bed. The other half was due to the fact that feeling the bottom of Sophie’s breasts brushing against his forearm as she breathed was persuading him to stay in bed for reasons Sophie would probably not be as anxious to pursue at that moment.
“I guess.” Her temptations left his arm and met the colder air of the cabin, which Miles gaped at with all the vigor of a teenager stumbling onto his first Playboy Magazine. Sophie caught him.
“Later. I’m hungry.” Miles saw a smile matching his until Sophie turned away to clothe herself.
“Ok, Frisky. What do you want to do about dinner?”
“We don’t have a damn bit of food in the house, do we?” Miles asked.
“Some tea, some crackers, a couple of other random things,” Sophie mentally ran through the contents of their cupboard as they walked to the lounge.
“But we’re trying to save money, so we shouldn’t go out to eat.”
“But if we go get groceries while we’re hungry then we’ll buy way too much, so we would have to go out to eat anyways.”
“Well, let’s see what’s happening when we get to the kitchen.”
When they got to the kitchen they were greeted by an almost full house. Emma and Jabari were watching a scariest police chase show in the living room, Christopher and Sergio were playing foosball, and Scott was rifling though the contents of his cupboard with Kyra passively looking over his shoulder.
“There they are,” Kyra said. Scott peeked out from behind the door of the cabinetry.
“Hey! What did you guys do, drop a bunch of lueds? You were out cold. And Miles, you have a very pale ass. You need to get some sun, my man.”
“What?” Miles saw Kyra nod in agreement. He heard Jabari and Emma grunt with feigned disgust and genuine laughter. Sophie reddened.
“Don’t worry; I threw a blanket over you. And I only took, like, eight or nine pictures for my pastyass.com site. You’ll get a cut, of course.” Mile flipped Scott a bird and a smile. “What are you guys doing for dinner?”
“Don’t know. We were going to see if we had anything to make a meal out of down here.”
“Do you?”
“No,” Miles said, without making a move to open his cupboard.
“We could go to that fancy pizza place in Concord,” Kyra suggested.
“I guess it’s only fifteen minutes farther than that diner that’s closest to us.”
“Not that place,” Sophie said.
“Sounds like it’s settled to me,” Scott concluded. He asked the rest of the room whether they were interested or not and, surprisingly, everyone was.
Miles drove with Jabari and Emma in his backseat. Scott took the foosball enthusiasts in his Camry.
That evening, much like the work day, was a blur for Miles. They ordered pizzas and pitchers, had fun and meaningless conversation, and smiled a lot. The evening in Concord, fun though it was, reconfirmed his gratefulness to Sophie. Who remembers going out for pizza twenty years after the fact? That restaurant would be worth millions.
Miles said as much to Sophie as they sat on his back porch slowly draining a bottle of wine. “I prefer Old England to New England, if you ask me,” he concluded.
“You’re pissed, but that’s cute.”
“I’m not pissed. Tipsy, definitely, but not pissed.”
“You’ve never even been to England.”
“I don’t think I want to go.” Sophie looked at her fiancée quizzically. “I have this picture built up in my mind, partially based on movies, mostly from knowing you, about what it would be like. It couldn’t possibly live up to expectations. I mean, I’m going, obviously, and I’m sure I’ll have a great time, but I have this romanticized image of London, like a bunch of yous running around sweeping people off their feet-“
“Shut up. And for the record, you almost got your arse kicked right then. But you saved yourself. I suppose I’m a bit tipsy as well.” Sophie clinked her glass to Miles’ and they finished what was left before pouring anew.
“You know another thing I like about you, Sophie?”
“What’s that, Love?” Sophie prepared herself for something either stupid or sappy.
“That I can talk to you about anything. I don’t mean just the deep, heartfelt stuff. I can talk to you about that, but I mean anything. Like what we were just talking about, stuff that pops into my head when I think about you. I can tell you that fluffy, fleeting stuff and the deep stuff and everything else. I feel fine telling you anything. I really like that.”
“Aww, I’m glad you feel that way.”
“That’s another one of those things that keep coming up, you know?” Sophie waited. “Every time some question or long-term thing comes up, like something that would be important especially later on after here... Every time something like that comes up, we’ve already answered it somehow. Right now there aren’t any lingering doubts or anything in my mind about the months and years ahead because they’re always answered somehow before I even have the chance to think about them too much. And it makes me worry less about things that might come up in the future because of how well everything has fallen into place so far.”
“You think about us a lot, don’t you, Miles?”
“Constantly. Sometimes I wish I could just stop for even a day.”
“I don’t want you to worry about us any more.”
“That’s easier said than done, Sophie.”
“I’m not asking you, Miles. I’m telling you not to worry.” Sophie pulled Miles’ eyes to hers with a delicate pair of fingers at the bottom of his chin. “I don’t want you to worry about any of it. I want you to enjoy it, because if you don’t revel in this then I can’t. And that’s no fun for either of us. I already told you that I will be with you forever, and you’ve told me the same. I’m talking Hollywood ending type of stuff if that’s what it takes. Since we’ve got that taken care of, everything else will just fall into place, like you said.”
“If you say so.”
“I do.” Sophie swallowed half her wine with conviction. Miles could see a green fire of determination in her eyes. He drank as deeply.

Tea - Chapter 18

Chapter 18

The hangover Miles awoke with was nothing epic, though it was too much to ignore. He succeeded in removing himself from the bed without waking Sophie to fill a mug with water and immediately drain it several times before bothering to find a larger vessel to share with Sophie when she woke up.

A headache kept Miles awake and thinking through all the ways he may have offended Sophie the night before. After a half hour of mulling he could remember nothing specific that could have caused her reaction, which worried him even further. Miles shrugged to himself, quite certain that Sophie would detail any grievances soon enough.

When she woke up Miles offered her the glass of water. She took it and drank until it was nearly gone. Miles was certainly not looking forward to whatever Sophie had to say because his head was still throbbing, but the look in her eyes when she finally turned them toward him was not puppy love.

“Do you even realize what you do when you’re like that?” Miles did not respond because he barely understood the question Sophie had asked. “You treat me like shit. You make fun of me; you make me feel like a burden to your good times. You want to fucking chase the moon all night, go ahead, but don’t blame me for not feeling the same way. But I can’t do this over and over again. After all I’ve given you to be here to have you do that do me? What the fuck, Miles?”

“Over and over? I’ve been drunk a grand total of three times since I’ve been here. I’m twenty-fucking-three, not sixty-three.”

“So that’s your excuse for treating me like a damned Uni fling? You can’t decide to cop out with that now when you’ve decided to marry me already, which by the way, will last until you’re sixty-three. Or haven’t you even thought that far ahead?”

“Sophie…”

“Am I supposed to wait for you to outgrow this? We’re making decisions that will affect the rest of our lives, Miles. We’re in the real world whether you like it or not. Having good times is not the issue. You treating me like shit when you’re pissed is. Miles, you’re so sweet and perfect most of the time. But these times when you go football hooligan on me are unbearable. I’m not being overdramatic, either. I won’t stand for it.” Miles still could not speak. “I’m not saying don’t go out and have fun, but I won’t be a part of it. I can’t be around you when you’re like that. I don’t know what makes you act the way you do…Do you feel like I’m holding you back from something?”

“No!” Miles finally found his voice, and he had used the time to think. “No, it’s nothing you’ve done. You’re the best thing that’s ever happened to me. I just…I just want to still be what I was, I guess. I love you so much and I hate that I hurt you and I want to be with you for forever but I’m not comfortable with the feeling. What I know is being single and doing whatever I want. This feeling with you…it’s an uncomfortable feeling. I like it most of the time, but it scares me. Every once in a while I have to go back to being me by myself, with no ‘you’ because I feel completely at ease that way. There are no complications. If I overdo it it’s because I know that I only have a rare shot at completely letting go of the ‘us’ feeling and reveling in the ‘me’ feeling for a while. But I shouldn’t make you feel like you’ve done something wrong. You’re completely right. I would hate it if you made me feel bad. But you would never do that. I’m sorry. I don’t know what else to say.”

“That’s a good start. Maybe we just need to have some alone time now and again. But, what makes you feel uncomfortable about us?”

“I don’t know. I’ve made a lot of dumb decisions in my life, but they didn’t hurt anyone but me. Now, everything I do affects the both of us. If I don’t make the right decision, we both pay for it. Sometimes I like to make dumb decisions just for me. To get it out of my system I guess. I like to do things that are just for me because I don’t feel that pressure of you being involved.”

“That makes sense, I think.”

“Don’t get me wrong, most of the time, well, mostly all the time, I love being with you. I wouldn’t have asked you to marry me if I didn’t love being with you, but now that we’ve gotten over the new-lust stuff, I start to remember a little bit the things I used to do before. And they’re pretty much the same things I do with you, but different. I don’t know. This drinking thing…I would get drunk when I was in a rebellious, ‘fuck everything’ mood. Not angry, but that mood where there’s no tomorrow, live for one night of debauchery and memories with friends, hangover be damned. I guess I feel that more and more because every single day we’re thinking about tomorrow. Before you I never really had a rhyme or reason for the feeling because I didn’t have the opposite side of the coin. I was rebelling against eight o’clock classes and never getting past a double-digit checking account balance. This…this is actually important and it scares me. I don’t know if I can do it.”

“Neither do I, Miles. But we’re supposed to lean on each other for that, not booze.”

“I’m not supposed to lean on anyone, though, Sophie. I’m supposed to figure all this out for us.”

“Oh Miles, come on now. This isn’t the nineteen-fifties. I’m just as much a part of this as you are.”

“I guess. I don’t know. I’m just sorry, Sophie.”

“I know. Just, tell me about things like this from now on before I start thinking the worst of you again. Not that you’re completely in my good graces, yet.”

“I’ll try. I’m not used to it, so I might screw up sometimes, but I’ll try, Sophie.”

“I know.” Sophie hugged Miles’ arm and pressed her lips to his neck. “Meeting adjourned?”

“I second.” Miles kissed the head below his lips. “You know, not to make light of all of this, but we were the first people to leave and we were both…well, you were tipsy, I was just plain drunk. I wonder how long they stayed out there until. I’m betting a few people are in far worse shape than I am right now.”

“Shall we go see?” Miles agreed to Sophie’s proposal and after getting decent they unknowingly made their two-hundredth trip to the staff lounge at the end of the road.

Even though it was almost midway through the day the pair met no one in the lounge. They saw evidence of and after-party in the place and out of ennui as much as graciousness gathered cups and bottles and other party favors in a garbage bag. After the impromptu housekeeping Sophie rummaged through their cupboard which was being purposefully depleted.

“We still have that instant oatmeal,” Sophie said, while absently sliding boxes and cans around.

“That really gross dollar box? Donate that to the common shelf. Someone will eat it.”

“We’re not really going to touch it again, I guess,” Sophie agreed and tossed the breakfast in question to Miles. He stuffed the box onto the shelf that had started out as holding common food for everyone. Over the months the common shelf had become a graveyard more than anything else. Bags of solidified sugar, cheap spices, unmarked bags of noodles, and strange powdered beverage packets made up the majority of the inhabitants on the shelf. Miles did not look back after leaving the tasteless maple and brown sugar pouches to fend for themselves. He had a feeling that if he and Sophie were to visit the camp out of nostalgia in ten or so years, that box would still be on the shelf, only a serving or two shy of what Miles had left in it.

Eventually Sophie came to the conclusion that there was nothing in their cupboard that could combine to make any kind of meal. A few more items were sent to Food Row, leaving their claimed space nearly barren.

“I guess that settles that then. Where would you like to go for lunch?”

“Either Mexican or an omelet.”

“That was quick. And a very strange set of options.”

“Have I ever told you how sexy your accent is?” Miles asked the question in the same tone he had used to put in his lunch requests but it did not keep Sophie from snickering.

“Yes, especially when we shag.”

“Ooohh, that’s the best.”

“Piss off,” Sophie laughed, while trying to sound infuriated. The action made Miles laugh back at her. They met in the middle of the room and buried themselves in one another’s necks until their giggles subsided.

“I love you, Sophie. I’m going to do everything I can to keep things like this. You’re amazing.”

“Oh, Miles, hush. I know. I love you, too. Let’s get out of here.”

“As long as you know.”

“I do. But it’s nice to hear you say it now and again as well.”

“Good. Let’s get out of here.”

“I just said that.”

“My mom is getting ridiculous with this whole wedding thing,” Miles gasped after he hung up with the Chicago end of the nuptial planning.

“Just stepping stones, darling.” Sophie stepped into Miles’ arms and stood with her man in the lounge’s kitchen. “Pretty soon all of this will be behind us and we’ll be living perfectly normal lives.”

“I don’t think you and I will ever have a normal life, Sophie. I mean that in a good way.” They pressed their lips together in one of the hundred different ways they had kissed a thousand times before.

“I figured as much. We’re far too interesting, aren’t we?”

“What do you want to do now?”

“We’re running out of options, aren’t we?” They had just come back from lunching at their Starbucks; nostalgic for the last ten years before the last ten years were done.

“Well, tomorrow and Wednesday we have that school group coming in for an overnight, so anything you want to get done, we had better do it,” Miles finally said.

“God, there’s so much going on right now that I hardly remember we’re still working here.”

“Not getting any hours makes you forgetful, too.” Miles stated. Sophie rolled her eyes in time with Miles’ own. Their finances, which they had long ago pooled without any formal ceremony, were showing the effects of the few short days they worked during the final weeks they had in their contracts. Even a silver lining such as having more time to spend together did not sparkle as brightly as it once had once the realization of Forever had set into their minds.

The time was close to one in the afternoon. One in the afternoon on the last day off before a work week is a tricky time. On one hand, there is an entire afternoon to be enjoyed if one is looking for that sort of thing. Looming on the horizon, however, are the groans of early mornings and the short attention spans of children. The day can go either way depending on whether pessimism or optimism wins the arm wrestle of the psyche. Love has a heavy hand.

Miles and Sophie decided to spend their last afternoon off in the lounge. If someone happened to wander in and something got started, then so be it. They stretched out against one another on the cleanest couch and made small talk during Home and Garden Television commercial breaks. From time to time someone would breach the hull, adding two shiny new cents, but for most of the afternoon the lounge was even less important than a weigh station.

The couch potatoes could have been in California, for all they cared. The place they found in one another’s company turned a blind eye to even the bleakest of New England weather. That place was what gave Sophie the confidence she needed to live on the other side of her ocean with a man she had met three swift months ago. That place was what gave Miles the courage to grow up and move ahead even though he did not know what ahead had in store for him.

They regarded the television as though it were a comedian that had not yet said anything funny while the same thoughts ran through their heads, mostly at different times, every once in a while crashing into one another in word, thought, and deed.