Killer Summer

She braced herself for what was coming. She became his verbal punching bag when things went south, which, basically, was all the time. He would apologize later, as if that made it all okay.

“So,” he asked, “what do you think? Pretty, isn’t it?”

She didn’t breathe. She’d not expected a tour guide.

“Are we going to go through the whole weekend with you not talking to me?”

He got his answer.

“It’s not right, not at seventeen. Somewhere inside, you know that. And don’t compare it with my meeting your mother because that was completely different, and we both know it. It was at a country club, our parents already knowing one another, having socialized together. It wasn’t some twenty-two-year-old Brazilian on the te

But your hooking up with Tanya… she felt like saying. What kind of training was she supposed to be helping with, exactly?

“You’ll like it up here. It’s like Telluride, only… better. More to do. Really nice people. And, I promise, there’ll be all sorts of kids around. Everybody brings their kids along on these weekends.”

She hated him calling her that.

“I can still get us into the mixed doubles tournament. You know, we can whip some butt with that serve of yours. It’s all for a good cause.”

She thought it unfair that silence was her only available weapon. No matter how effective it was-and it was effective-she felt robbed of a voice. He treated her like she was still thirteen and that it was still B.C.: before cancer.

“Don’t sulk,” he pleaded. “Please, Summer, don’t do this. I’ve got enough problems”-she mouthed his next words as he said them-“without you acting like this.”

So predictable.

In the world according to Teddy Sumner, she was the cause of everything bad that happened to them. Somehow, he always managed to bring it back around to her.

Her head slipped too close to the window and her breath fogged the plastic. She doubted it lasted long enough for him to see what she traced into the fog with the tip of her index finger.

An L… for Loser.

4

Match the hatch. Walt, closer to the bridge now and still knee-deep in the river’s chilly current, tried to fix his eye on any one of the few million swirling insects long enough to snatch it. He swiped his stubby fingers at one and managed to grab it but squeezed too hard and crushed it. Unidentifiable.

The idea was to match a live insect to a fly in his kit. He considered using the ubiquitous caddis fly but was afraid Kevin would criticize him for being lazy. The cycle of most flying insects included four stages: an emerging stage, where it rose to the water surface as an embryo; the parachute stage, where it opened its delicate wings to dry; the reproduction stage; and then the spi

Beatrice, his two-year-old Irish water spaniel, sat patiently on shore, eyeing the river mischievously, wanting to join Walt if for no other reason than out of obstinate loyalty. Walt told her to stay, and she obediently lay down and crossed her paws. With her moon eyes and forlorn expression, she could, and did, play him.

Still studying the swirling insects overhead, Walt was suddenly distracted by the rattling of a tow truck crossing the bridge. It had a Taurus on its hook. But what business did a loaded tow truck have heading west out Croy Creek Road? More to the point, the truck wasn’t local-Walt knew both towing services in the valley-which incited his curiosity. There was nothing west of this bridge but a few dozen McRanches and the valley’s animal shelter. What could possibly be the point of towing a vehicle out of town?

All these thoughts flashed through Walt’s mind as he swiped at another insect. Instead of looking into his hand to see if he succeeded, he eyed the tow truck and its catch.

He briefly saw into the Taurus.

It might have been a trick of the evening light, or maybe a reflection in the glass, but the disturbing image lingered: the driver slumped behind the wheel. It was not only illegal but downright dangerous to ride inside a towed vehicle.

Walt grabbed for the radio and checked in with dispatch. “Have we got anybody in the vicinity of Croy Creek?”

He had to wait for a response from the dispatcher, the mountains wreaking havoc with radio reception. He headed for the river’s edge hoping to improve communication.

“Hey!” Kevin complained. “You’ll put the fish down!”

“Sorry… Got to run.”

“Now?”

“Now.”

“You’re leaving me?”

Just then, the radio spit static.

“Negative, Sheriff. No patrols in town at the moment.”

“I’ll be right back,” Walt called out to Kevin.

Kevin moved to the opposite shore. “Forget that,” he said. “I’m coming with you.”

Walt broadcast over the radio that he was pursuing the wrecker, requesting backup.

“You stay,” he told Kevin. “Maybe with me gone, you’ll actually catch something.”

Walt scrambled up to the bridge, the waders bulky and awkward. Beatrice, seeing this, sat up, electric with anticipation, her eyes pleading for Walt to call for her.

Kevin, moving faster in waders than Walt, reached the Cherokee first.

“No way you’re ditching me,” Kevin said.

Beatrice trembled at the water’s edge.

“Suit yourself,” said Walt, grabbing for the driver’s door, “but it’s only a traffic violation, some yahoo from out of town. You’re going to wish you’d stayed here.”

Pointing back down toward the river, Kevin said, “You can’t just leave the gear.”

“I can and I will,” Walt answered, stripping off his waders and dancing out of them. He climbed behind the wheel in stocking feet. “We don’t have all day.”

Kevin stuffed his rod into the back, and climbed in front, still in his waders.

Walt whistled for Beatrice, who raced to the vehicle, throwing dirt in her wake. She jumped into Kevin’s lap, pressing up against him.

“That’s her spot,” Walt said.

“You think?”

The road ran nearly perfectly straight, due west. Walt worked the Cherokee up to seventy miles per hour, the wrecker now nowhere in sight.

“We can’t catch a tow truck? You want me to drive?”

“I’m dying of laughter over here. How ’bout you use your eyes instead of your wit?”

Kevin kept his attention on Walt.

“Did you happen to see those pronghorns back at Democrat?”

Walt glanced at his nephew.

“They were moving along real good,” Kevin said. “They were up and going before we came along.”

“What would a wrecker be doing up Democrat Gulch?” Walt asked. “That makes no sense.”

“Chop shop, maybe? Tow it out there and cut it up?”

“A Taurus? Nah…”

But a moment later, Walt slowed and threw the Cherokee in a U-turn. He drove off the road and navigated through the scrub.

“We should have seen lots of dust if they went out there,” he said, “that’s a dirt road.”

“Not if they stopped somewhere,” Kevin said.

The ride turned loud and shaky as the Cherokee’s four-wheel drive bit into the dirt road rising up Democrat Gulch. When Walt took the first rise a little hotly, the fishing rod slapped the window frame, and Kevin’s sunglasses flew off his face.