Fishing With RayAnne (23 page)

RayAnne sprints, not toward her trailer, but up the rougher path to the old scout camp, fleeing Location altogether. Stopping to tie her shoe, she regrets not rinsing her hands in the lake. Ripping some soft leaves from a low plant, she wipes the vomit off her palms and from between her slimy fingers. She marches and stumbles along overgrown paths around the old campsites, repeating circle-eights, a little like Danny Boy in his Habitrail.

The interview wasn’t just a failure. It was humiliating and the opposite of professional. She can only imagine what the sponsors are thinking. Backing up against a birch, she slides down to the mulchy ground, where she mindlessly strips more plants of their leaves. There she sits, struggling to think of anything but the events of the last hour.

Only when her bottom is numb and her pants damp from sitting does she rouse herself to slog back to Location. Rounding a corner, she waves her way through a cloud of gnats. When one suddenly zooms into her ear, she yelps. Stopping in her tracks, she shakes her head, trying to dislodge it. When shaking doesn’t work, she bends down and thumps the side of her skull with her palm as if it’s a ketchup bottle. Behind her, a male voice calls out, “RayAnne!”

Great.
She doesn’t respond, just keeps stumbling forward until her arm is grabbed.

“Ray. Hold on!”

She spins to face Hal with wild eyes and bangs her temple again. Why does it have to be him?

“Bug. In my
ear
.”

“Oh.” He looks relieved. “I thought you were having some sort of seizure.” He steadies her jaw and squints into her ear. “Can you hold still?”

She writhes. “Get it out? Please.”

Hal looks up the path and back, then steers her along. “C’mon.”

“C’mon where?”

In answer, he guides her to the windowless old well house, where he shoulders open the door and pulls her in.

“
What?
Why in here?”

“You’ll see.”

The door slams, veiling them in darkness and dank humidity. She cannot think straight with all the buzzing, which is like having an Alka-Seltzer plopped in her ear. “It’s dark!”

“That’s the idea. Just hang on.”

She hears clothing rustle and the distinct sound of a zipper.

Has he lost his mind?
She begins to struggle, her voice verging on screechy. “What are you doing?”

A square of blue light suddenly illuminates their faces from underneath. “Getting my phone. For the
flashlight
.” Even in the dim light it’s apparent how offended he is. “Now stop squirming.” He holds the beam up to her ear. “The bug will come to the light. It’ll come out.”

“Will it?” She doubts it. The insect seems to be pinballing the chambers of her head—soon it will tunnel down her throat.

“Quiet. Please?”

The perfect way to end the season: triple and quadruple the humiliation. Just heap it on.

“RayAnne, please, stay still.” A moment passes, and another. The insect seems to have at least calmed, probably considering its next plan of attack. She settles enough to hold herself steady. Hal lowers his voice, saying, “You didn’t really think I was going to . . . ?” They are close enough that she can feel his breath on her temple.

“To ravage me? Yes. No. Sorry, I can’t stand this.” She fights the urge to shake her head again.

Hal lightly holds her jaw. “Don’t. Move.”

They stand silent in a pool of darkness, both barely breathing, waiting. When they do speak, it’s to whisper.

She sniffs. “Oh God, my mother . . .”

“She’s fine.”

“I’m fired, aren’t I?”

“No. But—”

“Wait. No, I don’t even want to know,” RayAnne groans. “Gawd, it’s
buzzing
. Is she still here? My mother?”

“Last I saw, she was herding her group to their bus—what does she call them?”

“The Mavenhood.”

“Right.”

She cannot see Hal but can sense he’s smiling. “Quite the pair of parents you have, Ray.”

“Hardly a pair.” RayAnne flinches. “Never a pair; that was the problem.”

“Well, interesting, anyway.”

“Interesting?” RayAnne stiffens. “My mother’s head is shoved so far up her happy place . . . and he’s just a big toddler with a sippy cup of bourbon.”

“Well. Sure. They are who they are, but you wouldn’t be
you
if not—”

“Don’t do that.” She raises her voice. “Don’t patronize me. I’ve made a hash of it. Let’s agree to agree on that. You’ve seen the mistakes.” RayAnne shudders. “I mean besides just today.”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about. Listen, you were authentic out there, you were real with your mother, and actually? Sixty percent of it was fine.”

“Losing my shit on camera. Nice season finale.”

“Okay, forty percent. The worst will be edited out, Ray.”

“The sponsors all saw. How does editing fix that?” The buzzing gets louder, and her voice rises with it.

“Trust me, it will.”

“Right, like you can fix it.”

Hal pauses, as if carefully choosing his words. “What if I can, actually?”

“Just leave it.”

“You’ve no idea, do you?”

“Of what?”

“Of . . .” He shakes his head. “Wait, I can see it. Here it comes.” All is quiet as Hal delicately dips his pinky into the bowl of her ear. “Got it!”

Finally. “Thank God.” She slumps in relief, then looks up. “I have no idea of
what
?”

He still has her chin cupped in his hand. “Of how good you are at this—how bright, how natural you are. And, and how . . .”

She opens her mouth, about to object when he begins lowering his face to hers.

Is he going to
kiss
her?

He is. He’s going to kiss her.

In spite of herself, in spite of it all, RayAnne feels a sweet, elastic tug. Admittedly, she’s wondered just what kissing Hal would be like. Perhaps since the moment he walked past her car in the parking lot, flashing that grin. And on the morning they’d gone fishing when he’d fed her pancakes and was so easy to talk to. The thing about Hal, she realizes, is that he’s effortless. To be around, to joke with. There’s no agenda. Show or no show, she doesn’t need to be anything but herself around Hal.

And now he’s going to kiss her. Here in the satiny, musty darkness of the well house with the smell of bay rum and mild sweat like a tonic. As if her next breath is of helium, her body lifts lightly off her heels. His lips are a delicious inch away from hers. This is it.

Then the scritch of the needle as the soundtrack halts and she remembers with horror the canker sizzling on her lip. Her hand zip-lines to her face just in time for Hal’s mouth to connect with her knuckles, which, having been recently vomited on, reek.

His eyes pop open. “Ah?”

RayAnne steps back. “Oh, God. I’m sorry—I forgot about this . . .
this
.” She stupidly points at the cold sore, as if he can see in the dark.

Hal steps back. “Oh, I didn’t mean to—”

“No!” Of course, what she means is
yes
. Of course she would kiss him if not for the growing monstrosity on her lip and her vomit-caked fingers which not only smell, but now burn. “Wait. I can’t see. Something . . . my hands,” she holds them out and even in the darkness can tell something’s wrong.

He shines the phone at them and she gasps, “What the . . . ?” Each finger is swollen and pink, as if her palms have sprouted bundles of wieners. Seeing them acts as a panic switch, her fingers consumed by itchiness.

“I wiped them with those leaves. Oh, God! Is this—?”

“Oh, boy.” Hal grimaces. “Poison ivy—afraid so.” As they both look at her hands the beam from his cell phone flickers, then peters out, sinking them back into darkness.

He exhales. “Battery. You’ll need calamine. And don’t touch yourself; don’t spread the oil.”

In living, stinking color, it’s all rather more than RayAnne can handle. For the third time in one day, her flight instinct roars to life. She gropes for the door with her burning catcher’s mitts, barely managing to turn the handle. Hal reaches to help and the door slams open. Evening sunlight pours into the cocoon of space. She ducks out from under Hal’s outstretched arm.

Ten yards down the path, Cassi is walking with Amy. As the well house door bangs open, both stop dead in their tracks and watch RayAnne spill from the dark interior, followed by Hal, both blinking in the sudden glare. Clearly disheveled, RayAnne trots in the direction of her trailer.

“Be sure to wash that off!” Hal calls after her.

She calls back over her shoulder, “Do you have a bottle of that stuff?”

“Yes! You have ice?”

Amy’s jaw drops. Cassi’s face remains smooth; only her eyes are snorting.

Anemic strains of the wrap party float into the windows of RayAnne’s RV. She hears the flat drone of attempted conversations and the out-of-tune band. The klezmer trio, which had sounded like jazzy gypsies during rehearsal, now plod along as if they’ve played one bar mitzvah too many.

There is a distant scooping of ice and pffting of bottle caps being pried—she’d seen the caterers stocking the bar earlier; there’s enough booze for fifty Big Ricks.

Until this,
Fishing
had been going pretty well, even in RayAnne’s nothing-if-not-critical estimation. But the sponsors have now judged firsthand the “talent” their investments and efforts are backing. She can practically imagine the texts:
debacle, cancel, failed
. She plunges her hands in a sink of ice water.

When she had not answered Hal’s earlier knock, he’d waited a full five minutes before saying, “Right, have it your way.” He’d wedged the bottle of calamine between the door and the screen and left.

Once it’s dark and RayAnne’s hands have slightly deflated, she ventures down the path to the shore and treads quietly to the end of the dock, where she can get three bars of reception on her phone. She’d sooner motor out onto the lake, but Penelope has already been floated onto her trailer and pulled up the hill.

Dot’s not answering. RayAnne counts down the six rings, imagining the phone on its cradle in her grandmother’s empty kitchen. The recording chirps, “This is Dot, here I’m not! Leave a message.”

“Gran. I just . . . it’s kinda bad. Mom showed up and was on the show. And it was . . . well, awful doesn’t quite cover it.” She stops to breathe. “And you should see my hands.” Her voice is nasal with tears. “Dad’s still around here somewhere. Drunk, if you can imagine. And this guy, Hal . . . oh, never mind. But anyway, you must be feeling better, cuz you’re not home. Okay, season’s over, so . . .” She manages to inject false cheer into her voice. “Dismount! I can go home tomorrow. Maybe even tonight.” Words just seem to evaporate as they come out, meaningless. “Okay, Gran. Wuv yooou.”

After hanging up, she nearly wishes for a bug to take up residence in her other ear—something to knock aside thoughts of the interview with her mother, seeming to loop on replay in her head, no matter what else she tries to think about. Thankfully, Bernadette and her mavens would be deep in their teepees by now, ritualing, which Cassi informs her is now a word. At least she’s among her own, chanting farewells to their menses and probably drinking tom-tom–sized glasses of Beaujolais. If only Bernadette could forget the worst bits, as if it all were only a barf-shrouded dream.

She bends stiffly forward like a Barbie and swishes her itchy hands in the cold lake water. The swelling has gone down, thanks to ice and calamine. Still, she must fight the urge to chew the skin from her hands.

In the night sky above, the northern lights have begun to shimmer in and out of focus. Shafts of neon green pulse over the mirror of the lake, as if the heavens have gargled with Scope and are spewing it at Location. She sniffs and gets to her feet, muttering, “Big aurora boring-alis deal.”