Chapter 13: The Song Remains the Same

“Matt, you’re freaking me out! What the hell is going on?” Lara asked, clawing at my arm.

“There are two girls called Heather that work there,” I explained with haunted voice.

Lara took a patient breath. “Okay. But it still could’ve been her. It looked like her, all right? Just relax. Tomorrow morning you can go check it out for yourself. I’m sure it’s fine. People just don’t jump off of piers because someone didn’t call them a year ago!”

I digested her words. She was probably right. Once again I’d let my overactive imagination take hold of me.

“Lie down,” she said gently.

I fell back onto Lara’s pillow and she settled in beside me.

“I’m just a little wigged out from this morning, that’s all,” I murmured. “She was really different than I remembered her. It took me by surprise.”

“Well, like I said earlier, from her perspective, she has a different view of things.”

“Yeah, I know. I need to talk to her. Tomorrow I’ll work this out, once and for all.”

“Look, don’t blow this thing out of proportion,” she advised. “Things will work out.”

“I know, I know.”

Lara stroked my arm. “Just relax, Matt. Everything’s fine.”

Her touch was calming. As my mind returned to reality from the nightmare, I started feeling foolish for waking her up. Not everything in my life has to be like the end of the world, I thought. Fucking drama king.

I woke up confused, before realizing that I was in Lara’s bed and not mine. She was sleeping soundly beside me. I sat up quickly, surprised that I’d fallen asleep with her. I cringed at the memory of my midnight madness. It seemed all the more idiotic in the dim morning light. Of course Heather was fine!

Lara stirred and then was still again. My watch said damned early, so I hoped that no one had looked in on us. That would’ve been an awkward thing to explain. I carefully unwrapped myself from the sheet and slipped out into the hallway. No one in the house was awake yet, to my relief. I went to my room and pulled on a bathing suit and shirt. I considered lying down again, but I knew my mind was done with sleep for the day. I decided to go fish. With luck, I’d get another chance to talk to Heather.

When I arrived at the pier, it was empty. But it was also very early, and I wasn’t sure she’d come back after our last conversation. If she was mad at me, I’d probably have to go find her at her store.

After catching a few fish, I sat down on the deck and gazed out at the water. How different things seemed this morning. The tortured winds from the previous day had calmed and the waves seemed grateful for the respite. The sea was repentant, flushed to embarrassment by the blushing ribbon of sunrise that seeped up from the horizon. It purred apologetically to me as it lapped at a hundred and six pier posts, the intimate whispers of a confidant. And well it should be ashamed, given how it treated me yesterday. Maybe today will be different...

I pondered my situation. I had to talk to Julie soon. But how much do I need to bring up? John? Brian? At the very least, we had to discuss two issues. Her thing with Lara needed to be confronted, for everyone’s sake, and I needed to know what the future held once I left Montauk. I was very wary of trying the long-distance thing again. Lara and James’s ‘summer fling’ arrangement seemed much more suitable. I didn’t know what Julie would think of that, but she wasn’t really in a position to complain since she’d messed things up the first time.

As I rehearsed possible scenes in my head, a part of me started feeling that letting her give me all those blowjobs the day before wasn’t the best thing to do. It was just going to make discussing these things all the more difficult. If our talk didn’t go well then the sex would be an added burden, especially since I’d received the lion’s share of the pleasure. Then again, what pleasure it had been!

A noise broke through my thoughts. I turned to look at its source and let out a sigh of relief. Heather was approaching. She glanced at me for a moment, before setting her things down by the rail a couple of yards away. Further away than usual. I felt nervous at seeing her. My shoulders were twisted into knots. At least she came back. That has to count for something.

“Morning,” I said quietly, remaining seated.

“Hi. Catch anything?”

There was some life in her voice, I noticed with relief.

“Yeah, just a couple.”

“You’re here early. Trying to sneak in a few in before I showed up?”

I smiled at her. She was sounding more like the Heather I remembered from last year. “No, I wasn’t sure if you were even going to show up this morning.”

She eyed me seriously. “I’m sorry about yesterday, Matt. I was in a really bad mood. It was a crappy day.”

“I didn’t know you had those.”

“It happens.”

I watched her for a bit as she dug through her tackle box. Even in the dim morning light, she seemed radiant. The events of the previous morning seemed to suddenly be knifing at my heart.

“Listen, I have something to say,” I started gravely. “I’m sorry I was teasing you, yesterday. About not finding the note.”

Heather didn’t reply.

“I should’ve told you this yesterday, but I didn’t get the chance,” I continued. “I didn’t actually find your note right away. I only found it a few months ago, when I was on a fishing trip. I was looking for my new license, well, sort of ... Anyway, I found the old one you wrote on the back of, like completely by accident. And obviously you weren’t at your relatives’ house anymore, so I couldn’t call you.”

Heather looked up at me as I spoke.

“So, I’m really sorry about that,” I said earnestly. “I hope you didn’t think that I didn’t want to call, because I would have, if—if, you know...”

She smiled apologetically. “It’s all my fault for playing stupid games with you.”

“I probably should’ve seen your number though. But I was feeling bad that you were leaving that day and checking out my license wasn’t really on my mind.”

Heather stared down at the planks, though her mind was remembering a different time. “Well, it’s in the past, now,” she finally sighed.

She stood and cast her line out, her deep breaths visible in the sway of her shoulders. I gazed at her for some time, a warm feeling filling every last inch of me as I remembered the wonder of the pier girl.

“I just want to say that finding that note made my day. My whole year, even.”

She turned and considered me with interest. “Why?”

“I was going through a tough time. When I found it, it really caught me by surprise.”

Slowly she nodded, and for a moment she again seemed lost in another world. Then she resumed her fishing, twitching her rod and reeling in slowly. “Was that when you and Julie were splitting up?”

I eyed her for a moment. The regret at having hooked up with Julie again welled up a little stronger. “Yeah, that and some other stuff. I guess you know all about me and Julie.”

“It’s a small town,” Heather said simply as she turned back to the water and reeled in.

“Heh. I know what that’s like.”

She hoisted a little fish over the railing and deftly removed it from the hook. “You should get to it, Matt. I’m up one-zip,” she announced nonchalantly as the fish splashed into her bucket.

“One-zip? What about the four I already have?”

“Cheating,” she remarked, casting in again.

“What? How’s that?”

Her calm tone was deceptive. She was definitely back at her games.

“I wasn’t even here when you caught those,” she explained.

“Well, I caught four yesterday when you were here.”

“First of all, it was three.”

I laughed. Through all the misery, she’d still been keeping track!

“Second of all,” she added, “everything that happened yesterday, never happened.”

I laughed gently. If only it was that easy.

“All right, fine. I’m going to stand up, cast in, and we start from here. Clean slate, no excuses. Anything caught when the other person is present, fishing or not, moody or not, counts.”

I looked her in the eyes. They were brimming with their usual life again. She stared at me for a while, transfixing me to the spot. If she’d held my gaze indefinitely, I would still be there now.

Finally she nodded. “Fine.”

The game was set. I rose slowly with an exaggerated yawn. “All right, reel in,” I demanded.

“Why?” she asked innocently.

“I can tell you have one on the line. You’re just waiting for me to cast.”

A smile spread across Heather’s face as she cranked on the reel. Sure enough, a fish was flapping on the end of the line. I just shook my head in amusement as I took up my pole.

“Zero-zero,” I announced.

“Zero-zero,” she echoed. “On your mark ... Get set...”

We stared at each other, waiting for the imaginary starting lights to go off.

“Go!” we yelled at once.

We cast in like we were starting the Kentucky Derby. For a few minutes we worked our lines in silence, eyeing each other’s pole tips to see if something had been caught. Neither of us hooked anything though. Eventually I glanced at Heather and she at me. Then we started laughing.

“Somewhat anticlimactic, huh?” she remarked.

“Yeah, fishing could never be a spectator sport.”

“I don’t know, the suspense here is killing me!”

“Well, there’s a long way to go. The first fish caught won’t matter much in a few weeks, when I’ve soundly kicked your butt. Unless you’re planning to ditch me again like last year,” I added. I knew it was a risky comment, but I hoped her mood could handle it.

“No, Matt. Unfortunately, I’m stuck here fishing with you for the rest of the summer,” she drawled with mock ennui.

I felt deep relief at her returned barb. “‘Unfortunately’? ‘Stuck here’? Thanks! That makes me feel good!”

Heather stuck her tongue out at me but it was interrupted by a whoop. I rolled my eyes as she dramatically gripped her rod.

“Ooh, a big, meaty one!” she exclaimed exaggeratedly as the catch rose above the surface.

“You suck,” I muttered. I moved closer to her and smacked my rod tip against hers. To my surprise, the act caused the fish to drop off her hook and splash into the water. I sniggered as Heather gave me a foul look.

“What was that?” she exclaimed.

“Sorry, just trying to help—”

“That’s a penalty! Malicious interference. Three fish penalty!”

“Wait, that’s not fair! I barely tapped your pole, so it was about to shake itself off anyway. But I’ll let you count that one, out of pity.”

Her face scrunched up with incredulity. “Pity? Whatever! The score is two for me, negative three for you. The fish counts, and you get a penalty!”

“When did you become the referee?”

“I’ve always been the referee. And I always will be,” she said matter-of-factly.

“Well, sounds like there’s no room for discussion on that point!”

“Nope,” she confirmed.

I was distracted by a hard pull on my line. “Oh... ! Oh... ! Well, look at that! What a shame! They just never learn, do they? That looks a lot like the fish you just had, doesn’t it?” I sang triumphantly. I grinned and eyed the fat fish wriggling on my hook. “It’s so big and, what was it? Oh yeah, so big and ‘meaty‘ that I can hardly pull it in.” I pretended to stagger under the weight of the half-pounder.

Heather whipped her rod at mine, but I’d anticipated that and swung my pole out of the way, swiftly pulling the fish to the temporary safety of my bucket.

“You better watch out,” I warned. “That was almost a penalty for you. What was it? ‘Malicious interference’?” I mimicked in a high voice.

Heather just made another face at me. I smiled back innocently.

The fishing for the next while was intense. Well, as intense as fishing for pan fish on a pier in high summer can get, which is not very intense.

“I have to go to work,” Heather sighed at last.

I felt a twinge of sadness at the impending end of our morning together.

“That’s cool. Nothing’s biting anyway.”

Heather leaned over and scrutinized the contents of my pail. She sniggered for a moment and then pretended to contain it. She couldn’t keep her face straight, though.

“Negative two,” she said with derision.

“What? I have negative one fish,” I corrected, feeling ridiculous at having to argue for that pathetic score. I peered into my bucket as they swam around: one, two, three, four ... no wait, three, four, five. Five?