Parker A REAL CATCH

WHY IN THE HELL DID Amelia have to bring this Harris guy here? I bet he got seasick. I bet he’d never fished a proper tournament in his life. I bet Harris knew not the first thing about the Cape Carolina Summer Splash & Fish, and yet here he was.

Now he’d be fishing with me and my dad and Amelia’s dad, and they’d get to be all chummy. Don’t get me wrong. I liked the guy. But I couldn’t get Amelia to fall in love with me if her rich, handsome boyfriend was around. This nonsense had me off my game, which is the only reason I could figure my mother tricked me into stringing lights in the town square.

“If you can, lift that strand just a little higher, Parker, darlin’,” Mrs. Stack said, breaking me out of my thoughts. All I could think about was that, when we were in middle school, we called her Mrs. Stacked. She’d been the subject of every Mrs. Robinson fantasy in Cape Carolina. Now the memory makes me cringe.

But lucky for her, we all started volunteering for the Summer Splash around the age of twelve, and, looking around and seeing that Watson, Spence, and even useless-ass Mason (who hadn’t been out of bed this early since last year’s Summer Splash) were here helping, it seemed like, no matter the original reason why, the action stuck.

I gave Mason credit: he was a bigger man than I was. Watson, Spence, and I were the reason the 2000 number one draft pick was living at home with his parents. I was still pissed at him for what he said about Greer last time I was home, but I was trying to let it go.

“Mace!” I shouted to my brother, who was on another ladder about twenty feet away from me. “Catch!” I threw him a strand that I had secured in my tree branch and he secured it to his, then threw it to Spence, and so on and so forth. After twenty years, we pretty much had this whole situation down.

I couldn’t see my mom or Mrs. Saxton or Trina. But I could hear them. Mom and Mrs. Saxton were continuing in the legacy of their mothers, the charter members of the Cape Carolina Garden Club, and Trina was the next generation to carry the torch. After four years, they’d finally gotten the town’s approval and raised the money to install a gazebo by the pond, and they were making sure that the flowers around it looked perfect. Or, well, actually, Robby was. Poor guy. He’d drawn the short straw. We’d all been there, though. Because the Cape Carolina Garden Club didn’t plant or prune; they pointed. Today, they were pointing at Robby.

By tomorrow, the entire square would be transformed with lights and flowers, food and wine, and, in the middle of it all, a dance floor with a band where the whole town gathered. Grandchildren danced with grandparents and neighbors with neighbors, couples and singles. Everyone had fun. I never got nervous about dancing because I’d been doing it my whole life with my mom and my grandmother, Amelia’s aunt Tilley, the girl with the pigtails in my third-grade class, and, yes, even Mrs. Stacked. Stack. Force of habit.

But the first time I brought Greer here, I danced only with her. I could see only Greer, in her long yellow dress, a flower in her hair. The night she died, I closed my eyes and thought about her under the twinkle lights that I had hung on the dance floor at the Summer Splash. That’s how I wanted to remember her: free and alive.

My stomach rolled as I thought about the possibility of dancing with Amelia tomorrow night. Right then, I realized something: there was room for two great loves in my life. I could remember Greer. But I could also love Amelia. In a way, I always had.

“That’s all, boys,” Mrs. Stack called. “Thanks for your time.”

She winked at me as I climbed down the ladder and said, “Save me a dance, Parker.”

Twenty years ago, that would have given me bragging rights for months.

“You fishing with your dad tomorrow?” Watson asked, coming up beside me.

“Yeah. You?”

He nodded.

“And Amelia’s new paramour,” Mason said, walking up. I had to control my eye roll. “But not for long,” he added.

“What does that mean?” I asked, my heart racing. Had he heard something? Did she feel the same way about me as I did about her?

“Oh, I saw the way she was looking at me last time she was home. I think I’ve got a shot.”

“Yeah,” I said under my breath. “She’s just dying to get back with you after how well you treated her last time.” It was unfair, but the thought of Mason going after Amelia had me rattled, especially after my new realization.

He got up in my face. “What did you say to me?”

“Hey, man, chill out,” Spence said, running up behind us now.

“I said you don’t have a shot with Amelia,” I said, getting closer to him now. “What are you going to do about it? Are you going to tackle me in the town square? Make Mrs. Stack call Mom? We’re in our thirties, man. Grow up.”

The flash in his eye told me that Mason was furious, but, much to my surprise, he didn’t tackle me in the town square. But could he seriously want Amelia back? She’d never get back with Mason, right? The thought of my brother with the only woman that made me feel like I could move on made me sick.

“I hate to break your heart, man,” Spence interjected as we all started walking in the direction of home again, “but I’m pretty sure you’re not the Thaysden brother that has a chance with Amelia.”

Mason looked at me like I was dog shit and said, “Ass face couldn’t convert the point if his life depended on it.” But then he slung his arm around my shoulder in a brotherly way, so I assumed we were fine. He was quick to anger, but he was also quick to forgive, thank God. Otherwise there was no way we’d all be standing here together right now. “I’m just giving you a hard time, little bro. You got this.”

I wanted to act cool in front of my friends and my brother. That impulse never changes. But I needed support. “Do you guys really think I should go for it with Amelia?”

“She tried to have your baby, man,” Spence said. “If you’re waiting for a sign, I think that was it.”

Spence’s wife, Christina, stepped out of the gazebo, and their toddler daughter wriggled out of her mom’s arms and ran down the brick sidewalk, squealing, “Daddy!” as he lifted her up into the air.

Watson was saying, “You’ve got to get back out there.”

Watching one of my oldest, best buddies hold his daughter, I realized that Amelia wasn’t all I wanted. I wanted to be a dad; I wanted to be a family.

“You’re just getting started,” Spence chimed in.

Walking down the brick sidewalk with two of my oldest, best buddies and my brother in the town that raised me, I couldn’t help but wonder if maybe Spence was right.