Amanda slept late on Saturday morning. Cole allowed it, though in general he was against people sleeping the day away. He understood his daughter probably needed the extra rest after a couple of days on the construction site. Although they hadn’t pushed her to do anything too hard, the days were still long and physically demanding. Amanda slept soundly until about 9:30 AM when he started mowing right beneath her bedroom window. Amanda didn't feel like it was an intentional effort to wake her up, but at the same time her dad didn't believe in putting off work just to protect the sleeping.
After flopping around for a while, she decided she might as well get up. She immediately checked her phone. She’d gone to bed unusually early last night out of sheer exhaustion and found she’d missed a lot of group texts between her friends back in Virginia. They were all planning their weekends. None of it was anything Amanda would be able to participate in from North Carolina. She felt like she was a world away, which brought a pang of longing for her old life, and for her mother. She wondered how long it would be before she could wake up and not be hit with those memories before she was even out of bed. With thoughts of her mother came thoughts of the things she was now learning about her, including the fact she may have had a secret life.
There was also a text from Fox checking in on her and asking how she was doing. Amanda would have to text him back when she was little more awake. She threw on some shorts and went to the kitchen to grab a bottle of water. She’d insisted on buying a case for the house even though it drove her dad nuts. Her dad did have a point that the water they were pumping out of the ground here in the mountains of North Carolina probably was more pure than whatever was in the bottle. Right now, she still preferred the convenience of the store-bought stuff in the plastic bottle.
She went out on the back porch barefoot and leaned on the deck rail. When her dad saw her he killed the engine on the riding mower.
"You're not going to be able to run the weedeater dressed like that," Cole pointed out.
That was apparently a hint that her father had more work lined up for her on her day off. She looked toward the detached garage and spotted the weedeater propped against the wall beside a can of fuel. It was on the tip of her tongue to make some smartass comment back to her father, to tell him she was tired and needed a day to lay around. She knew a little bit about how he thought and she wanted something from him. She would have to earn it.
She looked from the weedeater to her father. “That’s fine. I'll go change into some work clothes and do the trimming. Will you let me borrow the Jeep later?" She was careful not to word it in a manner that implied it was an ultimatum. Her dad didn’t like those kind of choices.
"The Jeep?" Cole asked, his face conveying that he found this to be a completely outlandish request. She might as well have been asking for a condo in Hawaii.
Amanda nodded, not acknowledging his stunned expression. In fact, she had no idea why he looked at her that way. “Yes, the Jeep.”
"Where do you want to go? You know I’ll take you anywhere. Every time you’ve come to visit, I’ve driven you everywhere you asked to go."
Amanda shrugged. She looked off to the woods and gathered her thoughts. “This is different. I live here now. I just want to look around town. I want to see what’s here."
"Uhh, I don't know about that," Cole said. "You haven’t driven around this town."
Amanda laughed. "Dad, seriously, I learned to drive in Northern Virginia. I’ve driven the DC Beltway. It doesn't get any worse than that. Traffic up there sucks. I think I can handle rural North Carolina."
Cole wasn’t convinced. "I just don’t know about this.”
Amanda raised an eyebrow. "I used to drive all over the place at home. Fox would let me. Mom too. If I wanted to go somewhere, I just asked for the keys." She could see that her dad was still struggling with the idea. "If you plan on working me like an adult this summer then you should at least treat me like one."
Cole’s expression changed and Amanda knew she had played the right card. Her dad had realized the truth in what she said.
He sighed with resignation. "How about we start with three hours? You can have three hours.” His face indicated he was still very uncomfortable with the idea but he was willing to deal with it.
Amanda smiled. "I'll go change into some work clothes. Thanks, Dad."
She went back in the kitchen and shut the door behind her. She sucked down the rest of the bottle of water, feeling like she still hadn’t replaced everything she’d sweated out at the construction site this week. She flew up the stairs to change. Just the idea of this small adventure, the prospect of getting out for a little bit on her own, was the best she’d felt in weeks. She felt like it was a step toward moving on with her life, toward healing.