Wednesday was long and quiet. No one was in town. Pepper, Pike, and Cheddar were back at home, living their regular lives in town for a few days that week. They weren’t due back until Thursday.
The phone rang a little after nine in the morning. It was Flo. She’d be a little late. Whatever. Then it rang again around noon. Wrong number. Then I thought I heard it ring, but it was just the wind chimes on the back deck.
The phone finally rang on Thursday morning. It was Pepper. I was disappointed.
“Hey you!” she yelled. “Get down here.” So I started down there, walking, of course.
I walked for about ten minutes when Tim drove by.
“On your way to Hazard Point?” he said.
“Yes.” It bothered me that everyone knew my business.
“Hop in.”
I got in the passenger side of his dad’s pickup.
“Hey, I’d really like to hear about your shark trip,” he said as we pulled onto Water Street. Dad must have mentioned it to him.
“Sure.”
“Maybe we could get a pizza or something, and you can tell me all about it,” he said. That would be kind of nice, we’d always been friends, but I didn’t like that idea … Steve the Pizza Spy would see us and then tell Scout.
“I’m off to college in the fall. Studying marine biology,” he said, so proud of himself. I used to be proud of him, too. Now he just seemed annoying.
“I know. I’m kind of seeing someone, Tim.”
“Oh. I hadn’t heard that.”
“Not everything in this town is public knowledge,” I snapped.
“Yeah, but you’d be surprised at what is. Be careful,” he said as I got out of the car on Hazard Point.