3

Meg leaned back and tried to Think Cool. The air conditioning had broken down just after the bus left Green Bay, and the temperature had been mounting ever since. She thought of double-dip ice-cream cones (with Rhoda, who was getting farther away every second). Swimming in Lake Superior (icy-cold all year round, according to her father). A glass of soda (last night, in the kitchen with Bill. He’d pretended to be envious because Meg was going to spend three weeks lying on a beach, soaking up sunshine while he slaved in a laboratory.)

Think Cool. An ice pack (her mother, nursing a headache on the living-room sofa this morning, while Meg finished packing her suitcase).

Meg shifted on the hot vinyl seat, remembering how Bill had stalked into her bedroom after breakfast and closed the door behind him. “Look,” he’d said, “Ma’s out there making herself sick because she feels guilty about sending you to stay with Dad. Tell her it’s okay.”

Meg rolled her red bathing suit into a ball and dropped it into the suitcase. “It’s not okay,” she snapped. “Why should I pretend it is?”

“Because this’ll be the first vacation Ma’s had in years, and you don’t want to spoil it for her.”

Meg glared at him. “What about my vacation? Why do I have to make everybody else feel good?”

Bill gave the long black braid a tug. “Because you’re basically a not-bad kid,” he’d replied and left her fuming.

Eventually, she’d gone to the living room, as he’d known she would, and said she hoped the next three weeks would be a fun time for both of them. Her heart wasn’t in it, but a few minutes later she’d heard her mother go to the kitchen and empty the ice pack into the sink.

A fun time, she thought. Like now, for instance, riding in an overheated oven, with nothing to look at but endless miles of trees. Occasionally the bus caught up to a car pulling a trailer or a boat, its back seat loaded with suitcases and children and sometimes a dog. Meg looked down at them wistfully. Once in a while the children would wave, and she waved back. She wondered if they knew how lucky they were, going on a vacation trip with both their parents, and nothing to think about except having a good time.

The old lady in the aisle seat sat up suddenly and looked at her watch. “Twenty minutes to Trevor,” she announced, as if that were the best news in the world. “I can hardly wait! I feel as if I’ve been away a year instead of just ten days.”

Meg forced a smile. “My dad says it’s a nice town.”

“Oh, it is!” Her companion tucked wisps of hair under a net that was studded with tiny beads. “Of course, in summer it’s very crowded—don’t say I didn’t warn you about that. My boy Junior has a sporting-goods store—makes a ton of money, I can tell you. The tourists come from miles around to buy their camping and fishing supplies and get souvenirs and all. Sometimes you can hardly walk down Lakeview—that’s our main street.”

“I won’t be staying in town,” Meg said. “My dad and I will be at a cottage on Lake Superior.”

The old lady twisted to look toward the back of the bus. “Is your father sitting back there somewhere?” she asked. “Why didn’t you say so? We could have exchanged seats. I don’t care where I sit, just so I get home.”

Meg looked down at her folded hands. “I’m meeting my father in Trevor.”

“Oh?” The old lady sounded curious, but Meg didn’t explain. She hated telling people that her parents were divorced. Risking rudeness, she leaned back and closed her eyes, pretending a sleepiness she didn’t feel.

She must have dozed off, because suddenly the bus was slowing and the old lady was gathering her belongings into her lap. “This is it,” she said proudly, when Meg opened her eyes. “My Trevor! Don’t say I didn’t tell you it would be crowded. Just look at that, will you!”

The bus wheezed and groaned around a corner and threaded its way between cars parked on either side of the narrow main street. Meg stared in astonishment at the throngs of people on the sidewalks. “It’s like—like a carnival,” she murmured.

The old lady frowned. “If you mean everybody’s having a good time, that’s true,” she said primly. “But when the tourists go home at the end of the summer, Trevor is a very quiet town. I like it both ways.”

Meg nodded, wondering if she’d said something wrong. She concentrated on the signs over the shops—THE SQUIRREL’S NEST and THE WISE OLD OWL. The biggest store had long metal tubs lined up in front of its windows.

“That’s my Junior’s place,” the old lady announced. “Those things out front are freezers for fish, in case you’re wondering. Tourists bring their best catch in and leave it there for people to admire. Then they pick ’em up on the way home. You wouldn’t believe the size of some of those fish.”

Meg shivered. The fish in her dream would have been as long as that whole store. Longer! She thrust the thought away.

“There’s the bus station, right on the corner,” the old lady continued. “It’s the storefront with the crowd on the sidewalk. Folks here to meet friends, I suppose.” She leaned across Meg and waved vigorously at a huge man wearing a visored cap with TREVOR lettered on it. “That’s my Junior, come to meet his mother. Which one is your father, dear?”

Meg discovered that she couldn’t breathe. There was no one in the crowd who looked familiar—no tall, thin man with a dark beard and glasses. What if he was standing right there—maybe with his beard shaved off—and she didn’t recognize him? Or what if he hadn’t bothered to come to meet her?

She slid down in the seat and tried to look unconcerned. “He might—he might not be here,” she stammered. “He might have an appointment or—”

The door of the bus station opened, and a tall, bearded man stepped out, squinting into the sun.

“There he is!” Meg shot up. “He just came outside.”

“Well, that’s fine.” The old lady struggled to her feet. “You two have a good time, now.” She bustled down the aisle, leaving Meg to stare through the tinted glass at her father.

Of course she’d recognized him. How could she have worried about that? But she felt shy, as if he were a stranger. After all, this was the first time since he’d left home that she would be alone with him. On his visits to Milwaukee, he’d taken Bill and her out to dinner, and Bill had done most of the talking. College courses, new friends, part-time jobs—he always had plenty to talk about. Meg had sat quietly, pretending to herself that nothing had changed, pretending that her mother just happened to be working late, and soon Meg and Bill and their father would go home and they’d all be together again.

“Everybody out, young lady. This is as far north as you’re gonna get.” The bus driver sounded impatient, but his face was kind. Meg hitched her shoulder bag into place and hurried toward the door.

“Somebody meeting you?” the driver asked.

“Yes!” Meg stumbled on the top step and hurtled out of the bus, right into her father’s arms. They hugged without speaking, and Meg pressed her cheek against his chest.

“I’ll get your things,” Mr. Korshak said after a moment. He edged his way to the side of the bus, where the driver had opened the luggage compartment. “How many cases?”

“One.” Meg smiled at him, comforted by the discovery that she wasn’t the only person who felt shy in this situation. Her father’s arms had been strong and loving, but his heart had been beating very fast. Now he busied himself looking at luggage tags without waiting for her to point out which suitcase was hers.

When he rejoined her at the edge of the crowd, his face was red. “Car’s up the block a way,” he muttered. “Couldn’t get any closer. Tourists are cluttering up the street.” He began walking with long strides, and Meg scampered after him.

“The place goes crazy this time of year,” he said, and he didn’t sound as pleased as the old lady who had shared Meg’s seat. “You should see it in midwinter, though. Like a ghost town most of the time. Nice.”

Meg sidestepped to miss a collision with a fat man in shorts and a bright orange T-shirt. “Well, I guess it doesn’t make much difference to you,” she said. “The crowds, I mean. Uncle Henry’s cottage is a long way from town, isn’t it?”

Her father looked down at her and then away, as if the comment had startled him. “The car’s right there,” he muttered. “The blue sedan near the corner.”

Meg was surprised. “I thought you used Uncle Henry’s old truck.”

“Had to get something of my own. I thought I told you when I wrote.”

Meg recalled her father’s last letter. How are you doing in school? How’s Rhoda? I hope you’re helping your mother a lot.… I keep busy with my writing, and that’s the way I want it. No big sales so far, but some interesting prospects.… She’d kept every letter he sent her, but they had told very little about life in the north woods. Certainly he hadn’t mentioned buying a car.

Mr. Korshak dropped the suitcase in the back seat of the sedan and waited for Meg to fasten her seatbelt before he pulled out into traffic. “We’ll be turning off the main street just a block or so ahead,” he said. “Then you’ll see how the town looks the rest of the year. All the action’s here on Lakeview.”

“Do you have to get groceries before we go out to the lake?” One of the things Meg had wondered about during the long bus ride was whether her father would remember to stock up on important things like peanut butter and pizza and ice cream. She could imagine him thinking so much about his work that he forgot about eating. She didn’t want to be without her favorite foods for three whole weeks if she could help it.

“No problem.” They turned off Lakeview Avenue, and, as he’d predicted, the scene changed. Big old wooden houses and smaller shingled ones lined the street. The lawns were dotted with toys, and children rode their tricycles down the bumpy sidewalks.

Mr. Korshak swung the car over to the curb and parked in the shade of an oak. “This is more like it,” he said. “This is why I like living in Trevor.”

Meg looked around her. Was she supposed to admire this perfectly ordinary street? “But you don’t live here,” she said after a puzzled moment. “I mean, you just come into town to shop, right?”

Silence. Her father turned and looked right at her for the first time. “I’m awfully glad you’re here, Meggie,” he said. “It means a lot to me that you wanted to come.”

Now it was Meg’s turn to look away.

“But I’m afraid you’re going to be disappointed,” he hurried on. “I just hope—well, things aren’t the way you think. There’s more I didn’t get around to mentioning in my letters—besides the car.”

“What do you mean?” His nervousness was beginning to scare her.

“I don’t live in Uncle Henry’s cottage anymore. If you were looking forward to lying on the beach and hiking in the woods—well, I’m sorry.”

Meg forgot her shyness. “What do you mean? Where do you live, then? Do you have a house?” She looked around again. “Is it one of these houses? Is that why we stopped here?”

“No, no, I just wanted to talk to you,” Mr. Korshak said. “I moved into town about six weeks ago. To a house on Emerson Avenue, just a few blocks from here. And no, I didn’t buy it. I don’t have money to buy a house. It’s a kind of a—a boarding house.”

“A boarding house?” Meg couldn’t believe she’d heard right. “You mean you live in a crummy old tenement with a bunch of strangers?”

Her father laughed weakly. “It isn’t a crummy old tenement, babe, and they aren’t really strangers. The house belongs to a very nice woman I’ve known ever since I moved up here. She’s a nurse at the hospital, and she makes a little extra money renting out some rooms.”

“But—”

Mr. Korshak sighed. “You are disappointed, aren’t you? You wanted to stay at the cottage, and I don’t blame you. It’s beautiful out there. I guess I should have told your mother the whole story when I sent her my phone number, but I didn’t think she’d be interested. Still, it’s probably a good thing I didn’t. She might not have let you come if she’d known.”

Fat chance, Meg thought.

“Actually, I didn’t have any choice about moving,” her father went on. “Uncle Henry had a chance to rent the place for six months, and he didn’t want to pass it up. I wasn’t paying anything to stay there, you know—just looking after the place for him.… I’m sorry, Meggie.”

Meg didn’t know what to say. It wasn’t just the loss of the cottage that disturbed her. She didn’t want to live in one room in someone else’s house, be part of someone else’s family, for three whole weeks. Looking out the car window at the houses that lined the street, she envied the people who lived in them. They were home. That was where she longed to be, now more than ever.

“The Larsens—that’s the name of the people I live with—are great,” Mr. Korshak said coaxingly. “There’s a boy sixteen or seventeen and a cute little girl. You’ll have fun with them.”

Meg hardly heard him. Where would she sleep in this boarding house? Would she have to share a bathroom with a houseful of strangers?

What if there were bedbugs?

Rhoda’s voice sounded dryly in her ear, trying for a joke. In case of bedbugs, sleep in a chair.

But a boarding house! It was probably a dingy, dark place full of lonely people, like her dad, who had no place else to go. His expression, as he waited for her to say something, was that of a small boy who expected to be scolded.

Come on, Meggie. Don’t be a drag. Now it was Bill’s voice, pushing her to be nicer than she was.

Oh, well. She reached out and squeezed her father’s hand. “Don’t worry, Dad. We’ll have fun. I’m really glad to see you.”

The last part, at least, was true.