Page 10 of Came the Closest
“Ooh-ooh, ah-ah,” I tease.
“You be careful with her,” Gran scolds.
“Gran just wants a turn, too,” Jordan says.
Jolene bursts out laughing, and true to his word, Graham flips her upside down.
“Hey, party pe…ople?” Nash takes the deck stairs two at a time—because why come through the front door?—and his gaze toggles between us. “Is Dolly girl gonna try out for gymnastics or something?”
“No.” Jordan presses the drill into Nash’s hands and claps him on the shoulder. “But the last one here gets to babysit Gran. Good luck.”
Nash frowns down at the drill, then looks up questioningly. “What?”
“Don’t ask,” Graham and I say in unison.
To be completely honest, I kind of thought the whole we’re-gonna-put-the-dock-in thing was a charade to force me out of my funk.
It wasn’t.
We’re honest-to-God putting the dock in. Driving weathered white posts into the sandy lake floor, screwing the boards into place—the whole nine yards. And it is not going well. Probably because we’ve never done it before, and aside from Graham, we aren’t exactly handymen.
Dad is YouTubing tutorials while Jordan insists we’re installing the posts wrong. From her chair in the yard, Gran’s a backseat driver of the whole project, her hot pink sunglasses contrasting her coiffed white-blonde hair.
Knees in the damp grass, I lean back until my butt rests on my heels and lift the hem of my sweaty t-shirt to wipe my equally sweaty brow. We started an hour and a half ago, so you’d think we’d have at least half of it done.
Think again. We have two and a half posts in, and they might be installed incorrectly.
“I still think we need to drive them deeper into the ground,” Jordan says. He lifts his cap to scratch his head, then resettles it and studies the little progress we’ve made. “I mean, think about it this way: not only does it have to hold up through storms and people walking all over it, but it also has to sustain boats being tied to it.”
Graham frowns. “Isn’t that what the hoist is for?”
“Yeah, but you’re not gonna put it in the hoist if you just need to grab something real quick.” Jordan glances at our youngest brother. “Do Ember’s parents put their own docks in at the inn?”
“I think so. Why?”
Dad steps in when Jordan stares at Graham incredulously. “I think what your brother is trying to say is that we need help.”
“Here, here to that,” Gran calls, lifting her glass of ice water.
Nash coughs to hide his laugh. “I’d take offense to the insinuation, myself.”
Jordan points at me. “Don’t even think about saying it.”
“Saying what?” I feign complete nonchalance. “That I’d take—”
“Collie,” Jordan growls.
“—a post to it?” I finish, ducking out of the way when he tries to backhand me. “Get it? Because we’re driving posts into the ground?”
“If we didn’t get it,” Graham says dryly, pulling his phone out, “we’d all be as blond as Jordan.”
“Hey!” Indignation rings through Jordan’s voice.
Dad turns to Graham. “Would you mind calling Ember—or, I guess, her dad, to ask if he has any pointers? I’d be happy to pay him.”
“Does that mean you’ll pay me, too?” Jolene clasps her hands under her chin, swiveling back and forth. Her jacket is tied around her waist and one of her pigtails is lopsided; if Dad can tell her no, more power to him. “Please? I want to get my ears pierced, and it costs fifteen dollars, and Daddy says I can if I earn enough money. Don’t you want to help the needy?”
I stifle a laugh behind my hand.