Watermelon Summer (15 page)

 

    "But you don't want to leave," I said, my words
almost a question.  I remembered how adamant Jacob had been when
talking to his grandmother on the topic, but now he seemed to be
wavering.  And I needed him not to waver—I needed him to tell
me it was worth staying in Appalachia and finding a better life
here.  I needed him to tell me that it was possible for me too.

 

    But Jacob's reply was disappointing.  "I want to
think I can stay.  If you stick to the bare necessities, life here
is a lot cheaper than anywhere else in the U.S., and I'd lose so much
by leaving.  I feel like there's a way to bring in money from
outside our area and help pull everyone up around me.  But at the
same time, I've been telling Davey he needs to keep his grades up and be
willing to relocate where the work is.  So I don't know what I
think."

 

    As I digested Jacob's words, I realized that, unfortunately, I
did
know what he thought.  He might be willing to chase a crazy dream
for himself, but someone like Jacob stuck
with reality when looking out for loved ones.  The person I'd begun
to think of as the cure for Appalachia's ailments thought
Greensun and all it stood for was a pipe dream.

 

 

 

    Mom likes to say that when it rains it pours, and it
seemed like the storm clouds started to blow in after Jacob's
declaration.  The first pattering of metaphorical raindrops on our
rooftop came from Drew,  who was quickly shaping up to be the bane
of my
existence.  Kat's boyfriend always seemed to be asleep while we
were working,
he ate like a horse, and he didn't chip in either time or money toward
the
common good.

 

    More signs of the impending storm came soon
behind.  After a week of trying to work around Drew's voracious
appetite, our kitchen was feeling empty since the dried goods my
bio-dad had stocked were just about gone.  My wallet was feeling
empty too and our garden
wasn't producing yet, so I actually started considering Jacob's
suggestion that we apply for a kill permit from the game warden to get
that pesky, garden nibbler...and turn the deer into steaks.  At
about the same time, I realized I was beginning to look forward
to
the Greensun meeting rather than dreading it—at least someone else
would be in charge of feeding the masses for a weekend.

 

    But, as Dad would have pointed out, every cloud has a
silver lining.  I'd been complaining about Drew's appetite and
lack of work ethic for a week when Jacob decided to take matters into
his own hands and call a community meeting.  And since Drew always
made himself scarce
when the rest of us went out to work in the garden, we had no problem
meeting without him.  (Drew's absence was the silver lining, in case you couldn't tell.)

 

    "We need to talk," Jacob greeted Kat as she strolled
up
to join us in the pumpkin patch.  From the look on her face, I got
the feeling that my sister
knew what was on Jacob's mind, but in her typical fashion, Kat wasn't
going to make it any
easier on us.  She just raised her eyebrows,
leaned on the handle of her hoe, and waited.  "So talk," she said,
after we'd all stared at each other in silence for a long minute.

 

    "It's about Drew," I started, but paused, not knowing
how to bring up my complaints without setting off Kat's lightning
temper.  It also seemed a little unfair to say anything at all
since Kat
clearly didn't like my boyfriend any more than I liked hers.  (Not
that Jacob was my
boyfriend, but he'd promised Arvil he'd ask me on a date soon,
right?)  Yet, despite her feelings, Kat had been kind enough to
keep her opinion about Jacob to herself after
her first few warnings were ignored, so it seemed catty for me to pick
at
Drew's behavior.  All of these thoughts spun through my head in a
matter of seconds, and my words petered out before I could launch into
my request—that Kat whip her boyfriend into shape or ask him to leave.

 

    "We figured it was time to vote on whether or not
Drew
can join the community," Jacob said, taking the floor when it became
clear that my
courage had fizzled.  The two of us had talked through our line of
attack previously but had been unable to agree on the best solution to
the Drew problem.  Jacob thought we should just vote Drew off the
farm, removing the canker once and for all, while I'd thought it was
kinder to lay our complaints at
Kat's feet and give her an opportunity to repair the situation. 
Always a gentleman, Jacob had ceded to me the first stab at the issue, but
since I appeared to be
too timid to carry out my plan, it looked like Jacob's solution would
carry the day...assuming Kat was willing to listen to reason.

 

    "Since when do we vote people in or out?" my sister
responded,
startled enough by Jacob's words to speak without thinking. 
Seconds later, though, Kat had gathered her composure and gone on the
offensive.  "I
don't recall voting on
you
either," she continued, her words sharing the unspoken addendum—she'd be
just as happy to vote Jacob out of our community if we
ganged up on Drew.

 

    I was glad Kat was looking at Jacob since her tone
was enough to send me scurrying for cover, at least figuratively. 
But unlike me, Jacob wasn't cowed.  "And I didn't vote on you," he
tossed right
back.

 

    As the words of my two closest Greensun friends grew
more
heated, I couldn't help averting my eyes to the deer-scaring
sculptures.  This drama was just what I'd been afraid of, and why
I'd put off speaking to Kat all week.  Sure, Drew was a pain, but
it seemed much more painful to be bringing discord to a spot that had
filled us all with such joy not long ago.  So I backpedaled.

 

    "How about a compromise," I interjected, as Kat's
face twisted up into a snarl and her mouth opened to say something I
really didn't want to hear.  "We three are clearly the founders,
but we need some sort of procedure for deciding who can and can't join
us.  We can't just take anyone who walks in off the street," I
said, making it up as I went along.  "So, I think if someone
vouches for a new member, that person should get a trial period, and at
the end of the trial, we'll vote him or her in or out by majority rule."

 

    And that's how Drew got permission to stay until
after the Greensun meeting.  And how I averted a Kat-Jacob war and
saved my birthday from total annihilation.

 

 

 

    Yes, I did say "my birthday."  I'd be lying if I
told you I hadn't realized what day it was, but I hadn't told anyone
about the personal holiday either.  I was used to having all the people in
my life who cared about my birthday already well-aware of the date, and
it felt a bit like something my little brother would do to announce to
all and sundry that today I was one year older.  So I'd kept my
mouth shut, despite a childish wish that Kat and Jacob would bake me a cake and
sing "Happy Birthday."

 

    My silence had another facet as well—I'd been waiting and waiting and waiting for
Jacob to carry through and ask me out.  Arvil had clued him in
about my birthday last week, and it felt like a real test of Jacob's
affections whether or not he remembered the date.  If Jacob really
liked me, and hadn't just been put on the spot by my thespian neighbor, he'd take Arvil's advice.  Right?

 

    But as my birthday got closer, I had started figuring
I'd misunderstood what I heard, or had misread Jacob's words.  And
now the cold war currently being waged in the pumpkin patch was making
me think I should have set my birthday wishes a little lower—like
getting to hare off to my campsite and celebrate my majority with a book
and some Lucy time rather than being bombarded by bad feelings from my
community-mates.  Both Jacob and Kat seemed to feel they'd gotten
the short end of the stick with my Drew compromise, and neither was in
the mood to talk to me or to each other.  I'd tried breaking the
ice a few times, finally settling on working quietly, my
stomach knotted up from the tension hovering over us all.

 

    "I'm tuckered out," Kat said at last, after nearly an hour of muteness. 
Usually, she would have asked if we wanted to come back to the house
with her, but I could tell my sister's nose was still out of joint when
she walked off in haughty silence.

 

    That seemed to be a cue to head off to my own pity
party.  I was pretty sure Mom would have sent me a birthday care
package, and I could go check the mailbox in a couple of hours to get a
little jolt that way.  Maybe I'd even hike up to the top of Cell
Phone Ridge and start researching political parties—after all, I
could vote now, right?, so I should stay informed.  Turning eighteen had never seemed so
pointless.

 

    But as soon as Kat was out of sight, the sparkle came
back into Jacob's eyes, and he leaned his hoe against a tree.  "I
think you need an ice cream," he told me, giving my stomach something
else entirely to think about...but this time something good.  "My
treat," he added, and the trip did indeed sound like a treat.

 

 

 

    A sudden thunderstorm blew in as Jacob and I picked
out our 50-cent ice creams at the gas station.  We sat on the curb
under the protective awning and watched the water pour down around us,
the rain so loud it was nearly impossible to talk.  And I was
purely, 100% happy.  Whether this was a date or not, it was
certainly a birthday to remember, sitting so close to a cute guy that
our legs nearly touched, pointing at robins fleeing the storm, and sharing bites of each others' dessert.

 

    And then it got even better.  "I'm going to hold
your hand for just a minute," Jacob told me during a lull in the storm, the action of his fingers
backing up his words.  "If you don't like it, we can stop."

 

    But I liked it.  I liked it very much.

 

 

 

    "Okay, here's the game plan," Kat told me and Jacob
nine days later.  "The Exes will be here any minute, and we need to
put our best foot forward so we can get some of them on board.  A
bunch of these people are in the business world now, and they're our
best bet for raising the $30,000 Glen wants for Greensun, and for
getting an income coming in within eleven months.  Thia, please
stop looking at Jacob and start paying attention."