and got up, and I strode back toward the campsite where I knew my parents were. We finished packing up, and suddenly Abigail showed up on her bike. She threw the bike to the ground and ran over to me.
“I’m sorry I was mean,” she said, and her cheeks were still wet. Her grandmother walked up behind her, shaking her head.
“Hello, Mrs. Marshall,” I said.
“Y’all heading out?” she asked my mom.
“We have some things we need to do at home before the work week starts,” Ma said. “But thank you for letting Ethan hang out with Abigail so much this summer.”
Mrs. Marshall laid her hand on my shoulder and gave it a squeeze. “We love having Ethan around. I don’t have to play UNO with Abigail when he’s there.”
“She cheats,” I admitted.
“I know,” her grandmother replied.
“She cheats at Monopoly, too,” I added.
“I do not cheat at Monopoly!” Abigail cried. “You take that back, Ethan!” She came at me like a whirling dervish, her fist raised so she could punch my arm. Her grandmother grabbed her in time, though, and yanked her back.
“Just because you can’t win on your own doesn’t mean I cheated.” And then Abigail stuck her tongue out at me.
“You two have time for a short walk if you’d like to take one,” Ma said to us, and she shushed my dad when he started to complain. “You have one hour. No more.” She glared at me. “Understand?”
“Yes, ma’am,” I replied. But now I wasn’t sure if Abigail wanted to go walk with me. If her grandmother hadn’t grabbed her, she would have punched me. “You want to walk to the store?”
I had two dollars burning a hole in my pocket to spend at the tackle shop right down the road. Abigail and I walked down there all the time, and the owner, Shy, would give us each a piece of candy. Abigail always wanted the bubble gum that had the comics in them because she thought they were funny.
“I guess,” she grumbled and shrugged.
I tilted my head toward the road, and she fell into step beside me.
“Gran told me I was acting like a shrew,” she said quietly.
“What’s a shrew?” I asked.
“I don’t know, but I’m pretty sure it’s bad.” She finally looked at me. “I’m sorry.”
I shrugged. I never could stay mad at Abigail. She didn’t have an off switch. She was either all the way on, or she was asleep. There was no in-between. She felt things deeper than most people did, and she wasn’t afraid to let you know.
“I have two dollars,” I told her.
Her brow furrowed. “Where’d you get two dollars?”
I grabbed at a tall stalk of grass as we walked by a field and stuck the end of it in my mouth. “Left over from my birthday”
“Oh.” She walked a ways in silence. “I’m going to miss you.”
“Aren’t you coming back next year?” I asked.
She shrugged. “I guess we are. I stay with Gran every summer.”
“Why don’t your parents ever come?” I’d never even thought to ask that question before.
“They’re busy,” she said.
“Oh.”
The little bell over the door tinkled as we walked into the tackle shop. The smell of the place was always startling. It smelled like potting soil and fish and air fresheners all at once, with a little lemon furniture polish in the background.
“Well, looky who’s here,” Shy said. He leaned on the counter so he could talk to us. “What are you two doing out and about?”
“Going home today,” Abigail said.
“Well, just because of that, you get two pieces.” He grabbed four Bazookas and dropped two into Abigail’s outstretched palm and two into mine. “Can I help you guys find anything?”
I shook my head. “We’re going to look around, if that’s okay.”
He gave a quick jerk of his head. “Sounds good.” He winked at Abigail, which made her grin.
We walked toward the back of the store, and Abigail stopped to slide her fingertips down the length of some necklaces that hung on a rack by the wall. They were made of plastic, but they were still outside my price range. She kept walking, and I followed her.
On a low shelf, I saw a bucket filled with small rubber bracelets. They were all in primary colors, and they were only fifty cents. I crouched down to inspect them. “Look at these,” I said. “We could get matching ones.”
She knelt down next to me and rested her head on my shoulder. She almost knocked me off balance, so I spread my