The girl felt a single raindrop hit the tip of her nose. She hadn’t realized how long she had been staring at the pastor’s cottage. Now it’s drizzling, and the glimmer in her eyes seemed to say I told you so when she looked at him. But now she didn’t really mind the rain; After all, she had loved him for over a year now, and knew that their days were numbered; come fall, she would return to her home in Virginia, and leave the boy behind. Either growing impatient, or realizing that, if left to her own devices, they would never get home, the boy smiled and said, “Here, want some help?” She nodded, and the boy took his arm around her shoulder, lacing his fingers in between hers, and guided her finger across the page. He stopped when they reached a blue space labeled Bear Cove. “So, we’re here,” he said. “What direction do we have to go to get back?” She thought about it for a minute before nodding her head forward and to the left. She took it as a sign of affirmation when he planted a kiss on her cheek, so she pulled the throttle down, and started off southeast at 25 knots per hour. Before long, they had reached the inlet, and stood on the platform in the boathouse to dock. The wind had just picked up, and the water that was once calm began to rock the boat as it filtered into the boathouse. Struggling to keep the boat from floating away into the rip current, she tied the bow line while he did the stern. She wrapped it around the post once, before tying four tight knots—she knew that she only needed two, and the boy, who had finished tying off, stood behind her, waiting for her to let go of the line. When she felt that the boat was secure, she turned around. He pulled her in by the waist, and kissed her. She looked up at him. “I love you,” she said, before she buried her face into his chest. His embrace grew tighter. “I don’t want you to leave.” The current began to subside, and the boat stopped tugging against the line.
59
