Country Club Living - Rafe Cameron

Chapter 40 - I Wonder

A few days had passed since Rafe walked into the kitchen while Sarah was on facetime with Ivy, he hadn't spoken to her and despite his hopefulness, she didn't contact him either. The two had decided it would be for the best to stay separate while she was at college, but he couldn't help but long for her. His mind was consumed with thoughts of her 70% of the time, while the other 30% was spent wondering if he would be arrested or not.

Talk around town was that the police were beginning to believe that Michael was murdered and were gathering any information they could about the party he had on his boat that night. Barry didn't crack when questioned and as far as Rafe knew, he was off the hook, despite the fact that the only other 'witnesses' that could attest to his supposed being on the cut that night, would have had to be junkies that couldn't tell if it was New Year or New York. Ward had been keeping close tabs on the case via a friend on the force who would be getting a handsome payout once everything was finished if they managed to keep Rafe out of it. So far, they had no reason to believe that Rafe was involved.

However, this didn't ease Rafe's anxiety about the situation. He often woke up in a cold sweat after having nightmares about the night of the murder or of him being carted off to a cell, and despite this being frightening enough to think about, it wasn't the scenarios that scared him. It was the thought of Ivy mixed up in it all. He just hoped that she would be safe at Harvard.

A loud knock at his bedroom shook Rafe from his thoughts. A booming kind of knock that demanded to be answered, the kind of knock that meant you were probably about to get into a lot of trouble. The Cameron boy stood frozen in his spot, holding his breath as if it would hide him from whoever was behind the door. Was this it? Did he get caught?

"Rafe!" Wheezie yelled from behind the door

"Wheezie?" Rafe exhaled

"It's movie night, get your butt downstairs" she shouted again

Rafe chuckled, clutching his racing heart "Yeah be down in a minute. And Wheeze? Go easy on the knock okay"

"I had to kick the door; I have bowls of snacks" her voice said getting further away as she walked downstairs

Once every two weeks, Rafe and Wheezie would have a movie night. The tradition had started a few years back when they were both sick and couldn't attend a dinner the family was going to. They soon realised they were more similar than they had thought, and it quickly became a favourite activity for the pair.

Rafe truly valued his time with his younger sister. He and Sarah had never been close and after she began hanging around with the Pogue's and forming Kildare's answer to Mystery Inc he started to actively dislike her. She was always in his business and her friends were beneath him, well all but one. Wheezie was different, she shared qualities with both of her siblings but as she got older Rafe noticed she was starting to be more like Sarah and help Sarah out with her scheming, something he wished would stop. At least they had movie night. She didn't do any of that with Sarah.

Movie night took place in the pool house, away from the main house but close enough to the kitchen so that they could go for snack refills, which they often had to do because they shared an equal affinity for pretzels and popcorn. The pool house was a large space that could have been used as a second home if needed - Rafe was sure that Sarah had let her Pogue friends stay here before but that's something she would have never admitted to – It had a working shower and toilet in a separate bathroom, a large lounge area with a couch that could be pulled out into a bed and a bar area that Ward learned to keep empty after Rafe cleared the cabinets one night and threw up all over the cream furniture. The best part about the pool house though was the huge TV on the wall that looked straight out of a movie theatre, which is why Rafe and Wheezie claimed it for movie night. You could pull down the blackout blinds to hide the light from coming inside and for the next few hours it was just the two of them laughing along to whatever they had chosen, or jumping when it got to October, and they picked horror movies to watch.