Once we were at my dad's house and inside, I kicked off my sneakers.
"I gotta go change, I'm still wearing my beach clothes." I said, putting my cup in Dannie's hand. She took it without really looking at me as her eyes wondered around the house.
"Okay." Dannie said in a sort of whisper. She moved her eyes to her sneakers and began taking them off.
I went upstairs and changed into black long sleeve shirt and gray skinny jeans with black writing from my friends all over most of it. It was the last day of school, and we all kind of went crazy writing on my jeans. Mostly they just had the names of my friends written on them, with things like 'HAVE A GREAT SUMMER!' or 'SEE YOU NEXT YEAR!'. I'd ran out of room in my year book, so I just let people sign my pants.
When I got downstairs I headed to the living room, passing Dannie who was sitting at the table drinking her shake and flipping through a magazine she'd probably found sitting on the table. I smiled at her, although she didn't notice, and went to dig around in the hall closet.
"What are you doing?" Dannie asked.
"I thought I saw a tent in here the other day." I replied as I pulled out a green duffle bag.
"Your dad doesn't seem like the type to camp." Dannie said, the blushed. "Sorry, I wasn't intending to sound rude."
"It's okay." I said, smiling at her. "You're right. I guess he's too busy."
I swung the strap over my shoulder and closed the closet door.
"If he's so busy, why'd you come out while he was filming a movie?" Dannie asked. "I mean that just kinda seems like he would have even less time to spend going to the beach and stuff with the daughter he never knew about." Dannie wasn't being mean, she just seemed to point things out like they were. I suppose it was one of her tendencies. If anything, she seemed like a really sweet person.
"How'd you know that?" I asked. Dannie closed the magazine she was reading and held it up. There was a picture of my father and I on the front with the captions 'RICHARD ADAMSON A DEAD-BEAT DAD?'.
"Wow." I said, apalled. "Hadn't seen that one."
Dannie shrugged.
"He really seems like he's trying. The article talks about how he never knew you and stuff. But they're saying it might just be a cover up and that he probably never cared." I frowned and Dannie quickly went on.
"But I don't think that's true." She said, speaking fast. "You know, the writers in this magazine are always making stuff up. Trying to convince us Lady Gaga has eleven fingers. Pffsh." Dannie flipped her bangs out her face and sat back. I laughed.
"You're insane." I said, laughing. She laughed, too.
"That's just one of the things you can love about me." She said.
"Whatever." I teased and she smiled.
"So was he a jerk when you met him?" She asked.
"Kind of.. But I guess he's just been in the spotlights so much he's used to everyone thinking he's so perfect and everything. But he didn't make me sleep outside." I said with a laugh. Dannie smiled.
"Let's go set up a tent." She said.
****
It only took about twenty minutes to set it up. I did this kind of thing all the time with my mom, we camped out a lot in the summer and on some of the weekends when it wasn't too cold. And Dannie seemed to have lots of experience with setting up tents, too.
