The Glass Dance

Chapter 3: Creepy Coastal Crawlers

CHAPTER 3 Coastal Critters

   'Never am I having children,'  Tyler promised herself, for the hundredth time in the last few weeks.  Her two small cousins seemed to fight lately, more than they played, and each competed, non stop, for attention from their babysitter.

    "If you don't lay still and quiet, and watch the movie, I'm going to turn it off, and you'll have to take a nap,"  Tyler threatened, as she straightened the pallet in front of the television, yet again.

       "But we’re hungry."  The youngest, by barely one minute, little darling whined.

       "You just ate."  Tyler returned, more than a little irritated.  All she wanted was to close her eyes for twenty minutes.  

       "We're hungry again."

       Stretched out on the couch, Tyler could no longer hold her heavy lids open.  "That's because you barely touched your food."

       No sooner had she dozed, than she was abruptly awakened, by the shrill of the phone.  Muttering a curse, she came up off the couch, and went in search of the cordless, which was never the convenience it was supposed to be.  If it was Jared, she would murder him.  He was half of the reason she needed this nap that she couldn't seem to get.  Last night, after driving her home, Jared, as was his habit, had called, and they had talked on the phone until well after two a.m.  Then, she had to report to run a mile at the football field, at seven a.m. with Ms. Hall, and the other girls in dance.  Jared, himself, had to be at work each morning at daylight, and she had no idea how he had been doing it all of this time, after staying up so late.

       "Hi girl, it's Erin."  Bright and chirpy was the response to Tyler's halfhearted hello.

       "Erin, hey.  What have you been up to?"  Any traces of fatigue vanished when she heard her friend's voice.  They talked at length, catching up on the last few weeks, and sharing remembrances of camp.

       Erin invited her to the beach for the weekend.  Ashleigh's parents had rented a beach house, for the month, and were letting Ashleigh throw a party.  "Bring your boyfriend, okay?"

       After hanging up the phone, Tyler leaped up, invigorated.  First, she prepared two peanut butter sandwiches for the girls.  Next, as they happily smacked on their snack, she called Jared at the plant farm.

       It was no small feat, convincing her mother to let her make the trip to the coast.  Her mother's determination, that Tyler not grow up too fast, had resulted in strict curfews, and a close eye on her friends.  Often, when Tyler stayed the night at Dani’s, her mother called, midway into the evening, on some pretext.  It had been sheer luck that her first introduction into dating last year, had quickly produced Jared, whom Arlette loved.  Tyler didn't even want to think about having a conflicting boyfriend and the hell that brought on, like between Dani, Cole, and Dani's parents.

       Dani's parents did not deem Cole suitable for their daughter because his brothers had both been in trouble with the law.  Dani had phoned Tyler in tears, more than a couple of times, over a situation involving Cole that had gone down between her and her parents.  She would be grounded from seeing him, for a month or so, then her parents would relent and reinstate her dating privileges with him.  Regardless, sometimes Dani would sneak out to see Cole.

       Sneaking.  Tyler pondered the word as she waited for Erin to pick her up.  Was that what she was doing now?  She had led her mom to believe that she would be riding down to the coast with Erin, alone.  The small detail, about Jared meeting them at Erin's house, had been omitted.  Her mother did not even know that Jared was going on the trip.