“Damn, Kaleb, you’ve got one hell of an appetite,” Trask chuckles as he sips on his beer. “I’ll stick to a single serving of soup. But you do you, king.”
I toast my beer with Trask and allow my second bowl of soup to cool down just a touch before I demolish it.
Despite having planned on a typical evening at home, I decided that a last minute offer of free drinks all night from Trask was too good to resist. Even if I do suspect that it all some kind of prelude to him asking a favor of me…
“So. Are you going to tell me?” I ask, arching my eyebrow.
“Tell you…what… exactly?” Trask chuckles. “Shit. Is it that obvious?”
I nod and take a big gulp of the beer. It’s starting to get busy in Woody Hollow and while the free beer and food is a great way ofgetting me here, it won’t keep me here all night if the place gets too full.
I cast my eyes around and see all the typical suspects. A few of the young men of the town, playing pool but checking their phones constantly like they’re waiting on some incredibly important news when in fact they’re all probably just messaging each other rather than talking.
Weird.
If this is modern life, I’m not here for it.
Then of course we have a few of the local store owners and tradespeople. All good types, reliable, part of what makes this community so solid. I don’t know if they would speak as glowingly of me, but that doesn’t change the fact that I know they’re the glue that keeps places like this going during good times and bad.
We’ve got Mr. and Mrs. Peplinska who own the grocery store.
And then there’s old Jonathan Melville who’s made his life out of supplying all the pens, paper, and stationary you could ever need.
Plus not forgetting Miles and Henry Roberts, relative newcomers to our neck of the woods but they’ve set up a quite delightful Bed & Breakfast that brings a steady supply of visitors into the town too.
“Earth to Kaleb?” Trask says, playfully shaking my shoulder.
“Oh, right, yeah,” I say, back in the real world. “You were about to tell me the real reason that you’re buying my beers and food tonight?”
Trask smiles and takes a glug of his beer.
“Right,” Trask begins, half a smile on his face already. “You know we’ve got the annual fair coming up, right?”
Oh no.
Not again.
He asked me this last year, and the year before…
“Uh-huh,” I eyeroll. “Hurry up and get to it.”
“Well… how about getting that big grumpy ass involved this time,” Trask says. “I think there must be something you could do. Maybe a log cutting contest that you could judge? Or you could maybe challenge any one of the locals to a contest yourself? You’d win of course. But each entry could be five bucks. And I’m sure there’s plenty of boys out there who would kill for a chance to get up close with you in your tightest vest and jeans combo. Tell me this doesn’t sound like a good idea.”
“Pffft. It sounds like a terrible idea,” I say, shaking my head in disgust. “Listen, if you want I’ll write you a cheque to go toward a prize or something. But, come on. You know that’s not my thing.”
“Kaleb, you haven’t got anywhere near enough money to write a cheque that big,” Trask laughs. “If everyone knew there was a chance to Kaleb wood and get all hot and sweaty with you on a sunny afternoon, we’d have enough money to rebuild the whole Oak Lake reservoir! Listen, don’t answer now. Just promise you’ll think on it.”
“Whiskies as well as beer, and I’ll think about it,” I say. “And I meanthink.”
“Deal,” Trask says, patting my arm and signaling to the bar tender for a round of whiskies. “Now, let’s talk about those other trees you spotted.”
“That’s more like it,” I say, a smile on my face. “Now this is a subject I actually want to talk about…”
But before I can get going and explain to Trask why I actually have five trees in my sights for felling rather than the three I told him about earlier, I see that something has caught his eyes.
I turn to look behind me.
Who… the… hell… is he?