The Friends You Make Here… by BymagaJones 11/13
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Everyone figured they would be greeted on Earth Day with bright sunshine, birds chirping in the trees, and if they were really lucky, a breeze just strong enough to rustle the leaves. But when Nick looked out the window of his apartment that morning, he was unable to see much due to the sheets of rain falling to the ground.
“You think anyone’s going to come out?” Hank asked, rubbing a hand over his hair as he stumbled into the kitchen and stopped in front of the empty coffeepot. “What the hell? Who was supposed to set the alarm for the coffee maker?”
Nick shrugged. “You’ll have to check the calendar. I’m pretty sure it wasn’t me.”
Wu stuck his head out of his room. He was about two months behind in cutting his hair, and his bed head was spectacular. “Since no one’s coming, can I go back to bed?”
“We’re doing this for Hap,” Hank reminded him. “And you were in charge of setting the coffee maker last night.”
“Oops.” Wu’s head disappeared back into his room.
Hank snorted.
Nick smiled to himself as he heard Hank pull out the coffee from the freezer.
“Is it just raining, or is there thunder?”
“Just rain. Lots and lots of rain.”
“This sucks,” Wu said, walking out of his room to stand beside Nick. “Pretty much everything is set for outside today.”
“We can move most of our stuff inside,” Nick said, mentally running through their plans, “and if fewer people come, we won’t have to worry too much about the place being overcrowded.” He glanced over at Wu and did a double take when he realized that the other man was covered in nothing but a towel. “What’re you doing?”
“I’m going to take a shower.”
“Then stop standing there naked and get on with it,” Hank said, walking up with a cup in his hands.
“I’m going, “ Wu muttered, reaching for the cup.
Hank held the cup above his head. “You don’t make the coffee; you don’t get to drink the coffee.”
Frowning, Wu headed into the bathroom, muttering to himself.
Hank took Wu’s place beside Nick and exhaled deeply. “Man, it doesn’t look good out there.”
“I wouldn’t leave the apartment if I didn’t have to,” Nick admitted.
“It’s definitely a stay at home and have a movie marathon kind of day.” Hank looked at Nick. “How did we not know about this?”
Nick shrugged. “The weather report said clear skies when I last checked.”
“When was that?”
“Yesterday morning.”
“Wonder what happened between then and now?”
“Your guess is as good as mine.”
They stood there, silently staring at the rain while for another couple of minutes until Hank sighed. “Leave in fifteen?”
“Sounds good,” Nick said, pushing away the thought that he would love to be cuddled in bed with Monroe right about then.
They made it to Hap’s in record time due to the empty streets and dashed into the house, taking off their wet jackets.
“This place looks pretty good,” Nick said, looking around. He sniffed the air. “Smells pretty good too.”
The floor in front of the door was covered in a thick carpet that seemed to be absorbing the water dripping from their coats quite well. The sofa had been shoved against the wall, and the chair and coffee table were gone, leaving space for two five-foot plastic rectangular folding tables and seven metal folding chairs per table.
“You’ve already been hard at work and it’s not even nine yet,” Nick said approvingly.
“Monroe helped me before he left this morning,” Hap said, not very enthused.
“Buddy, I know it’s raining, but I’m sure some people will come,” Nick said, trying to bolster Hap’s mood.
“Yeah, it’s just that Monroe had me up at, like four, and I couldn’t get back to sleep afterwards!” He complained.
Nick shared an amused glance with Hank as Wu commiserated, complaining about the lack of coffee in his morning.
“I can help you with that,” Hap said brightly, leading them into the kitchen. “Monroe made some, and it’s the good stuff!” He took out three mugs and poured them each a cup. “You know where the milk and sugar are.”
Nick and Hank both took theirs black, so they looked around the kitchen while Wu doctored his.
Two round tables surrounded by more folding tables fit comfortably on one side of the kitchen while another long table with buckets underneath ran along the back wall.
“What’s that smell?” Wu asked. “It’s like muffins or something, but we aren’t doing any kind of cooking thing are we?”
“I almost forgot!” Hap opened the oven. “Monroe made muffins for us. There’re some blueberry, bran, and chocolate chip. Help yourself.”
“Hello!” Juliette called from the living room, and Hap ran to meet her.
“Is Renard coming?” Hank asked, grabbing a blueberry.
“No, he’s got something he needs to do to fulfill part of his GN requirement. He said he’d try to stop by later,” Nick said, grabbing a chocolate chip muffin with one hand before pulling out the print-outs that he’d placed in one of the drawers with the other.
“So he’s a student at both JT and GN? Who does that?” Wu asked, mouth filled with blueberry muffin.
“Someone brilliant and rich,” Hank said, taking the papers that Nick had handed him and looking through them.
Nick handed Wu a few papers as well. “So we did our run-throughs, and you know how to handle your tables, but this gives you some reminders and has some information that the parents might want to know.”
“You’ve really stepped up with this,” Hank said, admiration in his voice.
A little embarrassed, Nick said, “It really seemed to matter to Hap, and if you want to talk about stepping up…”
“He hasn’t been to a party in over a week,” Wu said. “But to be honest, pretty much all of the GN-olas have disappeared. I didn’t realize how many I’ve been hanging out with lately until I was the only one left in the room.”
“Hey, guys,” Juliette said. “Hap mentioned coffee and muffins?”
After handing Juliette her packet for her table, Nick left her to grab some food while he joined Hap in the living room.
“So I have our sign, but I wasn’t sure where to put it, since it was supposed to go outside,” Hap said, totally energized.
Nick could tell he was nervous and put a comforting hand on Hap’s shoulder. “Relax. You’ve done a fantastic job.” As he felt Hap’s shoulder relax, Nick looked around the living room. “Why don’t we hang it against this back wall?” He called in Hank, who came up with some options and immediately had Hap on the stairs helping to attach one side.
Nick nodded, watching the rain pouring outside, no sign of letting up. It wasn’t what they’d planned, but it was going to work out, provided anyone showed up.
People showed up. At first it was just one or two families with one or two kids, but then word must’ve gotten around, because suddenly they had more people than Nick thought was probably legal in a house that small. The noise level was at an all-time high, although it was mostly excited, high-pitched ones, so Nick figured it was a win.
Wu and Juliette were in charge of the Nature Terrariums at the table in the living room. Wu helped them start with the pebbles, soil, and earthworms and then Juliette took over with the sticks and plants Monroe had given them.
Hank reigned over the bottling your own beverage section using the long table in the kitchen with the buckets. With glass bottles they’d collected from recycle bins all over town that they’d then boiled clean, they’d lain out a spread of water, two separate teas (mint and green), and apple juice. Monroe had brought them fresh mint leaves, and Wu’s parents had donated strawberries and lemons, which they’d cut and sliced.
Hap was in his element helping people make pinecone birdfeeders with peanut butter and seeds on the two round tables in the kitchen. Turned out, he was a champion at tying the natural yarn to the pinecones and wrapping them in foil for safe transport home.
Nick had planned on running the sun print display with his bag of leaves, baking trays, and sunprint fabric (by far the most expensive item Renard had purchased), but it was hard getting a sun print without the sun.
Instead, he’d become what Hank and Wu had decided to call the cruise director, handing out pamphlets and flyers about recycling, telling people about the different crafts, even directing a few parents with young ones to the bathroom that Juliette had made sure was appropriate for strangers to enter.
Hap’d told Nick that the judging committee consisted of two men and a woman, and it was easy for him to recognize them, since they were the only adults who came without children. Without fawning too much, Nick made sure to bring out the presentation skills he’d learned in a Toastmasters class his freshman year and escorted them to Wu and Juliette’s setup. He caught Wu’s eye and received a slight nod in recognition.
Rosalee had arrived around one that afternoon, bearing sandwiches, chips, and more milk for the coffee. They rotated shifts on the tables as each one took some time and sat on the stairs, eating and taking a break.
As Nick handed a smiling kid his foil-wrapped birdfeeder and nodded as his mom thanked him, he heard Rosalee saying, “You’re welcome. I am glad you had fun,” and realized that he was having a good time, too.
The rain aside, Nick felt like the day had turned out to be an unmitigated success.
G R I M M G R I M M G R I M M G R I M M G R I M M
Monroe was exhausted. Thanks to Hurricane Justin’s determination to survive and move in unexpected directions, causing it to hit a cold front, they’d been surprised with torrential rain, which of course had everyone in a tailspin.
The freshmen and sophomores’ fruit stands were water resistant, not waterproof, and they certainly weren’t made to handle the rain that blew almost horizontally when the wind picked up. No one wanted to take - or even lead - tours around a farm in this weather, so the juniors were panicked. And the senior’s tree-planting schedule was absolutely pointless.
Monroe had just been coming home around one in the morning the previous night, his mind going over last minute details, when he’d felt something splatter on his cheek. Absently wiping at his face, he’d taken another couple of steps before another raindrop hit him. Another few steps, and he stopped, looking up at the dark sky. “No,” he whispered. He’d checked all of the weather reports frequently, and none of them predicted anything other than a fantastic day. He’d run into the house and immediately gone online, where - surprise! - everyone was stunned to realize that it was going to rain and rain hard in Virginia for Earth Day, the Earth Day where Monroe would be in charge and needed it to go well in order to graduate. Terrific.
After allowing himself two minutes of self-pity, he went downstairs to bond with the coffee machine and began to plan, making muffins as his mind worked through the problems.
At four, he woke up Hap. A few days before in a rare free moment, he’d stood over the stove, eating spaghetti straight from the skillet as Hap told him about their plans for the house. Because if the rain, he knew that Hap was going to need to adjust his plans a bit. He helped set up some tables and chairs, made sure Hap was panicking as little as possible, and left to try to salvage the rest of Earth Day for his groups.
He spent a couple of hours in the office at the farm, first calling Bud, who’d ended up spending all night in the hospital with his sick daughter and because of that wouldn’t be able to help at all. Then he hopped on the computer to update their information - and Hap’s - on all of the websites advertising Earth Day activities before heading to the square with the farm’s truck. After installing the freshmen in the foyer of the library, taking about a quarter of their food and arming them with posterboard, markers, tape, and plastic, he met with the sophomores and set them up inside Farmer Hoyt’s barn, right down the road from where they’d planned to set up. He took a quarter of their food as well and grabbed more sign supplies and handed them off before leaving to meet with the seniors. They all followed him back to the farm, where they began to call all of the contacts who’d agreed to have them plant on their property and get them to postpone until the following Saturday. He also put them to work storing all of the supplies they’d planned on using and then had half of them help the juniors focus on activities they could do inside the barn with anyone who might chance the rain. He grabbed as many large umbrellas that he could find for those adventurous enough to still want the tour - which turned out to be more than he expected. He took the other seniors and had them pull out part of the vegetable and fruit stand they used in the summers and load it up with the food he’d taken from the underclassmen. He snagged one senior with a concentration in some sort of computer science and put her on the computer to create and print some flyers about the change in tree planting date until Saturday. He answered her complaints about outdated equipment with a hearty, “thanks so much, Janine!” and left her to it.
By eleven, they had a steady stream of people in the barn, everyone having a good time, and the produce stand was almost empty. He called Hap to check in and headed out to check on the freshmen and sophomores. The freshmen hadn’t sold much, so he packed them up and sent them out to the farm to help out. While not extremely busy, the sophomores were doing well enough that he let them stay and continue selling their produce. Farmer Hoyt’s kids had joined them, and they had a small craft table set up that seemed to be creating a lot of laughter.
He stepped out of the truck at the farm and got a little dizzy, but it faded after a moment, and he reminded himself to grab some water when he got a chance.
He’d had to work a little magic over the phone with a few people who decided they didn’t want tree plantings on their properties on Saturday, but by the time he’d hung up with the last person, he was able to say that they still had one hundred percent participation.
He worked in a second phone call to Hap around five, and Rosalee picked up the phone, telling him that things were starting to wind down and that they were getting ready to close up shop. She mentioned that they were starving, so he offered to bring something home for everyone as long as they could wait for about another two hours. Wu snagged the phone, saying that they’d have to resort to sucking the juice out of the few lemons left but that they’d try to survive.
Monroe partnered each senior with an underclassman to shut down and clean up while he hopped into the truck and picked up everything from the Hoyt’s farm to bring back to the barn. He unloaded, calling the local pizza place to order some pies for pickup before helping with the final bit of cleanup, and after a resounding thank you to everyone, he let them go and shut down.
He picked up the pizzas and drove home slowly, the rainwater not being absorbed by the earth now filling up the streets. At a couple of the lights he found himself fighting to stay awake, so he turned the air conditioner on full blast for the rest of the ride home.
After pulling into the driveway, he grabbed the pizzas and ran for the door, which opened right as he stepped up to it.
“Thanks,” he said to Hank as Wu took the pizzas, allowing him to wipe the rain out of his eyes. He smelled Nick immediately, closing his eyes for a moment to feel it throughout the rest of his body, giving him a little more energy.
A cheer from the kitchen made Hank laugh. “Thanks for the food,” he said, eyeballing Monroe. “Man, you look exhausted.”
Monroe gave him a wan smile. “It’s been a busy couple of weeks.”
Clapping Monroe on the shoulder, Hank led him further into the room. “Now it’s over, so you can relax a little, eat some pizza.”
Monroe’s stomach gave a little twist at the idea of eating anything and realized that he hadn’t had anything besides coffee all day. He figured he probably should eat something, but just not pizza. He remembered the soup he’d bought the other day and waited for his stomach to chime in. When it remained silent, he figured that it was the perfect call. And then he would go to bed and sleep for the next three days.
He followed Hank into the kitchen.
“Thanks for the pizza!” Hap said, mouth filled with food.
Monroe winced, too tired to say anything.
“You want a piece?” Rosalee asked, tilting the box toward him.
His stomach gave another protest to make sure he remembered that it wanted the soup and definitely not the pizza. “No thanks,” he said, opening up the refrigerator. He paused, trying to remember where he’d left the soup, shifting a few things around to make sure he wasn’t missing it.
“What’re you looking for?” Hap asked.
“My soup,” Monroe said.
“Oh.”
Monroe knew that tone, and he slowly stood up as he closed the door. He must’ve stood too quickly, because he had to put out a hand to the refrigerator to keep his balance.
“You okay?” Nick asked, and Monroe tried not to be warmed by the concern in Nick’s voice.
“Yeah, just tired.” He looked at Hap, who looked as guilty as he had sounded. “So, you ate the soup?”
“Yeah, a few hours ago. I’m sorry, man. I was just totally hungry.”
“It’s fine,” Monroe said, wanting to cry a little bit, which told him that he really needed to get some rest. “I’m gonna head up, get some sleep.” Absently, he heard the phone ring but turned around and headed for the stairs.
“Monroe!” One foot on the stairs, Monroe looked longingly up at in the direction of his bedroom. Rosalee appeared beside him, cordless phone in her hand. “It’s for you.” She smiled sympathetically as she gave him the phone and walked back into the kitchen.
“Hello,” Monroe said, turning to sit on the stairs.
“How did the Earth Day celebration go?” Professor Mendelsohn asked.
If he’d had the energy, he would’ve rolled his eyes. Instead of remaining on campus in case they’d needed him, Mendelsohn was currently vacationing in Hawaii with his third wife, one of his students who’d graduated the year before. It wasn’t as though the date for Earth Day changed every year, or that they’d suddenly decided to celebrate it, so Mendelsohn had intentionally booked his time away during the most important festival on campus. “It went pretty well, all things considered.”
“What things?” Mendelsohn said, alarmed.
“Things like the weather.”
“The forecast was for a perfect day. What happened?”
“It rained,” Monroe said simply. He was too tired to play Mendelsohn’s games. All he needed was a few hours, and he could return to tamping down his sarcastic comments and reminding himself that he was out of here in just a couple of months.
“How bad was it?” Mendelsohn asked. “The Dean’s going to be expecting a report from me.”
“We made do. I’m going to sleep now.” He hung up as he heard Mendelsohn yell, “Wait!”
“That your boss?” Nick asked, leaning against the wall.
Monroe blinked at him, wondering how he’d completely missed Nick’s walking up to him. “Advisor. He’s in Hawaii.”
“Wait. Isn’t this the biggest event of the year for GN?”
“Yep,” Monroe said, trying to find the energy to stand up. Instead, he tilted so his head leaned against the wall.
“Why’s he in Hawaii instead of here?”
“You’ll have to ask him that,” Monroe said, holding back a yawn.
He wasn’t sure how much time passed before he felt a warm, hand on his head, and Nick’s whispered, “You need to go to sleep.”
“ ‘m sleepin’ right here,” Monroe muttered.
“Upstairs, in your bed,” Nick said.
“Too far.” He kept his eyes closed, enjoying the feeling of Nick running his fingers through Monroe’s hair. If he refused to open his eyes, he could pretend that he and Nick were still together, that they’d get up and fall into bed together. He knew that it wasn’t going to ever happen again, but it was so much nicer to pretend.
“When was the last time you ate something?”
“Too much work to think.”
“It was so long ago that you have to think that hard?”
Monroe sighed and tried to think. “I had something yesterday.”
Nick heaved a sigh of his own and sat down beside Monroe, adjusting his hand but still playing with Monroe’s hair. “Did you have dinner yesterday?”
“Um.” It was hard to think with Nick warming his side.
“What about lunch?”
He had something for lunch yesterday… didn’t he? He couldn’t remember.
“Okay. Breakfast?”
“Cereal!” Monroe perked up a bit at actually remembering something. “I had cereal.”
“Dude, I knocked over your bowl before you even started it,” Hap said as he grabbed something from the living room and returned to the kitchen.
“I’m going to get you a piece of pizza,” Nick declared, standing up.
Monroe’s stomach couldn’t stand the thought of dealing with pizza, and Monroe couldn’t stand the thought of Nick being so far away. He grabbed Nick’s arm and held him still. “No pizza.”
“You need to eat something,” Nick protested, and Monroe felt reality returning.
Nick was not his to have, not anymore. He let go. “I’ll eat something when I wake up.” He heaved himself to his feet and rode through the brief wave of dizziness before walking slowly down the hall and falling across his bed.
On to Chapter 12
Chapter 11
Everyone figured they would be greeted on Earth Day with bright sunshine, birds chirping in the trees, and if they were really lucky, a breeze just strong enough to rustle the leaves. But when Nick looked out the window of his apartment that morning, he was unable to see much due to the sheets of rain falling to the ground.
“You think anyone’s going to come out?” Hank asked, rubbing a hand over his hair as he stumbled into the kitchen and stopped in front of the empty coffeepot. “What the hell? Who was supposed to set the alarm for the coffee maker?”
Nick shrugged. “You’ll have to check the calendar. I’m pretty sure it wasn’t me.”
Wu stuck his head out of his room. He was about two months behind in cutting his hair, and his bed head was spectacular. “Since no one’s coming, can I go back to bed?”
“We’re doing this for Hap,” Hank reminded him. “And you were in charge of setting the coffee maker last night.”
“Oops.” Wu’s head disappeared back into his room.
Hank snorted.
Nick smiled to himself as he heard Hank pull out the coffee from the freezer.
“Is it just raining, or is there thunder?”
“Just rain. Lots and lots of rain.”
“This sucks,” Wu said, walking out of his room to stand beside Nick. “Pretty much everything is set for outside today.”
“We can move most of our stuff inside,” Nick said, mentally running through their plans, “and if fewer people come, we won’t have to worry too much about the place being overcrowded.” He glanced over at Wu and did a double take when he realized that the other man was covered in nothing but a towel. “What’re you doing?”
“I’m going to take a shower.”
“Then stop standing there naked and get on with it,” Hank said, walking up with a cup in his hands.
“I’m going, “ Wu muttered, reaching for the cup.
Hank held the cup above his head. “You don’t make the coffee; you don’t get to drink the coffee.”
Frowning, Wu headed into the bathroom, muttering to himself.
Hank took Wu’s place beside Nick and exhaled deeply. “Man, it doesn’t look good out there.”
“I wouldn’t leave the apartment if I didn’t have to,” Nick admitted.
“It’s definitely a stay at home and have a movie marathon kind of day.” Hank looked at Nick. “How did we not know about this?”
Nick shrugged. “The weather report said clear skies when I last checked.”
“When was that?”
“Yesterday morning.”
“Wonder what happened between then and now?”
“Your guess is as good as mine.”
They stood there, silently staring at the rain while for another couple of minutes until Hank sighed. “Leave in fifteen?”
“Sounds good,” Nick said, pushing away the thought that he would love to be cuddled in bed with Monroe right about then.
They made it to Hap’s in record time due to the empty streets and dashed into the house, taking off their wet jackets.
“This place looks pretty good,” Nick said, looking around. He sniffed the air. “Smells pretty good too.”
The floor in front of the door was covered in a thick carpet that seemed to be absorbing the water dripping from their coats quite well. The sofa had been shoved against the wall, and the chair and coffee table were gone, leaving space for two five-foot plastic rectangular folding tables and seven metal folding chairs per table.
“You’ve already been hard at work and it’s not even nine yet,” Nick said approvingly.
“Monroe helped me before he left this morning,” Hap said, not very enthused.
“Buddy, I know it’s raining, but I’m sure some people will come,” Nick said, trying to bolster Hap’s mood.
“Yeah, it’s just that Monroe had me up at, like four, and I couldn’t get back to sleep afterwards!” He complained.
Nick shared an amused glance with Hank as Wu commiserated, complaining about the lack of coffee in his morning.
“I can help you with that,” Hap said brightly, leading them into the kitchen. “Monroe made some, and it’s the good stuff!” He took out three mugs and poured them each a cup. “You know where the milk and sugar are.”
Nick and Hank both took theirs black, so they looked around the kitchen while Wu doctored his.
Two round tables surrounded by more folding tables fit comfortably on one side of the kitchen while another long table with buckets underneath ran along the back wall.
“What’s that smell?” Wu asked. “It’s like muffins or something, but we aren’t doing any kind of cooking thing are we?”
“I almost forgot!” Hap opened the oven. “Monroe made muffins for us. There’re some blueberry, bran, and chocolate chip. Help yourself.”
“Hello!” Juliette called from the living room, and Hap ran to meet her.
“Is Renard coming?” Hank asked, grabbing a blueberry.
“No, he’s got something he needs to do to fulfill part of his GN requirement. He said he’d try to stop by later,” Nick said, grabbing a chocolate chip muffin with one hand before pulling out the print-outs that he’d placed in one of the drawers with the other.
“So he’s a student at both JT and GN? Who does that?” Wu asked, mouth filled with blueberry muffin.
“Someone brilliant and rich,” Hank said, taking the papers that Nick had handed him and looking through them.
Nick handed Wu a few papers as well. “So we did our run-throughs, and you know how to handle your tables, but this gives you some reminders and has some information that the parents might want to know.”
“You’ve really stepped up with this,” Hank said, admiration in his voice.
A little embarrassed, Nick said, “It really seemed to matter to Hap, and if you want to talk about stepping up…”
“He hasn’t been to a party in over a week,” Wu said. “But to be honest, pretty much all of the GN-olas have disappeared. I didn’t realize how many I’ve been hanging out with lately until I was the only one left in the room.”
“Hey, guys,” Juliette said. “Hap mentioned coffee and muffins?”
After handing Juliette her packet for her table, Nick left her to grab some food while he joined Hap in the living room.
“So I have our sign, but I wasn’t sure where to put it, since it was supposed to go outside,” Hap said, totally energized.
Nick could tell he was nervous and put a comforting hand on Hap’s shoulder. “Relax. You’ve done a fantastic job.” As he felt Hap’s shoulder relax, Nick looked around the living room. “Why don’t we hang it against this back wall?” He called in Hank, who came up with some options and immediately had Hap on the stairs helping to attach one side.
Nick nodded, watching the rain pouring outside, no sign of letting up. It wasn’t what they’d planned, but it was going to work out, provided anyone showed up.
People showed up. At first it was just one or two families with one or two kids, but then word must’ve gotten around, because suddenly they had more people than Nick thought was probably legal in a house that small. The noise level was at an all-time high, although it was mostly excited, high-pitched ones, so Nick figured it was a win.
Wu and Juliette were in charge of the Nature Terrariums at the table in the living room. Wu helped them start with the pebbles, soil, and earthworms and then Juliette took over with the sticks and plants Monroe had given them.
Hank reigned over the bottling your own beverage section using the long table in the kitchen with the buckets. With glass bottles they’d collected from recycle bins all over town that they’d then boiled clean, they’d lain out a spread of water, two separate teas (mint and green), and apple juice. Monroe had brought them fresh mint leaves, and Wu’s parents had donated strawberries and lemons, which they’d cut and sliced.
Hap was in his element helping people make pinecone birdfeeders with peanut butter and seeds on the two round tables in the kitchen. Turned out, he was a champion at tying the natural yarn to the pinecones and wrapping them in foil for safe transport home.
Nick had planned on running the sun print display with his bag of leaves, baking trays, and sunprint fabric (by far the most expensive item Renard had purchased), but it was hard getting a sun print without the sun.
Instead, he’d become what Hank and Wu had decided to call the cruise director, handing out pamphlets and flyers about recycling, telling people about the different crafts, even directing a few parents with young ones to the bathroom that Juliette had made sure was appropriate for strangers to enter.
Hap’d told Nick that the judging committee consisted of two men and a woman, and it was easy for him to recognize them, since they were the only adults who came without children. Without fawning too much, Nick made sure to bring out the presentation skills he’d learned in a Toastmasters class his freshman year and escorted them to Wu and Juliette’s setup. He caught Wu’s eye and received a slight nod in recognition.
Rosalee had arrived around one that afternoon, bearing sandwiches, chips, and more milk for the coffee. They rotated shifts on the tables as each one took some time and sat on the stairs, eating and taking a break.
As Nick handed a smiling kid his foil-wrapped birdfeeder and nodded as his mom thanked him, he heard Rosalee saying, “You’re welcome. I am glad you had fun,” and realized that he was having a good time, too.
The rain aside, Nick felt like the day had turned out to be an unmitigated success.
G R I M M G R I M M G R I M M G R I M M G R I M M
Monroe was exhausted. Thanks to Hurricane Justin’s determination to survive and move in unexpected directions, causing it to hit a cold front, they’d been surprised with torrential rain, which of course had everyone in a tailspin.
The freshmen and sophomores’ fruit stands were water resistant, not waterproof, and they certainly weren’t made to handle the rain that blew almost horizontally when the wind picked up. No one wanted to take - or even lead - tours around a farm in this weather, so the juniors were panicked. And the senior’s tree-planting schedule was absolutely pointless.
Monroe had just been coming home around one in the morning the previous night, his mind going over last minute details, when he’d felt something splatter on his cheek. Absently wiping at his face, he’d taken another couple of steps before another raindrop hit him. Another few steps, and he stopped, looking up at the dark sky. “No,” he whispered. He’d checked all of the weather reports frequently, and none of them predicted anything other than a fantastic day. He’d run into the house and immediately gone online, where - surprise! - everyone was stunned to realize that it was going to rain and rain hard in Virginia for Earth Day, the Earth Day where Monroe would be in charge and needed it to go well in order to graduate. Terrific.
After allowing himself two minutes of self-pity, he went downstairs to bond with the coffee machine and began to plan, making muffins as his mind worked through the problems.
At four, he woke up Hap. A few days before in a rare free moment, he’d stood over the stove, eating spaghetti straight from the skillet as Hap told him about their plans for the house. Because if the rain, he knew that Hap was going to need to adjust his plans a bit. He helped set up some tables and chairs, made sure Hap was panicking as little as possible, and left to try to salvage the rest of Earth Day for his groups.
He spent a couple of hours in the office at the farm, first calling Bud, who’d ended up spending all night in the hospital with his sick daughter and because of that wouldn’t be able to help at all. Then he hopped on the computer to update their information - and Hap’s - on all of the websites advertising Earth Day activities before heading to the square with the farm’s truck. After installing the freshmen in the foyer of the library, taking about a quarter of their food and arming them with posterboard, markers, tape, and plastic, he met with the sophomores and set them up inside Farmer Hoyt’s barn, right down the road from where they’d planned to set up. He took a quarter of their food as well and grabbed more sign supplies and handed them off before leaving to meet with the seniors. They all followed him back to the farm, where they began to call all of the contacts who’d agreed to have them plant on their property and get them to postpone until the following Saturday. He also put them to work storing all of the supplies they’d planned on using and then had half of them help the juniors focus on activities they could do inside the barn with anyone who might chance the rain. He grabbed as many large umbrellas that he could find for those adventurous enough to still want the tour - which turned out to be more than he expected. He took the other seniors and had them pull out part of the vegetable and fruit stand they used in the summers and load it up with the food he’d taken from the underclassmen. He snagged one senior with a concentration in some sort of computer science and put her on the computer to create and print some flyers about the change in tree planting date until Saturday. He answered her complaints about outdated equipment with a hearty, “thanks so much, Janine!” and left her to it.
By eleven, they had a steady stream of people in the barn, everyone having a good time, and the produce stand was almost empty. He called Hap to check in and headed out to check on the freshmen and sophomores. The freshmen hadn’t sold much, so he packed them up and sent them out to the farm to help out. While not extremely busy, the sophomores were doing well enough that he let them stay and continue selling their produce. Farmer Hoyt’s kids had joined them, and they had a small craft table set up that seemed to be creating a lot of laughter.
He stepped out of the truck at the farm and got a little dizzy, but it faded after a moment, and he reminded himself to grab some water when he got a chance.
He’d had to work a little magic over the phone with a few people who decided they didn’t want tree plantings on their properties on Saturday, but by the time he’d hung up with the last person, he was able to say that they still had one hundred percent participation.
He worked in a second phone call to Hap around five, and Rosalee picked up the phone, telling him that things were starting to wind down and that they were getting ready to close up shop. She mentioned that they were starving, so he offered to bring something home for everyone as long as they could wait for about another two hours. Wu snagged the phone, saying that they’d have to resort to sucking the juice out of the few lemons left but that they’d try to survive.
Monroe partnered each senior with an underclassman to shut down and clean up while he hopped into the truck and picked up everything from the Hoyt’s farm to bring back to the barn. He unloaded, calling the local pizza place to order some pies for pickup before helping with the final bit of cleanup, and after a resounding thank you to everyone, he let them go and shut down.
He picked up the pizzas and drove home slowly, the rainwater not being absorbed by the earth now filling up the streets. At a couple of the lights he found himself fighting to stay awake, so he turned the air conditioner on full blast for the rest of the ride home.
After pulling into the driveway, he grabbed the pizzas and ran for the door, which opened right as he stepped up to it.
“Thanks,” he said to Hank as Wu took the pizzas, allowing him to wipe the rain out of his eyes. He smelled Nick immediately, closing his eyes for a moment to feel it throughout the rest of his body, giving him a little more energy.
A cheer from the kitchen made Hank laugh. “Thanks for the food,” he said, eyeballing Monroe. “Man, you look exhausted.”
Monroe gave him a wan smile. “It’s been a busy couple of weeks.”
Clapping Monroe on the shoulder, Hank led him further into the room. “Now it’s over, so you can relax a little, eat some pizza.”
Monroe’s stomach gave a little twist at the idea of eating anything and realized that he hadn’t had anything besides coffee all day. He figured he probably should eat something, but just not pizza. He remembered the soup he’d bought the other day and waited for his stomach to chime in. When it remained silent, he figured that it was the perfect call. And then he would go to bed and sleep for the next three days.
He followed Hank into the kitchen.
“Thanks for the pizza!” Hap said, mouth filled with food.
Monroe winced, too tired to say anything.
“You want a piece?” Rosalee asked, tilting the box toward him.
His stomach gave another protest to make sure he remembered that it wanted the soup and definitely not the pizza. “No thanks,” he said, opening up the refrigerator. He paused, trying to remember where he’d left the soup, shifting a few things around to make sure he wasn’t missing it.
“What’re you looking for?” Hap asked.
“My soup,” Monroe said.
“Oh.”
Monroe knew that tone, and he slowly stood up as he closed the door. He must’ve stood too quickly, because he had to put out a hand to the refrigerator to keep his balance.
“You okay?” Nick asked, and Monroe tried not to be warmed by the concern in Nick’s voice.
“Yeah, just tired.” He looked at Hap, who looked as guilty as he had sounded. “So, you ate the soup?”
“Yeah, a few hours ago. I’m sorry, man. I was just totally hungry.”
“It’s fine,” Monroe said, wanting to cry a little bit, which told him that he really needed to get some rest. “I’m gonna head up, get some sleep.” Absently, he heard the phone ring but turned around and headed for the stairs.
“Monroe!” One foot on the stairs, Monroe looked longingly up at in the direction of his bedroom. Rosalee appeared beside him, cordless phone in her hand. “It’s for you.” She smiled sympathetically as she gave him the phone and walked back into the kitchen.
“Hello,” Monroe said, turning to sit on the stairs.
“How did the Earth Day celebration go?” Professor Mendelsohn asked.
If he’d had the energy, he would’ve rolled his eyes. Instead of remaining on campus in case they’d needed him, Mendelsohn was currently vacationing in Hawaii with his third wife, one of his students who’d graduated the year before. It wasn’t as though the date for Earth Day changed every year, or that they’d suddenly decided to celebrate it, so Mendelsohn had intentionally booked his time away during the most important festival on campus. “It went pretty well, all things considered.”
“What things?” Mendelsohn said, alarmed.
“Things like the weather.”
“The forecast was for a perfect day. What happened?”
“It rained,” Monroe said simply. He was too tired to play Mendelsohn’s games. All he needed was a few hours, and he could return to tamping down his sarcastic comments and reminding himself that he was out of here in just a couple of months.
“How bad was it?” Mendelsohn asked. “The Dean’s going to be expecting a report from me.”
“We made do. I’m going to sleep now.” He hung up as he heard Mendelsohn yell, “Wait!”
“That your boss?” Nick asked, leaning against the wall.
Monroe blinked at him, wondering how he’d completely missed Nick’s walking up to him. “Advisor. He’s in Hawaii.”
“Wait. Isn’t this the biggest event of the year for GN?”
“Yep,” Monroe said, trying to find the energy to stand up. Instead, he tilted so his head leaned against the wall.
“Why’s he in Hawaii instead of here?”
“You’ll have to ask him that,” Monroe said, holding back a yawn.
He wasn’t sure how much time passed before he felt a warm, hand on his head, and Nick’s whispered, “You need to go to sleep.”
“ ‘m sleepin’ right here,” Monroe muttered.
“Upstairs, in your bed,” Nick said.
“Too far.” He kept his eyes closed, enjoying the feeling of Nick running his fingers through Monroe’s hair. If he refused to open his eyes, he could pretend that he and Nick were still together, that they’d get up and fall into bed together. He knew that it wasn’t going to ever happen again, but it was so much nicer to pretend.
“When was the last time you ate something?”
“Too much work to think.”
“It was so long ago that you have to think that hard?”
Monroe sighed and tried to think. “I had something yesterday.”
Nick heaved a sigh of his own and sat down beside Monroe, adjusting his hand but still playing with Monroe’s hair. “Did you have dinner yesterday?”
“Um.” It was hard to think with Nick warming his side.
“What about lunch?”
He had something for lunch yesterday… didn’t he? He couldn’t remember.
“Okay. Breakfast?”
“Cereal!” Monroe perked up a bit at actually remembering something. “I had cereal.”
“Dude, I knocked over your bowl before you even started it,” Hap said as he grabbed something from the living room and returned to the kitchen.
“I’m going to get you a piece of pizza,” Nick declared, standing up.
Monroe’s stomach couldn’t stand the thought of dealing with pizza, and Monroe couldn’t stand the thought of Nick being so far away. He grabbed Nick’s arm and held him still. “No pizza.”
“You need to eat something,” Nick protested, and Monroe felt reality returning.
Nick was not his to have, not anymore. He let go. “I’ll eat something when I wake up.” He heaved himself to his feet and rode through the brief wave of dizziness before walking slowly down the hall and falling across his bed.
On to Chapter 12