“What? Oh, yeah. Of course. Sorry. I was just, uh, zoning out, basically.” This is my default. Just act like a space cadet. That seems to be an acceptable pigeonhole for me for someone like Mike. Nothing threatening. Just a girl.

“Oh, yeah. Okay.” He nods and I take the opportunity to walk backward toward the house, tripping on a tree stump.

“Whoops. Yeah, I didn’t see that. Obviously. Because it was behind me.”

Baseball Hat Mike just stands there.

“Hey, can I ask you a question?” There’s nothing mean in his voice. It’s almost like he feels sorry for me.

“Uh, sure.”

“Why are you here all alone?”

It’s a direct question. I will say that. But it’s not something I can really answer in full. Without possibly having a midday breakdown. In front of the guys. Who probably wouldn’t even notice.

“Oh, I’m just. Well, I start college next fall. Summer job.”

“Ah.” He sort of squints. “You didn’t want to go to Europe or stay with your friends or something?”

Now, this seems prying. Like, how does he even know I have any friends?

“Um . . . well, this kind of helps me . . . be able to . . . actually go to college.”

And that is true. Without this job, no room and board. Without room and board, no college. Pretty simple.

“Ah. And where are you going?”

“Um. Bryn Mawr.”

He whistles. Just a whistle. No comment.

“Wait. Why did you just whistle?”

He smiles and shakes his head. “Sorry. It’s just an expensive school. I guess I wasn’t thinking. I didn’t mean to be rude.”

I just noticed something about him, something I didn’t notice before. He’s not a bad-looking guy. I mean, some girls, not me of course, would even find him attractive. In a freckle-faced kind of way. Again, and I feel this is important, not my type. But . . . I can see how he might be someone’s type.

“How is the . . . work . . . coming along?” Do you call it “the work” in a situation like this?

“Oh, it’s fine. It’s gonna be nice, actually. They’ll like it, I think. He will. I don’t know about her. I only met her once.”

I’m assuming he’s talking about the professor. Funny, no one ever seems to have anything nice, or anything really at all, to say about the wife. I wonder why that is? Is it unconscious misogyny or is she really, like, not a nice person? Aloof? Full of herself? Snooty?

“What are you guys doing now?” I am trying to seem like I care. A normal person would definitely care.

“Oh, we’re digging a hole. For the foundation.” He contemplates for a second. “Hey, did you see a dog out here or anything?”

“Excuse me?” That came from left field.

“I dunno. There were all these claw marks around some of our equipment.”

The blood stops in my veins.

“Kind of big ones.”