Page 3 of Grumpy Bear

We were in the dining hall comparing schedules and lists at our customary morning meeting. Jim was always up hours before anybody else, including the kitchen staff, so he was already several cups of coffee ahead of me.

He knew it was my biggest pet peeve in the world to be hit with his caffeinated brainstorms before I’d had a chance to catch up.

I turned, showing him my empty cup, and glared. This had better not be about Chef Levi threatening to quit. We usually made it to the Fourth of July before he started up with that drama.

Jim finally delivered what he clearly intended to be a bombshell. “I woke up this morning with vibes.”

Jim and his fucking psychic intuition. Great. This was that again.

I went back to pouring coffee.

“Major vibes, Sawyer.”

I closed my eyes, gathered my patience, and slowly lowered myself into the chair across from him.

Jim held up his hands like he was soothing a scared animal. “Now, I don’t want you to panic. I can’t put my finger on what it’s about just yet. It’s still pretty hazy. But it’s coming.” He spread his hands theatrically. “It’s emerging from the mist.”

I huffed. “Like that storm last night? You know, your vibes sure would be a lot more helpful if they could predict the weather once in a while. I had the radio on before I went to bed, and there wasn’t a single peep about that rain.”

“Sounded like the end of the world, didn’t it?” Jim shuddered. “My poor little dog was whimpering and hiding under the covers. Scared the shit out of both of us.”

“Yeah, well. After that little monsoon, I woke up with some vibes of my own. Anxiety, stress, and dread. I don’t even want to know how high the creek is.”

We went through this almost every season to some degree or another. There had been a few times when the creek had entirely overflowed its banks, filled the pool, and turned the whole floor of the valley into a shallow lake. One year, several RVs in the trailer park had been flooded and started floating away.

I was forever cursing Wayne for putting the pool at the bottom of the holler, right in the bend of the creek, and expecting the water to go around it. But that brilliant decision had been made before my time.

“Watch your thoughts now.” Jim shook his finger at me. “You don’t want to manifest the worst.” For the record, spiritual positivity coaching was my second biggest pet peeve in the world. “You want to radio Ryan and see if he’s checked?”

I sighed. “Let me finish this cup before I face all that.”

Right on cue, the walkie-talkie squawked. “Sawyer, Sawyer, Ryan.”

Jim and I shared a look.

“Go ahead, Ryan.”

“Boss, um…” Pause. Crackle. Pause. “Creek’s in the pool.”

Well, fuck my life.

And fuck Jim and the smug little I told you so look on his face.

We always kicked off the season with a pool party a few weeks before Memorial Day. Normally it was a bit of a soft opening—most guys waited for the holiday with the three-day weekend—but this year, for whatever reason, every cabin, every RV, every room was filled.

In a little over twenty-four hours, four hundred guests would start arriving.

How in the hell were we gonna have a pool party with no pool?

“Well, look on the bright side.” Jim ignored my murderous look. “It could have happened tomorrow. And it’s a blessing the storm wasn’t forecast, or we’d have cancellations left and right.”

Yeah, well, now we’d just have a bunch of pissed off guys whose vacations were fucked.

It was hard for me to tell the difference anymore between what was a blessing and what was a curse. This was some serious man versus nature bullshit.

Jim patted my hand. “We’ve got time.”

By we, he meant me.