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“Come on. Let’s get a quick run on the beach before our shift. I’ll shout you a coffee.” Mikayla frowned, waiting for Rafe to answer. He’d rolled up the blow-up mattress and was shoving it back in the cupboard, his back to her. “Rafe?”
“Huh?” He turned, an uncharacteristically guarded expression on his face.
“You wanna take the dogs for a run on the beach before we drop them at your place? I’ve got a soccer ball in the trunk of my car. We can give them a really good run.” He scrubbed his hand through his black hair, looking like he was trying to find a way to say no. Mikayla’s frown deepened. “No?”
But then he said, his tone flat, “Ah, yeah, sure. Let’s do that.”
Perplexed, she turned away to put her shoes on. They walked from Ambulance HQ across to Coco’s Cafe, on Main Street. The air was cold and still, as if all its power had been used up the night before. Rafe was quiet, answering her in monosyllables. Although he wasn’t a highly extroverted person, neither was he the shy type. He also wasn’t moody or broody, as a rule, but he definitely seemed to be both at that moment. Maybe she could take his mind off whatever was bothering him.
Once they got to the beach, Mikayla put her coffee cup on the rock wall that separated the beach from the cycle path. She stepped onto the wet sand, unclipped the dogs from their leashes and booted the soccer ball along the sand as hard as she could. She grinned as both pups took off, streaking along the sand and ending in a tangle of fur as they scrambled around. Buttercup won the skirmish, picking the ball up by the string and jogging back to Mikayla, with Wesley close on her heels. She dropped it at Mikayla’s feet, who then toed it over to Rafe. He stepped forward and booted the ball again, then strode off after the dogs without a word. Mikayla grabbed her coffee and followed. She held the plastic lid down as she jogged by Rafe, bumping him with her hip so some of his coffee spilled over. He rolled his eyes at her, so she flashed a cheeky smile before heading off after the dogs.
“I wanna try something. Watch this. Buttercup, sit.” Mikayla rolled the soccer ball under her foot, moving it around, watching Buttercup as she avidly followed the movement. Then she flipped the ball to the top of her foot and flicked it in the air, laughing delightedly when Buttercup bounced up and bumped the ball hard with her nose back towards Mikayla. “Oh, clever girl! Let’s do it again to make sure it wasn’t a fluke.” Buttercup performed the trick three more times, which finally garnered a smile from Rafe. “How do you think she learned that? I’m pretty sure she didn’t know it before we found her, or we would have seen it by now.”
He shrugged, drinking the last of his coffee, moving over to the bin near the footpath, and throwing the cup away. “Like I said, they’re smart dogs.” He clicked his fingers, patting his hip for Wesley to heel, then gestured to Mikayla to give him the ball. She felt the first stirrings of temper at his ongoing attitude, so she flicked the ball up with her foot, kicking it at him a little harder than was necessary. She felt a burst of satisfaction when she heard him exhale sharply as it hit him square in the chest. He dropped the ball at his feet, moving back and saying to Wesley, “Give me the ball.” Wesley hustled forward, pushing at the ball with his nose so that it rolled towards Rafe.
Mikayla clapped in appreciation, momentarily forgetting her temper. “How did you know he could do that?”
“I didn’t, really. I’ve just noticed that they pay a lot of attention when we play with them so I thought maybe he could do more than just fetch the ball back when we kick it.”
“Hmm, I wonder what else they can do.”
Rafe gave a disinterested shrug before booting the ball hard, watching as the dogs shot off after it. Mikayla stomped over to the bin and dropped her half-finished coffee in. Walking back to Rafe, she punched him on the arm and said, “Race ya!” She took off quickly, fairly confident he couldn’t catch her if she got a good enough head start. She was pretty fast, but she couldn’t outrun his long strides. Mikayla slowed once she got to where the dogs were wrestling over the ball and turned to see Rafe jogging up behind her.
“Cheer up, McKenzie, or I’m gonna have to surgically remove whatever bug’s crawled up your ass.”
A glimmer of amusement at her turn of phrase showed in his dark eyes. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
Mikayla rolled her eyes. “Whatever. Here.” She grabbed the ball from the dogs and toed it to him. He showed off some pretty impressive footwork, keeping the ball away from the dogs. Mikayla checked her watch. “Should probably get going. I want to have a shower before work.”
“Okay.” Rafe pushed the ball forward, letting the dogs nose it along rather than picking it up. Mikayla saw her opportunity and ran up behind him. She placed her hands on his shoulders and boosted up to wrap her legs around his waist. He stiffened for just the briefest moment before hooking his arms under her legs and piggybacking her along the beach, but it was enough to have her frowning with concern. Had she upset him? Wasshethe bug up his ass? Jesus that sounded weird. She would have laughed if she wasn’t so concerned. They were always perfectly straight with each other so she was pretty confident if she’d upset him in any way, he would have let her know. Plus, she couldn’t think of anything she had done or said that might have rubbed him the wrong way. She shifted to get down and he let her. They walked back to HQ in silence. Mikayla was desperate to ask him, genuinely, what was wrong but for the first time in their entire friendship, she hesitated, scared of what the answer might be. Maybe she could just see how he was during their shift and if he was still in this weird mood, she’d have to bring it up. She just couldn’t work with him if it was going to be like this.
* * *
“And then he was fine. It was so strange.” Mikayla reached for a corn chip, munching on it pensively. She looked around the room. With just under two weeks until Juniper and William’s wedding, she was excited to see all the planning really starting to come together. Juniper had wanted a short engagement, and with the ceremony taking place less than three months after William’s proposal, she was getting her way. William had to work double time to get the Long House at the Blessed Inlet lighthouse compound ready in time, leaving all the finer details to Juniper. So here they were, comfortably ensconced at a corner table in the long room with Juniper, making the table centerpieces while Mikayla looked on, pretending to be helpful.
“Hmm, that is strange. It doesn’t sound like him at all.” Juniper finished tying a sapphire-colored ribbon to the base of a glass bowl that contained polished silver stones and a fat pillar candle.
“Exactly!” Mikayla passed over the scissors, watching as Juniper cut the extra lengths of ribbon off. “I dunno, maybe he just needs a good shag. He hasn’t dated in a while. Maybe I could set him up with someone.” As soon as the words were spoken, Mikayla felt a flash of objection. “Nah, I’ve set him up before and it didn’t work out.”
“No?”
“Yeah, it was a girl I went to uni with. Don’t know what I was thinking. She totally wasn’t his type, she was too…I don’t know, girly.”
“Oh? What’s his type?”
Mikayla gave it some thought. “He dated this really great girl about five years ago. Met her at a football round robin we played in. She was sporty, fun, didn’t take herself too seriously.”
“What went wrong?” Juniper asked curiously.
“You know, I’m not sure. She moved to Sydney for work. I know she asked him to go with her. They had dated for about a year, so it wasn’t out of the question. But he said thanks but no thanks. He never really told me why.” She shrugged.
“Maybe the move was too much.”
Mikayla, remembering Juniper’s reaction to the possibility of moving to Sydney, reached over to rub her arm affectionately. “He quite likes the city though, and he would have found work easily enough. It’s not like he had much keeping him here at the time, since his grandmother had passed away.”
“He had you.” Juniper shot her a look as she reached for another bowl.
Mikayla snorted. “What, you think he turned down a relationship with a lovely girl to hang out here with little old me?”
