One Last Summer

by Jo Noelle

  Chapter 14

  Cole Zamora

  The drive to the hospital in Shelton only takes half an hour, but I leave at nine, knowing Walter won’t get released until around eleven. I drop by a store to pick up a book of crossword puzzles and some Louis L’Amour books. That might help keep him in bed for the rest of the day. Walter slipped up last night, telling me he could go home as long as he took it easy. To him, that probably means catching up on paperwork instead of staining a deck. I’m determined to keep him down at least until tomorrow.

  I’m taken aback again when I see Walter. Everyone looks sick in a hospital bed, but now I can see how much he’s aged in the thirteen years I’ve known him, and he wasn’t young then. His cheeks are hollow, and his skin is thin enough to show blue lines beneath the surface. It’s funny how days roll from one to the next, and the little changes don’t register too much.

  Walter signs his discharge papers, then they give him care instructions. Finally, he’s scheduled for a follow-up visit and given a prescription.

  After we visit the pharmacy down the hall, they wheel him out to my truck, Walter protesting that he can walk by himself. Finally, we leave the hospital and head north.

  “Take a left here. Let’s get a burger for lunch before we go home.”

  I don’t think that’s what the doctor meant by making changes to reduce the high blood pressure. But when we park and go in, Walter orders a veggie burger wrapped in lettuce instead of on a bun. He’s big enough to make his own decisions, and I won’t nag him, but I’m glad he wants to hang around longer.

  “Guess this old body is reminding me to get rid of the cabins.” Walter chuckles. “No backing out now.”

  “But if you take it easy and get your blood pressure down, couldn’t you stay at Misty Harbor?” I pause and take a quick look his way to see him shaking his head. “I’ll bet Jenna would understand if you’re not ready to move yet.”

  “No. I’ll come back, but I’ll be a guest when I do.” His eyes twinkle toward me. “Don’t think you’re getting out of the contest that easily. I think Jenna would be pretty sore at you if you didn’t give it all you’ve got—or she’d make you sore. Not that I’d mind seeing that. She hates it when someone throws a win her way. Didn’t you learn that lesson the first summer she came here, when she beaned you with the wooden ball from the lawn bowling set?” Walter chuckles. “You had a goose egg right here for a week.” He points to his left temple. “She’s nothing like her mom, you know. Jenna has spirit, ambition. She’s a spicy salsa while her mom’s plain yogurt.”

  She’s salsa all right—with jalapeños. I smile at the thought of Jenna wielding an alarm clock at a burglar. She has guts. I like that.

  Walter slaps his palm on the table, effectively getting my attention back. “The judging is tomorrow, and I intend to get rid of this place to one or the other of you. I want to wake up and have a whole day to do what I want for a change in a place that’s always a sunny seventy degrees. It’s time to pass the torch, and I don’t have cold feet about it at all. In fact, today I’m even more sure.”

  We eat in silence, at least outwardly. When I thought Walter could die, there were so many things I wanted to tell him. Now, I don’t know how to bring them up. Instead, I pick up French fries one after another and wash them down with Coke.

  When we get back to the house, I take a deep breath and say, “Thanks for taking me in. You didn’t have to, and I’m glad you did.”

  “Some things are a gift from God.” Walter’s voice is solemn. “I expect you’re old enough to hear the story about how that came to be. You’ve been old enough for a long while, and maybe you think you know all of this because you lived it, but I’m going to tell it my way anyway.”

  He looks across the room to where pictures of he and his wife hang on the wall. “You know, my little Belle and I didn’t have kids. We had a full life, meeting new people every few days, but our family was just the two of us. Our work kept us busy, and we had each other. That seemed to be enough. We had a good life.” His eyes sparkle with unshed tears at her memory.

  “Oh, I loved that woman, and the surprise of it was, she felt the same about me. Belle moved to heaven without me a couple of years before your mom took a job at the cottages as a maid. Your mom asked if you could trail around with her as she worked, and it looked like you did more work than she did, so it was all right by me.” He nods with a satisfied look.

  “One weekend, she left with friends. I found you down at the beach, sitting on a picnic table, gazing out over the canal with red, swollen eyes, waiting for her to come back for you. I moved you into the guest room, and you took to following me on my chores. One thing must’ve led to another, and we didn’t see her until the next Monday.”

  I think back to that day—I thought it was only one, not realizing until now that she had left me for several days. Walter never said anything about that. In fact, I don’t remember him ever saying anything negative about my mom.

  “Her car came screaming into the parking lot, and she was yelling for you. She nearly like to woke up every cabin. I told her you took a job with me for summers and after school. She worked for me a few weeks longer, then drifted to another job, but she let you work here.

  “I don’t want to speak ill of the dead, but I figure you and I did some good for each other.” Walter grabs his napkin and wipes his eyes. “You’ve been a real good boy. Now you’re the kind of man I can be real proud of.”

  “Thanks.” My voice is rough with emotion, and I have to clear it to continue. “I want you to know, I’ve always thought of you as my dad. I love you, Walter. I’m sorry I’ve never said it before.”

  The next morning as I check in with Walter, Jenna’s standing by his bed, fluffing a pillow, and says, “There’s a walkie-talkie and a cell phone on the bedside table in case you need us. You’ve still got that old phone plugged into the wall on the dresser too. I put a sticky note with my number and Cole’s beside it.”

  Walter is dressed, like he’s going to go to work. Since he isn’t leaving the room, Jenna must have put a stop to that.

  “What else do you need?” I ask, not knowing what to do.

  “For you to leave.” Walter starts throwing the extra pillows I put on the bed yesterday onto the floor. “I know what a phone does. You two get out of here and clean the guest cottages that vacated this morning.”

  Yeah, he’s feeling a lot better. “Try to stay in bed.”

  He kicks his shoes off and reaches to pull at a sock. “Don’t think that’s possible.” I toss the bag of Louis L’Amour books and word searches onto his bedspread. He looks inside. “Yeah, think I’ll stay in for a while after all. Shut my door on your way out.”

 

  That night, Jenna and I sit in Walter’s living room watching a movie, neither of us wanting to leave, but Walter doesn’t want us hovering over him. Jenna hits pause and jumps up. “I need popcorn.” A few minutes later, she returns and says, “You know, we still haven’t had a date.”

  I think about it for a moment. Dates are what strangers use to get to know each other. We’ve used more ordinary ways. “I’m going to count the summer we met and had that mud fight as our first date.”

  Jenna laughs, shaking gently against my side. “As first dates go, it was original. I’ve never had anyone else cake mud in my hair since then. Maybe our second date was sneaking into that apple orchard and eating green apples all afternoon.”

  “That date made us both sick.” I turn toward her and throw her legs over mine so we can face each other. “We’ve had a lot of dates, like when we made dry-ice bombs and took out that picnic table.”

  “Seriously? I’m not counting that one. We’re lucky no one lost a hand that day. But we’ve been to lots of movies and gone out to eat. That’s mostly normal date behavior, even though we were often holding hands with someone else.”

  “I’m going to count shopping for the cottages the other day too.” I pull her closer, s
tealing some of her popcorn. “And I’m going to count sitting here with you tonight.”

  “I agree.” She smiles and says, “Stop stealing my popcorn.”

  We get quiet to watch the end of our movie, but my mind can’t focus on it anymore. I’m holding a secret that she has no clue is about to happen. Just thinking about asking Jenna to be my wife tomorrow expands my chest, and my heart burns. She’s an extraordinary woman, and I want to share my life and this beach with her for decades to come.

  Either tomorrow will be the best day of our lives that we tell our children and grandchildren about, or it will completely push her over the edge, and I’ll never see her again.

  “We’re going to have an early morning if we’re going to tour each other’s cottages before Walter comes to judge them.”

  Jenna nods. “Five thirty.” She puts the bowl on the coffee table. “Then Walter decides our fate.”

  No, he doesn’t. I think the words, but don’t say them.

  We both move, not to leave, but to be closer. I pull her legs across my lap and lean her down on the pillows at the end of the couch, her chestnut-colored waves flowing across the pillow. Her smile reveals the long dimple in her right cheek. I lean over on my elbow, and my finger traces it.

  “I’m glad you came back this summer. Our future won’t be decided by a contest or a coin toss or by Walter. Tomorrow has it’s own secrets. I don’t need to know what’s going to happen in the future, I only need to know that right now—being with you—is perfect.”

  Her arms pull me toward her until our lips meet. Fire explodes through me when her hand presses down my back and then moves up my chest.

  “It always was a little tricky, having the two of you under my roof.” Walter’s loud voice makes us jump. “But there’re old-fashioned values inside these walls. Just stand up and wave goodnight. Your lips don’t need no more action,” he barks from the stairs.

  “Goodnight,” I whisper against her lips.

  Jenna looks over my shoulder and hollers at Walter, “What are you doing out of bed?”

  “Oh, just eavesdropping. Glad to see the competition has repaired your friendship,” Walter says with a wink.

  “Yup, all fixed.” She rises from the couch and walks up the stairs past Walter to her room.

  “Oh, good. ’Cause I’m out of ideas for things for you two to do together. Glad I didn’t have to take an ax to the pavilion.”

  “Why’d you do a competition instead of picking one of us to buy the cottages?” I ask after Jenna’s door shuts.

  “I’m old, TV was broken the night I thought it up, I knew you’d be a hoot to watch, and you have not disappointed.” Walter’s smile widens. “Yup, things are finally getting interesting. Come here a minute,” he says, turning back to his room.

  I flick off the TV and follow him. When I get to his room, he’s sitting on the edge of his bed with an envelope in his hand. He reaches in and pulls out a diamond ring. “This is the ring I put on Bella’s finger when she finally agreed to marry me. Seems like we’d known each other our whole lives. Loved her since we were kids.”

  He pauses, giving me a knowing look, and I can’t help but think of Jenna. The little freckles across her nose that fascinated me when we first met. The girl she grew into that could do anything I could do, and beat me at it half the time. The woman whose smile broke wide as she descended the escalator at the airport. And tonight. The woman with love in her eyes as she gazed at me.

  Walter continues, “I think Bella would be happy to know I’ve passed it along to someone else who will have a forever love, like ours. You’ll use this one day.” He places the cool ring in my palm.

  I swallow back a lump in my throat. I nod, but am unable to speak or look at him. My eyes brim with unshed tears.

  In all significant ways, Walter is my dad. Giving me this ring, Bella’s ring, is the same as passing me a family heirloom. It shows me that I’m family, more than the custody papers the court filled out. Those ended Walter’s responsibility to me when I turned eighteen. But the family tie has kept me in his life, and will continue. I matter to him.

  “Thanks, Walter.” I swallow back more tears, but my voice is thick. “This means a lot.”

  “And the good ones are worth all the work it takes to win them over.”

  I nod and clear my throat. “Jenna is.” I’m finally able to look up at him now.

  “Now, get out of here. I’m tired.” His eyes are full of tears as well. “I’ve got a big day tomorrow. And so do you.”