Two Summers

by Aimee Friedman

  We went to the movies on Monday and when the spaceship was landing on Earth 2.0, he leaned over the popcorn bag and totally KISSED ME!!!! she’d written in one breathless stream. This is IT—SUMMER OF FALLING IN LOVE, baby!!!

  I’d stared at the screen, feeling hollow. I knew I was supposed to write back with exclamation marks of my own, and expressions of excitement and joy. I couldn’t. I’d been the one to leave Hudsonville and yet here was Ruby, leaving me behind again. Falling in love. This was supposed to be my “best summer ever”—the summer I turned sixteen. Once, I’d heard the phrase Sweet sixteen and never been kissed and it had stuck in my head like a drumbeat. Not only had I never been kissed, I’d never had a boy like me. I couldn’t even talk to Hugh Tyson.

  As I’d reread Ruby’s email, it struck me that time didn’t care whether or not you were a late bloomer—it continued along at its regular pace, aging you, while you went on unkissed. And others, like your best friend, hurried ahead, right on schedule with their rites of passage.

  I turn away from Dad’s house, my chest heavy. The fact that Ruby’s summer love is Austin Wheeler makes the whole situation even worse. Austin is bland and blond—another cog in the popularity machine. He’s buddies with Skye Oliveira, and I can’t help but fear that Ruby is headed in that same direction. Although Ruby hasn’t mentioned Skye in any of her emails, I’ve seen upsetting evidence on Instagram.

  Like the photograph Skye posted from her Fourth of July party, of herself and some of her clones posing in her fancy backyard. And there, in the background, wearing a striped dress and chatting with Austin, was a beaming Ruby. It had felt like a stomach punch, seeing that picture.

  A few days later, Austin posted a photo of himself, Skye, and Ruby all squished into a booth in Better Latte Than Never—Ruby in her barista’s apron and Skye and Austin drinking iced coffees, everyone grinning like BFFs. Stomach punch number two.

  Meanwhile, Ruby and I have been trading benign emails. I’ll tell her about life in Les Deux Chemins, and she’ll tell me about visiting her dad in Connecticut. In typical Ruby fashion, she’ll urge me to not only call up Cute Waiter Jacques (Do it!) but to take photos of him to send to her (Pics or it didn’t happen!). We still sign every email with Love you times two. But something feels different.

  I trudge down Rue du Pain, my hands in the back pockets of my shorts. I hate feeling distanced from Ruby. From home. I’m certain that if I were in Hudsonville, everything would be normal. Ruby and I would be honest with each other, like we’ve always been. I’d know all the secrets, have all the answers.

  Here, I’ve had to rely on Instagram for answers. It’s not just Ruby, Skye, and Austin I stalk on there. Alice has been posting pictures of her trip to California to visit Inez; they’ve looked relaxed and happy on the beach, as two best friends should. Hugh Tyson—who is not very active on Instagram, but when he does post, it still makes my heart jump a little—posted a photograph of a Nikon DSLR camera, similar to the one Aunt Lydia gave me. His caption read: Summer photography course for the win! I wonder if he’s taking that course in New York City.

  I’ve been using my Nikon every day, taking photographs of the lemon trees in Dad’s garden, of the breads and pastries fresh out of the oven at the bakery, of the cupid fountain on the corner. Now, as I turn onto Boulevard du Temps, passing by the fountain, I’m a little sad that I didn’t bring my camera along.

  I could have taken a picture of the white stone cathedral, framed against the vivid blue sky. Or the two elderly women sitting on the cathedral steps, sharing a baguette while pigeons peck around their feet. The red sign of the tabac. Café Cézanne, its outdoor tables crowded with people eating lunch in the sun. The clothing boutique, with its display of sherbet-colored ballet flats in the window …

  I hesitate in front of the boutique, and something compels me to step inside. I haven’t been shopping since I went to the mall with Ruby in May, to get new flip-flops for my trip. This boutique has polka-dot wallpaper, vintage bags on shelves, perfume bottles on trays, and stylish little dresses hanging on hooks. It would seem out of place at the mall back home, but it feels right for Les Deux Chemins. It also feels right for me to select a filmy, short-sleeved blouse printed with small red flowers—they look kind of like poppies. I take the blouse into a fitting room, where I shed Ruby’s purple tank top.

  “Très jolie,” the saleswoman tells me when I emerge to study myself in the full-length mirror.

  I understand that she’s saying the top is “very pretty,” and I know it’s her job to say those things. But as I look in the mirror, and pile my untamable hair on top of my head, I have to admit the blouse … is nice. The color brings out the pink in my cheeks, and I like the loose, flowy shape paired with my denim shorts. It’s not something Ruby would wear—she prefers more fitted tops—but maybe that’s okay. Maybe that’s good.

  I feel a kind of recklessness, similar to what I felt back in the barn when I stood up to Eloise. In a stammering mix of French and English, I tell the saleswoman I will buy the blouse—I have enough euros in my pocket—and ask her to cut off the tags. A few minutes later, I am outside, wearing the very pretty new blouse and holding Ruby’s tank top balled up in my hand.

  The warm afternoon breeze makes the back of the blouse billow. I smile, feeling weightless, floating along the cobblestones. The boulevard is bustling, and as I’m passing Café des Jumelles, I bump against a passerby’s shoulder.

  “Excusez-moi,” I say, proud that I went automatically to French.

  The passerby is a teenage boy, a couple heads shorter than me, with a mop of curly brown hair and brown eyes. I’m confused when he stops and smiles slowly.

  “Bonjour, mademoiselle,” he says to me, an invitation in his voice. “Ça va?”

  Wait. My face flames. Can it be that this guy—is he, like, hitting on me?

  I think again of the mall back home, how random guys would sometimes say hi to Ruby, grinning at her, as she and I walked between stores. If the guy was cute, Ruby would say hi back, and occasionally they’d exchange numbers. I always stayed silent, the unseen sidekick. No one ever grinned at me or spoke to me, and I was accustomed to that.

  I am not accustomed to this.

  The brown-eyed boy seems to be waiting for a response. But I’m far too flustered to say “Ça va”—or anything—back to him. So I spin away and continue down the boulevard, my pulse quickening. I do sneak a glance over my shoulder and the boy is still watching me, still smiling. Then he shrugs gamely and walks on.

  My heart thuds beneath my new blouse. I don’t get it. Was it the blouse itself that cast some sort of spell, causing a boy to notice me? Maybe it’s something about France, or French boys. After all, there was that interaction I had with Jacques at the café, even if it seems unreal now, and never to be repeated.

  Distracted, I find myself turning into the sunlit plaza that hosts the daily farmers’ market. Stalls overflow with cheeses and vegetables, fruits and flowers. Whole fish lie glistening on beds of ice, and bottles of lavender oil and packets of herbs are arrayed on tables. I pause to touch bundles of thyme tied with twigs, wondering if these would be good souvenirs to bring home in August. Not that Mom would necessarily want a reminder of France, and Dad. Not that Ruby would have much use for thyme. I glance down at her tank top in my hand.

  I wander through the crowds. Men and women stand haggling with the different sellers, and there’s a pleasant buzz of business all around. I stop at a vegetable stall, admiring a mound of ripe red tomatoes. Maybe I’ll buy one for lunch, along with a wedge of Brie from the cheese stall. I’m reaching into my pocket to see if I have any euros left when I hear a familiar voice behind me.

  A boy’s voice.

  My heartbeat accelerates again and I turn around.

  There, standing by the barrels of olives, talking with the man selling them, is Cute Waiter Jacques. I feel my breath catch as I take in his profile: his high cheekbones and strong nose, his shock of black hair. He’s here
. It’s like I conjured him with my thoughts.

  I hesitate beside the tomatoes, my heart and mind racing in tandem. I could surrender to my standard shyness and scurry away. Or …

  I think of the boy saying Ça va? to me on the street. I remember Ruby’s email about falling in love. I picture Hugh Tyson, off on his photography course, living his life. My new shirt is soft against my skin, and I can smell the herbs and the flowers in the air. Everything conspires in me, and that feeling of recklessness from earlier returns. And before I can continue my inner dance of indecision, I walk right up to Jacques.

  “Ça va?” I venture, which seems appropriate.

  Jacques glances away from the olives and his dark-blue eyes widen at the sight of me. Butterflies form a colony in my stomach. What am I doing? I ask myself, but it’s too late, I’m already doing it, it’s already happening right now.

  “Summer!” Jacques exclaims, his wolfish smile spreading across his face.

  He remembers me? He remembers me!

  He leans forward, so close to me that I can smell the cologne on his neck, and he kisses me quickly on each cheek. I feel myself blush a deeper red than the flowers on my shirt, than the tomatoes behind me. Suddenly, this cheek-kiss custom doesn’t seem so bad. I stand still in the middle of the busy market, the butterflies frantic in my belly.

  Jacques draws back. “One moment, s’il te plaît?” he asks me, and I nod. Now that I’ve taken this initial step, I can wait a moment, an hour, a day, all summer …

  I watch as Jacques turns to the olive seller and begins speaking in fast French, gesturing with his hands. I try to breathe normally. The seller scoops a bunch of glossy green olives into a big container and hands it to Jacques.

  When the transaction is done, Jacques flashes me a grin. “My parents, they were missing some ingredients at the café,” he explains, “so they sent me here, you see.”

  I notice that he is wearing his waiter uniform, but his white shirt is untucked and rumpled, and his black necktie hangs undone around his collar. Somehow, this makes him look even handsomer than the last time we met.

  “I see,” I manage to say.

  Jacques chuckles. “Alors, Summer,” he says as we walk away from the olive stall, side by side. Our arms brush, and I feel a zap of electricity. “You did not ever call me for French lessons.” His tone is teasing, and his eyes sparkle. “Where have you been?”

  My pulse flutters at my throat. “I—” I’m reluctant to explain that I’ve never actually called a boy before. “I don’t have my own phone,” I finally offer, lamely. I explain how my cell doesn’t work here, and Jacques tells me that I can purchase a temporary mobile and a phone card at the tabac. I thank him for the tip, even though, in some ways, it’s been sort of refreshing to be without my phone (once I got past the initial withdrawal).

  “Where have you been?” I volley back as we stroll past a stall selling sunflowers. Then I bite my lip, hoping this question hasn’t revealed the fact that I’ve been taking occasional strolls past Café des Roses, on the lookout for him.

  Jacques laughs, pushing a hand through his tousled black hair. “Ah. My family and I, we were out of town for a few days,” he replies. “We went to Antibes, on the Côte d’Azur—the Riviera. You know this place?”

  “I do!” I exclaim, recalling my South of France guidebook. “I mean, um, I don’t know-know it,” I amend, blushing again. Jacques looks amused. “I’ve never been. But I’ve read about the Riviera. I’d like to go there someday.”

  “Oui?” Jacques raises one eyebrow. I’m seized by the terror that he thinks I’m suggesting he take me there. The idea of being on a beach with Jacques, in my swimsuit, makes me want to crawl under the stall of eggplants we are passing now.

  “I’d like to go to lots of places,” I babble on, picturing the underlined passages in my guidebook. “There’s Avignon, which has the Palace of the Popes. And the Camargue, where you can see wild horses … ” I’m starting to sound like a guidebook myself. “Oh, and most of all, Galerie de Provence, which is pretty close to here, right?”

  “Yes, it is not far,” Jacques says as we maneuver around a family of four who are sampling slices of salami at the meat stall. Jacques glances at me, a smile playing on his lips. “Pourquoi? Why ‘most of all’?” he inquires.

  I wonder if I should simply say that I like art, and that it seems a shame to come to France and not visit a museum. Which is all technically true. But the deeper, realer truth, about my portrait and Dad—would that sound like I was boasting?

  I settle on something in between. “There’s a painting there I really want to see,” I explain, my eyes on my flip-flops. “By, um, my father. He’s a painter,” I explain.

  Jacques looks impressed. “Vraiment, a painter? That is cool,” he says, his accent making the o’s extend in a very cute way. “He is French, your father?”

  I shake my head, passing by a stall that’s selling herbed goat cheese. “He’s American, but he lives in Paris, and spends the summers in Les Deux Chemins.” It occurs to me then that maybe Jacques has heard of Dad, or knows him from the town. “His name is Ned Everett?” I venture.

  Jacques smiles, giving me an amiable shrug. “I am afraid I am not familiar with any painters of today. But there are always artists living here in Provence. I think perhaps it is because of the beautiful light.” He holds aloft his container of olives; the mellow sunlight turns them golden.

  I nod, wishing again that I had my camera. “Like Paul Cézanne, and Vincent van Gogh,” I say. I’m no longer as nervous as I was a few minutes ago. Especially because I’m on familiar ground now; I know artists.

  Jacques nods back at me, his dark-blue eyes sparkling as he takes me in. “So you are here, then, visiting your father, Summer?”

  His gaze makes my nervousness return. “Sort of,” I reply, hoping to avoid the whole Berlin issue. “I’m staying at his house, on Rue du Pain.” Agh. I cringe, wanting to disappear. What if Jacques thinks I’m inviting him to Dad’s house? Just when I was starting to relax and not feel like a complete freak in front of a boy …

  “My parents’ café is closed this Friday,” Jacques says, stopping to survey a pile of peaches. I guess he’s changing the subject, which is a relief. “For le quatorze juillet—sorry, July fourteenth. Bastille Day. You know, France’s Independence Day? It is like your Fourth of July.”

  “I know about Bastille Day,” I say with a smile. Thanks to my trusty guidebook.

  “But Galerie de Provence, I believe it will be open then,” Jacques goes on, picking up a peach and examining it in the sunlight. “Perhaps we could—”

  Oh my God, I think, the butterflies doubling in number, and then a girl calls out, “Jacques!”

  I look around, my brain foggy. A tall, model-esque girl with dark skin and brown hair in a short, fashionable pouf, is coming our way, holding hands with a sandy-haired boy in a Phoenix band T-shirt. The boy has a bookbag on his shoulder, and the girl is carrying a large sketch pad under one arm.

  I recognize them, but from where? Then it hits me: They’re the couple I saw kissing in front of the cupid fountain my first day here, and the couple I saw with Eloise at Café des Jumelles that first night. They are Eloise’s friends. And they know Jacques?

  Tensing up, I whip around and pretend to be deeply absorbed in the peaches. I let my hair fall into my face, hoping it disguises me sufficiently.

  I listen to Jacques greeting the couple—he cheek-kisses the girl, and slaps the guy on the back. He calls the girl “Colette”—that’s right; Colette!—and the guy “Tomas.” As the three of them exchange more pleasantries in French, I stare at the peaches, silently imploring Jacques not to introduce me. Thankfully, he doesn’t, and Colette and Tomas don’t linger long. I hear Tomas call “À bientôt!” which I know means “See you later.” Then, carefully, I turn around, gripping a peach in my free fist.

  “Those are cool people I have met this summer,” Jacques explains cheerfully; over his shoulder, I s
ee Colette and Tomas trotting away. “They have been coming to the café often, with some other friends from their art class.”

  I know, I think, and something solidifies in my mind, something I hadn’t put together before. If Eloise and her art class besties, Colette and Tomas, always go to Café des Roses (when they’re not avoiding me), then Eloise and Jacques know each other.

  My stomach falls. If Jacques knows Eloise, he’s surely noticed her beauty. And, as far as I can tell, Eloise, unlike Colette, doesn’t have a boyfriend. I squeeze the peach in my hand. This feeling of possessiveness is foolish; I have no claim on Jacques.

  Then Jacques reaches out and gently takes the peach from my grasp. Our fingers touch. I feel my heart give a kick, and all thoughts of Eloise flee.

  “Merci, Summer—thank you for choosing this one,” Jacques says, holding up the peach. “It is ripe enough for the dessert my father will make.” He pauses, and then adds, “So, I will pick you up on Friday, and we can go to the gallery on my moped?”

  Hold on. What? I stare at Jacques, my blood thrumming in my ears.

  “Galerie de Provence?” he prompts, grinning at me. “Shall we go?”

  The full implication of his words makes my skin go hot with shock.

  Is this a date? A date with a BOY?

  Excitement and disbelief swell up in me. I don’t remember how to speak—my tongue is stuck to the roof of my mouth—but I muster up a nod.

  I hear Jacques asking for my address, and his voice sounds fuzzy and far off. As I stand there in the middle of the farmers’ market, I realize that today has been full of impossibilities. It’s like I’m in an alternate world, where the regular rules don’t apply.

  And, maybe I’m getting way ahead of myself, but I think I now have a response to Ruby’s email.

  Hey, BFF, remember how you predicted a French boyfriend for me? Well, let’s just say you might not be the only one with a summer love story …