by Mazzy King
We’re silent for a long moment, the stillness in my bedroom broken only by our soft pants until we catch our breath. After a moment, she slips from underneath me to duck into the bathroom. My heart is in my throat, thinking she might leave me again, until she creeps back to the bed a moment later and crawls under the comforter into my arms.
Full of relief, I pull her close and hold her tight. “Thought you were going to walk away from me again.”
Summer nestles her head under my chin. “No. This is where I’m supposed to be.”
5
Summer
The loud jangle of my cell phone startles me from a deep sleep, where I’m still entwined in Dylan’s arms.
“What’s that?” he mumbles sleepily.
“My phone,” I reply, fumbling for it. I clear my throat several times as I study the screen. It’s after one in the morning. I don’t recognize the number, but I don’t get calls at this hour. Something tells me I should answer. “Hello?”
“May I speak to Summer Ortiz?” a woman says briskly, sounding very awake for the hour.
“Speaking,” I say slowly.
“Ms. Ortiz, my name is Jamie Raymond, a nurse at York Bay General Hospital.”
York Bay? Hospital? I sit up straight in bed. “Yes?”
“I’m calling on behalf of your grandmother, Mildred Ortiz. She’s been admitted as a patient.”
“What’s wrong with her?” My voice rings out shrilly through the still room. My heart jumps in my chest. Not my grandma. Not my grandma.
Dylan sits up beside me, sliding an arm around my waist. “What?” he whispers.
“An ambulance brought her in a little while ago,” the nurse says. “It appears she’s suffered a heart attack.”
“Jesus Christ!” I cry, clapping a hand over my mouth.
“Summer,” Dylan says sharply.
“She’s stable,” the nurse tells me. “She’s awake or was a little while ago. She asked for you.”
“I’m on my way.” I hang up without so much as a goodbye and jump out of bed, searching for my clothes.
“Can you please talk to me?” Dylan’s voice is low and calm.
“Grandma had a heart attack tonight.” I shimmy into my clothes. “I’ve got to go see her.”
“I’ll drive you.” Dylan slides out of bed and dresses in record time.
“She’s in York Bay,” I add.
“Then I’ll drive fast. Come on.”
We rush outside to his car and take off into the night.
York Bay is an hour’s drive from Port City. An hour isn’t a long amount of time, but every minute is too long as I worry about Grandma.
“Thanks for driving me,” I say, because I have to say something. And I mean it. Dylan didn’t have to drop everything and cart me here in the middle of the night.
“It’s not safe for you to drive while upset.” He pauses, his eyes on the road. “Besides, she’s like a grandmother to me, too. I don’t have anyone left.”
Dylan’s parents are both gone. He got really close with my grandparents, and when Grandpa died, he took that as hard as he would have if they were blood. I know Grandma means a lot to him.
I reach over and touch his hand. “You have me.”
He spares me a glance. It’s brief but penetrating. “Do I, Summer?”
I draw my head back. “Of course you do. We just…” I trail off.
Dylan swallows. “I know. And it was amazing. But let’s be real here—sex is sex. It doesn’t have to mean anything. But I need it to mean something…to you.”
“What makes you think it didn’t?” I demand.
“I’m not saying it didn’t. I guess what I mean is, I need it to mean to you what it means to me.” He lets out a slow breath. “Summer, I’ve never stopped loving you. Ever. And it killed me when you rejected that love before.”
“I didn’t reject anything!” I exclaim. I shift my body in the seat to face him, mouth hanging open. “Dylan, I’ve known you for years. We grew up together. You were my first. How many years passed where you said nothing? And then the night before I leave for half a year, you decide to tell me something like that. Sorry that it totally blew my mind and left me unable to know what to say. I’m sorry you were hurt. In a way, I was too. Why couldn’t you have told me that before?”
“Because I was a coward,” he replies softly. “And I thought I might never see you again. So I had to tell you the truth. And it’s still true.”
“I can’t deal with this right now,” I murmur, shaking my head. “I’m sorry, Dylan, but…there’s too much on my mind. My heart.”
“I understand,” he says.
And then silence falls between us for the rest of the ride. I send texts to my mom and dad. Grandma is my dad’s mom, and he’s already been notified and is trying to arrange a flight here.
Dylan pulls into the hospital’s emergency side parking lot and we rush inside. The nurse directs us to my grandma’s room.
She’s lying in bed with oxygen tubes in her nose and hooked up to a bunch of machines, but she’s awake.
I immediately burst into tears.
“Oh, you stop that now,” she says, her tone a mixture of annoyance and comfort. “I’m a tough old broad, and some wimpy little chest pain ain’t gonna take me out.”
Dylan chuckles softly and nudges me toward the bed. I can’t hug her, afraid I’ll mess up the stuff attached to her, but we take turns giving her big kisses on the cheek. I pull a chair beside her bed.
“I see she’s in one piece,” Grandma says to Dylan with a little wink. “Good work.”
He grins down at her. “You know I always got you, Mrs. O. You’re barely in one piece yourself. You ladies party a little too hard?”
“We were having a wonderful time,” Grandma says grumpily. “And I’d still be having one if my body knew how to act right.”
“You’re eighty-five, Grandma,” I remind her. “You can’t party like you used to.”
“Bullshit. You didn’t see me in action. I was holding my own.”
Dylan and Grandma chat a bit more while I hold her hand, listening. They have an easy, bantering relationship that suggests real closeness, and it warms my heart.
Finally Dylan glances at me. “I think I’m gonna take off and let you visit with your Grandma alone, okay? Text me when you need a ride, and I’ll drive back up and get you.”
“Nonsense,” Grandma says firmly. “You’ve done enough, and it’s late as hell. Or early, depending on how you look at it. You go home and get to bed. I’ll make sure Summer gets home fine. Besides, I should be getting out of here in the morning.”
“I don’t think they’ll send you home so soon,” I tell her.
“Well, I’ll just have to slide the doc a fifty and then see what he has to say.”
I roll my eyes but follow Dylan into the hall after he says goodbye to Grandma. “You don’t need to come back up and get me,” I say. “Seriously. If Grandma has to stay another night, I’ll just stay here. And when she’s ready to leave, we’ll just take a taxi or something.”
He sighs but nods. “Okay. You need anything, just let me know.”
I nod back, feeling terribly awkward.
Dylan lingers for a moment. I want to wrap my arms around him, feel the reassuring pressure of his arms around me, but I stay where I’m at.
“Bye, Summer,” he says finally, then turns and walks down the hall.
My heart cracks.
It feels like he’s walking out of my life.
6
Summer
“So,” Grandma says when I step back in the room. “You want to tell me what the hell’s going on?”
“Sorry?” I say, genuinely confused. “What’s going on with what?”
“You and Dylan,” she says like she’s speaking to a toddler. “If you think for a moment I couldn’t tell something’s wrong, then you’d be wrong.”
My cheeks heat. “Grandma, let’s just focus on getting you better.”
“Where the hell am I going?” She spreads her hands wide. “They got me pricked up with all kinds of shit. I’ve got a thing up my twat to help me pee. I’m stuck here, and I’m awake, and you’re going to tell me what’s what.”
I sigh. “We just…rehashed old stuff. The night before I went to Europe, he told me he loved me.”
Grandma’s face is impassive. “And you said?”
I give her a withering stare, but the vitriol is for no one but me. “‘Thank you.’”
“Yikes, girl. No wonder he’s so touchy whenever I mention you.” Grandma eyes me. “You feel nothing for him?”
“I didn’t say that.”
“No, you said ‘Thank you,’ which is basically the same thing.”
“I have feelings for him,” I mutter, toying with the hem of my dress. “I just haven’t processed them.”
“Did you go on that date tonight?” she asks. “Is that why you’re so dressed up and pretty?”
“Yeah. It was a disaster. Guy was a douche.”
“And…then you met up with Dylan?”
“He actually followed me to the bar, if you can believe it.” Then I lift my head and meet her gaze. “I suppose you can, since you’re the one who told him to keep tabs on me.”
She smiles, not at all guilty. “I’m the one you should be thanking. I knew you two just needed a little push together.”
I tilt my head. “What makes you so sure we were together?”
“Your mascara is smudged, there’s a hickey on your neck, and you came in here together at almost three in the morning.” Grandma lifts a brow and adjusts the oxygen tubes in her nose. “I’m eighty-five years old, dear, as you pointed out. I know a thing or two about a thing or two.”
There’s no point in lying to her. I clear my throat.
“Do you love the man?” she asks softly. “For pity’s sake, Summer, what are you so afraid of?”
“Look at what happened to Mom and Daddy,” I tell her. “Love doesn’t last. Even when you want it to. Look at Grandpa. Look at Dylan’s parents. It’s fleeting. I just…I don’t want to go through loss like that.”
“Then you will miss out on the single greatest joy we can know as humans,” she says simply. “And I want more for you.”
I reach up to brush away a tear I didn’t know was falling.
“You didn’t answer me. Do you love him?”
I swallow. It’s time to admit, out loud for the first time, a truth that hit me like a gut-punch when I was in Europe.
“Yes.”
“Then you need to tell him that,” Grandma says. “And you need to give that love a chance to grow. Good heavens. I thought I raised a smarter granddaughter.” But she grips my hand, tugs me closer. “Thank you for being here, sweetie. I suppose I was getting a little lonely all by myself.”
“I love you, Grandma.”
“I love you too, sweet pea.” She strokes her thumb over the back of my hand. “Promise me when you get home, you’ll stop being such an idiot and tell that man the truth.”
I smile. “I promise.”
7
Dylan
Sunday evening, as I sit on the couch not really watching TV and staring at my phone, I glance out the window as a taxi pulls into Mrs. O’s driveway. Summer texted me earlier during the day to let me know they were heading home but didn’t say when. Seeing Mrs. O carefully step out, Summer supporting her, fills me with a relief that leaves me physically weak.
I hurry out the front door. “Can I help?”
Summer nods. “I’ll get her purse.”
I support Mrs. O’s arm and slide an arm around her waist to help her up the walkway. “Feeling better?”
“Like I went to the spa,” she says gruffly. “I guess I can’t have the kind of fun I prefer anymore.”
“You just gotta take it a little easier.”
“A lot easier,” Summer clarifies behind us.
We help Mrs. O inside and into her favorite easy chair. Summer turns on the TV for her.
“How about a glass of wine?” Mrs. O says.
“Yes, a glass of water, coming right up.” Summer cocks an eyebrow.
“Are you hungry?” I ask. “I did some research on good foods to focus on after a heart attack and made a chicken vegetable soup I think is pretty damn good. I can bring over a container.”
“That sounds nice, dear.” Mrs. O snaps her fingers at Summer. “Go with him.”
“I can manage it on my own,” I say with a shrug.
Mrs. O smiles up at me. “She can go with you.”
Sheesh. Mrs. O, forever playing the matchmaker.
Summer follows me next door. I’ve already divided the soup into containers, so I grab a few, then shrug at her.
“I really could have managed on my own.”
Summer shakes her head. “Grandma was just trying to get us alone. I kind of told her about us.”
“Really? How much?”
“Not every little detail,” she replies, flushing. Her teeth sink into her lower lip. “Look, Dylan, I need to tell you something.”
“It’s okay,” I say quietly. “You don’t have to—”
She holds up a hand. “I want to. I was wrong for reacting the way I did and not following up with you afterward, before I left. I was hurt that you didn’t come see me right before—and I was confused. I had a lot of time to think in Europe. Even when I was visiting museums and cafes and castles, I always thought of you.”
“And?” My heart is thudding.
“And…I realized something.” She reaches out to take the containers from my arms and sets them down. Then she takes my hands. “I realized something I’ve known probably for years now but have been too scared to acknowledge.”
My voice is hardly above a whisper. “What’s that?”
A gentle smile crosses her lips. “I love you too, Dylan,” she says, in this tone like she’s annoyed at herself. It makes me smile. “I’ve been in love with you for years. I’ve just been too scared to act on it. I’ve never seen love last in my life, but…that doesn’t mean it can’t.”
I release my breath slowly, my hands coming to rest on her waist. “What do you want, Summer Ortiz?”
“I want you,” she begins. “I want to see where we can go. What we can be. I want to give us the shot we should have taken a long, long time ago. I want you, Dylan.”
I lower my mouth to hers, feeling like it’s been a century since our last kiss. That it’s only been a day and a half doesn’t matter. Nothing matters now—not the past, the hurts, not the negative feelings. All that matters is that she loves me.
There’s just one thing left to say.
“I love you too,” I murmur.
Her lips curve into a wide, joyous smile, and she pulls me close. “Think we can be fast and quiet?”
I laugh. “I don’t know about the quiet part, but I’m willing to try.” I kiss her still smiling lips. “You know I’ll do anything for you, Summer.”
“All you have to do is keep loving me,” she says simply.
I tilt my forehead against hers. “Then consider it done.”
Epilogue
Dylan
Four months later
“Now that you’re officially my grandson-in-law,” Mrs. O says as I wheel her down the ramp in the backyard toward the picnic table, “I have to insist you stop calling me ‘Mrs. O’ and start calling me Grandma, dammit.”
“Yes, Mrs.—sorry,” I say, grinning, arranging her at the head of the table. “You’re talking, like, over two decades of conditioning. Grandma.”
She nods. “That’s better.”
Summer and I got married last month in a quick ceremony with just Grandma as our witness. We’ll have a bigger wedding and reception soon, but the need to make it official and forever was too strong to ignore. Luckily, Grandma approved and insisted on being there, wheelchair or not. She ended up having another heart attack a month after the first, and recovery took longer, requiring her to be in a whee
lchair. She doesn’t seem to mind it too much, but her independent streak took a bit of a hit.
Today, one month to the day after we vowed to be together forever, we’re having a little celebratory picnic. Fall has just arrived, but the chilly temps haven’t, so we’re trying to take advantage while we can.
Summer’s in the kitchen, so I get Grandma set with a glass of iced tea and return to the grill. I can’t help but smile as I turn over chicken breasts and hot dogs. I’ve never felt so content, so complete, in my whole life. I can’t imagine how life could get any better.
“Almost ready?” Summer asks, gliding out the back door. She has a bowl of baked beans in one hand and a dish of potato salad in the other.
I lean back to give her a kiss. “Yep. Just finishing up this chicken for Grandma.”
My wife looks beautiful and radiant in a long white dress that ruffles in the light breeze. The sun gleams off her bronze skin. It’s only the sharp sizzle of the meat on the grill that forces my attention away from her.
After loading the meat onto a platter, I carry it across the lawn to the table and set it in the middle. Summer fixes Grandma’s plate, then mine, then hers, and sits beside me.
“Looks excellent,” I say, squeezing her hand. “I just want you both to know how blessed I feel right now.”
Summer smiles at me. Grandma nods. “We love you too, honey. Now can it and let’s eat.”
We all laugh.
I reach for my napkin and unroll it. Instead of silverware dropping out, a plastic baggie falls into my lap. What the hell?
When I pick it up, I realize what I’m holding.
A pregnancy test.
And there are two bold lines on the readout.
I let out a small, idiotic noise and meet Summer’s gaze. She smiles gently at me, and her eyes are filled with tears.
