Serial Summer

by Angel Lawson

  “We slept,” I say again and then groan. “Fine, and some other stuff but I didn’t have sex with him. He let me crash.”

  “Fine, fine. If you say so,” she concedes. “So you went over after your ex showed. Did you tell him everything?”

  “Not last night but I did today. I told him about Mark coming and what he wanted.”

  “And he was cool with everything? Even the cheating stuff?” I make a face and she sighs. “You didn’t tell him about the wife.”

  “He said it was in the past—ancient history and he didn’t care about what relationships from before we met.”

  “Oh Paige, you have to tell him. About the wife. It’s a touchy subject.”

  “Yeah it’s a touchy subject for me, too. I ruined someone’s home. I’m a home-wrecker. There is photographic evidence.”

  “I’m not sure—“ she says, but then her eyes flash over my shoulder and her mouth snaps shut.

  “Not sure about what?” Justin asks, handing me a fresh drink. I haven’t finished the other one yet but I take a gulp anyway. He’s all cute smiles and disheveled hair, and he throws an arm around my neck. I know I don’t want to ruin the night.

  I’m searching for a witty distraction but Anita speaks first, “Not sure who that is?”

  I turn and see the guy she’s pointing to, standing in the doorway connecting the porch and the bar. Great.

  “That’s Mark,” I say and just as I instinctively start to slide out from Justin’s reach, his arm tightens around my shoulder.

  “What does he want?” she asks, but his eyes level on mine, shifting once to Justin, and he starts in my direction. “Oh crap. Justin, no.” Anita moves in front of us. “No fighting. Okay?”

  I look between the two of them and see the concern in Anita’s eyes. “Fighting?”

  With a quick glance over her shoulder, she says, “I’m going to get Bobby.”

  I tense when Mark gets close enough for me to see his smile. It’s wide enough but his eyes are dark and angry. I can only assume he followed me here, which means he may have been following me for some time. After his little meltdown yesterday that could be a problem. “What are you doing here?”

  “Looking for you,” he admits. He thrusts a hand at Justin. “I’m Mark.”

  “Justin.”

  The handshake is friendly enough, but I can see Mark sizing up Justin. They’re a contrast for sure. Preppy, clean-cut Mark verses Justin’s laid-back, beachy style. I’m not even sure how I ended up with two such opposite men. In this environment though, Mark is the one out of place in his blue pressed shorts and button down.

  “So you’re a friend of Paige’s,” Mark says.

  “Mark,” I warn.

  He gives me an innocent look. “What? I can’t meet your friends before I go back to the city?” I sigh in defeat. Hopefully, he’ll say his piece and move on. “We were going to France this summer,” he says to Justin. “I was hoping I could convince her to still go with us. Get a little culture in her life.”

  I offer him a tight smile. Justin doesn’t react, other than his arm slipping from my shoulder to the small of my back where his hand has made a fist in the fabric of my dress. I look over my shoulder wondering what happened to Anita. She may have been right. Bobby may need to come out here after all.

  Since neither of us say anything Mark continues tossing his next back-handed remark out direction. “But who needs France when you’ve got all this, right? I suppose I can see now why she wants to stay. Did she lure you in with that innocent game, too? Acting shy and sweet?”

  “Stop,” I tell him.

  “What did you offer her? All I had was passing grades but you look like you could probably get tickets to the rodeo or something.” The words come out in a rambling slur and it dawns on me that he’s drunk.

  “What the hell—“ Justin steps forward but I stop him.

  “Stop,” I say, grabbing his arm. “Let me talk to him for a minute.”

  “You sure?” Justin asks and I feel his fingers clench tighter near my back.

  “Yeah, this is stupid. He may be drunk but I can handle him. Let me just deal with it once and for all.”

  I return the smug look on Mark’s face with a scowl on my own. “Down there?” I suggest, pointing to the dock below the porch. I start down the steps and Mark follows me. Once we get close enough I see a couple of boats tied to the side of the dock. I turn to him and say, “You need to go.”

  “Eh, don’t worry, I’m leaving tomorrow. How was I supposed to know you would be here?”

  “Knock it off. I know you followed me. Even I didn’t know this place existed.” I shake my head. “This needs to stop. We’re done. Go back to your wife. Don’t ruin your marriage over all of this.”

  Although it’s dark down here, the only light comes from small lamps surrounding the dock, I can see the anguish on his face. “You think I want her back? I don’t. And don’t think that whatever fling you have with this guy is going to last, either. He’s trash, Paige. Country, red-neck trash, and you know it. Stop with the slumming and come back with me.”

  “Don’t talk about him like that. You have no idea what you’re saying.”

  “Why?” he asks, grabbing my arm. I’m close to the edge of the dock and the black water laps against the edge, knocking the boat into the wood. “You planning on seducing him, too? Letting him think this is more than a fling? You want him to give up everything for a taste of Paige Barnes?”

  His words sting but I refuse to stoop to his level. I attempt to jerk my arm away but he holds tight. He’s scaring me a little but I still find the courage to say, “Stop it, you need to go on your own or I will let Justin and his brother make you go. I don’t think that’s what you want.”

  “Threatening me?”

  “Just go,” I plead. He’s twisting my arm hard enough that it hurts. “Please?”

  “Hands off, man,” Justin says from the stairs. I sigh in relief. I don’t want a fight but at this point Mark is beyond reasonable.

  To my surprise, instead of letting go, Mark pulls me to him and smiles. “You want her?” he asks. I can smell the alcohol on his breath and I decided then I kind of do want Justin to punch him. Justin is close enough now to do it but just before he reaches us, Mark says, “You can have her,” and releases me. The problem is I’m too near the edge of the dock and he doesn’t just let go of my arm—he pushes me off the edge and into the water.

  “No!” I shout, panic replacing all anger. I sink like a stone. My feet hit the sandy bottom and I push up, emerging from the dark water. Something brushes my foot. I yelp. “Justin!”

  A shadow passes over me and I’m knocked around in the water by a splash. “Paige?” Justin calls, and in the dark I reach out for him.

  “Over here,” I call, but it’s dark and shadowy and all I can see is dark water and shadowy waves. My breath catches and I twist, looking to make sure nothing is near me. It’s too dark to tell.

  “Stop moving!”

  “I’m not moving!”

  You’d think I would calm down the minute he reaches me, but I don’t. Instead I start crying. Tears of fear and anger. “I’m sorry,” I sob, accidentally taking in a gulp of sea water. I cough and sputter, choking as he drags me to the dock.

  “Grab on to the edge,” he tells me. I do as I’m told but I don’t have the upper body strength to pull myself up. “Okay, I’m going to push you up but you have to try to get on the dock though.”

  It takes a minute and Justin’s hands are all over my butt, heaving me out of the water, but eventually we’re both lying on the dock. I’m soaked and the thin fabric of my dress clings to every inch of my body. Justin’s clothes are heavy and wet. We’ve both lost our shoes.

  “You okay?” he asks.

  I nod, catching my breath, trying to push the panic attack aside. “Yeah, just cold.”

  “Come on.” Justin stands and helps me off the dock. He leads me around the side of the building, instead of back insi
de. There’s no sign of Mark anywhere and I ignore the look we get from some people in the parking lot. When we get to his car he rummages around the back and hands me a dry shirt. “You want this?”

  We’re in a dark part of the parking lot, near the trees, so I peel off my dress, tossing it with a soggy thud over the edge of the Jeep and into the back.

  Justin’s runs his hands through his wet hair and he mutters, “Damn,” but I notice he looks away. What guy looks away when his nearly-naked kind of girlfriend strips in a bar parking lot?

  A feeling of discomfort settles in my stomach.

  I wait in the front seat as Justin does the same, stripping off his shirt and jeans. He’s slides in next to me only wearing boxer shorts. We must look ridiculous leaving the bar like two drowned rats. I say a quick prayer that we don’t get pulled over.

  “I’m sorry I dragged you into all that.”

  “You didn’t drag me into anything,” he says over the wind. “You sure you’re okay?”

  I’m still cold, shaking from the open top Jeep, but my nerves from being in the water have finally settled. “The water scares me. It’s irrational. Plus it was dark and I couldn’t see anything.”

  We ride the rest of the way in tense silence. Something has shifted between us but I’m not sure what. Justin keeps to his side of the Jeep, his hands never coming to my side like they did on the way to the bar. The crease never leaves the center of his forehead.

  When he pulls into my driveway at the campground I see my mother’s car but the interior lights are off. “Guess she’s asleep.” I linger in the front seat. Justin hasn’t turned off the car and from the clenched way he’s holding his jaw I can tell he’s not planning on staying anyway. “Sorry,” I say again. “That our night was ruined.”

  “Was he really married?”

  I look up at the starry night. “You heard us fighting?”

  “Yeah, you two weren’t very quiet. Was he?”

  “Yes.”

  “You had an affair with a married guy.”

  I nod, wanting to defend myself but my acts were indefensible.

  Justin clenches his jaw, making the bone sharp in the lamp light. He says nothing else. I can catch a hint, so I get out of the car. I’m barely at the door when I hear the Jeep’s tires spray gravel across the driveway.

  Chapter Fourteen

  Two days later, my phone vibrates under my pillow. Half asleep, I roll on my back and check the screen. It’s a text from Irene, a picture really, with the caption, “Mark won’t tell us anything.”

  I stare at the photo.

  “Holy crap,” I say aloud.

  “What?”

  I roll over and see my mother at her desk/table. She’s got her hair back and her glasses perched on her nose. I had no idea she was home. She’s been gone a lot lately.

  “Irene just sent me this picture of Mark.” I crawl out of the bed and hand her the phone. She squints and looks at the picture.

  “Someone gave him a black eye, huh?”

  “Looks like it.”

  She looks over the phone and at me sitting on the edge of my bed. With a raised eyebrow she asks, “Any idea who?”

  “I’ve got a couple of ideas,” I mutter. Just none of them are talking to me right now. I look at the photo again. Irene must have taken the picture on the sly, because Mark isn’t looking at the camera and appears to be at the airport, going through security. His eye is obviously bruised. Even in the crappy cell phone photo I can see the swelling on his upper cheek.

  I gather my things from the cabinets over my bed and skirt past my mother’s work station to take a shower. I’m about to close the bathroom door when I hear my mother say, “Maybe I was wrong about Justin Hawkins.”

  I snap the door shut and turn on the water, wondering if he’ll ever speak to me again.

  ~*~

  “You want me to go where?” I ask. Anita is standing on my front step. It’s Sunday—early—and she’s asking if I’ll join them for church.

  “It’s really casual. Actually, it’s on the beach. You can wear whatever you want. Even a bathing suit.”

  I give her the side-eye, knowing good and well I’m not wearing a bathing suit to church, even if it is on the beach. “I’m not really the churchy-type,” I confess.

  “Please? Sibley loves to go and Bobby is at work. I need some company. Like real, adult company. We can hang out for a while afterwards on the island.”

  If I wasn’t so lonely and depressed, I might have told her no. “Let me change,” I tell her, promising to meet her at her house in twenty minutes.

  I have no idea what to expect but she’s right, the gathering is causal. Most are in shorts and t-shirts. I can see bathing suit ties at the back of several women’s necks from my spot in the sand. Anita brought us chairs, but Sibley sits on a towel building a sand castle while the minister speaks.

  “Do you come every week?” I whisper. I haven’t listened to much of what the minister has to say, but the crashing waves are soothing.

  “Just when we feel like it. They only have it out here during the summer months. My mom harasses me if we don’t go to church, so this is a good compromise.”

  Once the service is over, we move our chairs down to the water and Anita dumps a bag of sand toys on the ground for Sibley. We watch her stumble to the waves.

  “The Fourth is next week,” Anita informs me.

  “Yeah, you guys doing anything special?”

  “Drink beer, eat, swim, fireworks. The usual.”

  I laugh. “Sounds like it.”

  “It’s fun, though. Ivy’s parents will be here for the week and they always have a big cookout. Lots of crab and shrimp. We can crash at her place legally this time. You should come.”

  “I will, thanks.” There’s a brief silence between us and I muster the nerve to break it. “He’s never going to speak to me again, is he?”

  Anita leans her head back into the chair and looks at me. “Honey, I don’t know what he’s going through right now, but I can say you hit a nerve.”

  “How did I hit a nerve? We were just…”

  “Just what?”

  “Having fun?”

  “You know the saying: ‘It’s all fun and games ‘til someone gets hurt.’”

  “How can something I did before I met him hurt him?” The mistake of all mistakes continues to haunt me. Not for the first time, I wish I’d never laid eyes on Mark.

  “You couldn’t have known. But you also can’t blame him—cheating is a sore subject for him. You gotta let him work through this.”

  “Work through what? I’m only here for the summer, you know. I don’t have a lot of time to give him space and to deal with his demons.”

  Anita’s mouth pulls tight. “Then maybe it’s for the best that it ended before it got too far. Trust is a big one with him. Why do you think he comes back here every summer? Takes care of all of us? He’s smarter than all of us combined, but he’s decided to stick close to home and always will. He trusts us, Paige.”

  “So just because I didn’t grow up here makes me untrustworthy? And this thing? He doesn’t even know what happened. He didn’t give me a chance to explain.” I’m angry. How dare this girl—this girl I barely know—judge my character. And Justin? He’s too weak to even confront me himself. “I’ve got to go,” I say.

  “Wait? Where are you going? Slow down.”

  “You’ve made your point and his. I thought I could break into your clique, but I can’t. I wasn’t born and raised here. I’ll never be more than a tourist.”

  “Paige, stop, of course you’re more than a tourist.”

  Like a child, I huff. “I won’t bother any of you anymore.”

  I gather my things and storm off the beach. I ignore both Sibley calling my name and Anita following me as far as she is willing to go from her daughter. I’m breathing heavily by the time I reach the main road. Once I’m on the street, I call my mom. Thankfully, she picks up on the first ring.

&nbs
p; “Can you come get me?” I ask, trying to hide my distress.

  “What happened to Anita?”

  “Mom, please just come.”

  “Where are you?”

  I give her my location and start walking. Half a mile later, I see her car just as she’s coming over the bridge.

  “Thanks,” I say when I’ve shut the door. She drives to the end of the bridge and turns around so we can go back home.

  When we’re back on course, she gives me a worried glance. “Is everything okay?”

  “I guess.”

  “I know things have been hard lately, with Mark showing up like that, but you made the right choice.”

  “I know.”

  She stops at the traffic light at the end of the beach road. To my surprise, she turns the opposite direction from the campground.

  “Where are you going?”

  “I’ve got to pick something up. It won’t take long.”

  I stare out the window at the bland landscape and hope this doesn’t require me to talk to anyone. For someone on an extended vacation, I’m exhausted.

  My mother turns down a familiar street and I perk up. “Mom, where are we going?” I ask again.

  “I left my calendar over here the other night.” Her voice oozes with innocence. Guilty innocence.

  “Over where?” I push. I want her to say it.

  “At Richard’s.”

  “Yes,” she says. Her voice is calm. Too calm. “We’ve been seeing each other.”

  “Like dating?”

  She rolls her eyes. “I suppose you could call it ‘dating’, but at our age that feels kind of silly.”

  “Oh my god! You’ve been hooking up with Richard? This whole time? All those nights you were out?”

  “Three times.” She gives me a hard look. “Don’t exaggerate.”

  “Ew. You spent the night with him didn’t you? All while you were lecturing me about Justin.” She opens her mouth to answer, but I cut her off. “No. Nevermind. I just don’t even want to know about it.”

  She parks the car in the drive, near Richard’s house. “You coming?” she asks. I’m alarmed when she checks her hair in the mirror. I’m even more distraught when she fishes in her purse for lipstick. It’s an immature reaction, but I’m having a sudden insight as to why we made this trip to Ocean Beach. It wasn’t all about Donald Gaskins and missing family.