A Summer to Die

by Lois Lowry

  And Dad can't write. He goes in the little room and sits, every day, but the typewriter is quiet. It's almost noisy, the quietness, we are all so aware of it. He told me that he sits and looks out the window at all the whiteness and can't get a grip on anything. I understand that; if I were able to go out with my camera in the cold, the film wouldn't be able to grip the edges and corners of things because everything has blended so into the colorless, stark mass of February. For Dad, everything has blended into a mass without any edges in his mind, and he can't write.

  I showed him the closet floor, where William is carved into the pine.

  "Will Banks is a fascinating man," Dad said, leaning back in his scruffy leather chair in front of the typewriter. He was having a cup of coffee, and I had tea. It was the first time I had visited him in the little room, and he seemed glad to have company. "You know, he's well educated, and he's a master cabinetmaker. He could have earned a fortune in Boston, or New York, but he wouldn't leave this land. People around here think he's a little crazy. But I don't know, I don't know."

  "He's not crazy, Dad. He's nice. But it's too bad he has to live in that teeny house, when he owns both these bigger ones that were his family's."

  "Well, he's happy there, Meg, and you can't argue with happiness. Problem is, there's a nephew in Boston who's going to make trouble for Will, I'm afraid."

  "What do you mean? How can anyone make trouble for an old man who isn't bothering anybody?"

  "I'm not sure. I wish I knew more about law. Seems the nephew is the only relative he has. Will owns all this land, and the houses—they were left to him—but when he dies, they'll go to this nephew, his sister's son. It's valuable property. They may not look like much to you, Meg, but these houses are real antiques, the kind of things that a lot of people from big cities would like to buy. The nephew, apparently, would like to have Will declared what the law calls 'incompetent'—which just means crazy. If he could do that, he'd have control over the property. He'd like to sell it to some people who want to build cottages for tourists, and to turn the big house into an inn."

  I stood up and looked out the window, across the field, to where the empty house was standing gray against the whiteness, with its brick chimney tall and straight against the sharp line of the roof. I imagined cute little blue shutters on the windows, and a sign over the door that said "All Major Credit Cards Accepted." I envisioned a parking lot, filled with cars and campers from different states.

  "They can't do that, Dad," I said. Then it turned into a question. "Can they?"

  My father shrugged. "I didn't think so. But last week the nephew called me, and asked if it were true, what he had heard, that the people in the village call Will 'Loony Willie.'"

  "'Loony Willie'? What did you say to him?"

  "I told him I'd never heard anything so ridiculous in my life, and to stop bothering me, because I was busy writing a book that was going to change the whole history of literature."

  That broke us both up. The book that was going to change the whole history of literature was lying in stacks all over my father's desk, on the floor, in at least a hundred crumpled sheets of typing paper in the big wastebasket, and in two pages that he had made into paper airplanes and sailed across the room. We laughed and laughed.

  When I was able to stop laughing, I remembered something that I had wanted to tell my father. "You know, last month, when I visited Will, I took his picture."

  "Mmmmm?"

  "He was sitting in his kitchen, smoking his pipe and looking out the window, and talking. I shot a whole roll. And you know, Dad, his eyes are so bright, and his face is so alive, so full of memories and thoughts. He's interested in everything. I thought of that when you said Loony Willie."

  "Could I see the pictures?"

  I felt a little silly. "Well, I haven't been able to develop them yet, Dad. I can't use the darkroom at school because I have to catch the early bus to get home. It's just that I remember his face looking like that when I photographed him."

  My father sat up straight in his chair very suddenly. "Meg," he said, "I have a great ideal" He sounded like a little boy. Once Mom told Molly and me that she didn't mind not having sons, because often Dad is like a little boy, and now I could see exactly what she meant. He looked as if he were ten years old, on a Saturday morning, with an exciting and probably impossible project in mind.

  "Let's build a darkroom!" he said.

  I could hardly believe it. "Here?" I asked.

  "Why not? Now look, I don't know anything about photography. You'll be the expert consultant. But I do know how to build. And I need a little vacation from writing. Could I do it in a week?"

  "Sure, I think so."

  "What would you need?"

  "A space, first of all."

  "How about that little storeroom in the passageway between the house and the barn? That's big enough, isn't it?"

  "Sure. But it's too cold, Dad."

  "Aha. You're not thinking, Consultant. We need a heater." He turned to his desk, found a fresh sheet of paper, and wrote, "1. Heater." My father loves to make lists. "What next?"

  "Let's see. There are already shelves in there. But I'd need a counter top of some sort." He wrote that down.

  "And special lights. They're called safelights. You know, so you won't expose the photographic paper accidentally."

  "No problem. There's electricity out there. What else? You'll need lots of equipment, won't you? If you're going to have a darkroom, it might as well be the best darkroom around."

  I sighed. I could already tell what the problem was going to be. But, as I said, my father loves making lists. What the heck. I started telling him everything a darkroom would need: an enlarger, a timer, trays, chemicals, paper, developing tanks, special thermometers, filters, a focuser. The list grew very long and he started on a second sheet of paper. It was kind of fun, listing it, even though I knew it was just a dream. It was a dream I'd had for a long time, one that I'd never told anyone.

  "Where can you get this kind of stuff?" he asked.

  I went to my room, picked out one of my photography magazines, and brought it back. We looked through the ads in the back pages: New York. California. Boston.

  "Boston," he said triumphantly. "Terrific. I have to go down there to see my publisher anyway; might as well do it this week." He wrote down the name and address of the company. "Now. How much is all of this going to cost?"

  I started to laugh, even though I didn't really feel like laughing. It was so typical of my father, that he didn't think of the obvious problem till last. We looked through the Boston company's price list, wrote the prices on my father's paper, and finally added them up. His face fell. Good thing I'd realized all along it was a dream; that made it less disappointing. Poor Dad; he'd thought it was real, 36 and it took him by surprise that it wasn't.

  We both kept smiling very hard, because neither of us wanted the other to be sad.

  "Listen, Meg," he said slowly, folding the list up and putting it on a corner of his desk. "Sometimes when I'm sitting here working on the book, I come to a problem that seems insurmountable. When that happens, I just let it go for a while. I keep it in the back of my mind, but I don't agonize over it. Do you know what I mean?"

  I nodded. I'm pretty good at not agonizing.

  "So far," he explained, "all of those problems have resolved themselves. Out of nowhere, all of a sudden, the solutions appear. Now here's what I want you to do." He tapped the folded darkroom list with his finger. "I want you to put this out of your mind for a while, but keep it somewhere in the back where your subconscious will be working on it."

  "Okay," I agreed.

  "And before long, the solution will come. I'm absolutely sure of it. Probably soon, too, because both of our subconsciouses will be working."

  I laughed. He was so sure, and I didn't believe it for a minute. "All right," I promised.

  "Or would that be 'subconsciese'? The plural, I mean?"

  "Dad," I said, picking
up our empty cups to take them to the kitchen, "you're the English professor."

  Mom was in the kitchen, sitting by the fireplace stitching on her quilt. She was so excited about that quilt, and it was pretty, what she had done so far. But Molly and I cringed when we looked at it too closely, I suppose because it was full of memories; let's face it, some memories are better off forgotten, especially when you haven't lived far enough beyond them yet. There was the dress with the butterflies, which Molly always hated, right near the center. Near it was a blue-and-white-striped piece that I didn't want to be reminded of. It was the dress that I wore to my fifth birthday party, the day when I threw up all over the table, just after the cake was served. There was the pink with little white flowers, that I wore to Sunday School on Easter when I was supposed to say a poem to a roomful of people, forgot every word of it, and cried instead, when I was maybe six. There was the blue plaid that Molly wore her first day in junior high, when she didn't realize that every other girl would be wearing jeans. And there was a piece of my old Brownie uniform; I hated Brownies, always spent my dues on candy before I got there, and was scolded every week.

  "What's that white piece with the embroidery?" I asked Mom. She really liked it when Molly and I took an interest in the quilt.

  She turned the quilt around and held it toward the window so that she could see the piece I meant. Then her face got all nostalgic. "Oh," she said affectionately. "That's Molly's first bra."

  "What?"

  I hadn't even noticed Molly until she burst out with "What?" She was lying on a couch in the corner. (Old houses are neat, in many ways. How many houses have a couch in the kitchen?) Actually, it didn't surprise me that she was there. Molly's had the flu all of February, and she's kind of like a fixture, or a piece of furniture herself now, lying there with a box of Kleenex.

  In a way, it's fun having Molly sick, because she's home all the time, instead of off with her friends after school and on weekends. We've been doing things we hadn't done since we were little, like playing Monopoly. It's fun to play with Molly, silly games like that, because she doesn't take them seriously. I build hotels all over everything, even on stupid old Baltic Avenue, and when she throws the dice and realizes she's going to land where I have hotels, she starts giggling. She moves her piece along, closer and closer, and laughs harder and harder till she gets there, and then sits him down, thump, by the hotel, and just starts counting out all her money. "You got me," she says. "I'm absolutely wiped out!" Then she hands over all her money, laughing, and says right away, "Let's play again."

  I'm a terrible loser. I go around muttering "It isn't fair" after I lose. I thought about it once, about what makes the difference, when I was feeling stupid and childish because I had cried after I lost a game of gin rummy, and said, "You cheated!" to Molly, even though I knew she hadn't. I think it's because Molly has always won at important things, or the things that are important to her, like making cheerleader, and having the best-looking boyfriend; so the little things, like Monopoly games, don't matter to her. Maybe someday, if I succeed at something, I'll stop saying "It isn't fair" about everything else.

  It's also a nuisance, Molly being sick. She's grouchy, which isn't like her, because she's missing school—which means missing Tierney McGoldrick, even though he calls every day—and because she worries about how she looks. She can't be feeling too bad, because she spends a lot of time in front of the mirror in our room, trying to fix her hair which has gotten kind of scroungy looking, and putting rouge on her face, because it's so pale.

  Sometimes, when Molly is messing around with a hairbrush and bobby pins, making herself even more beautiful, which isn't necessary, I kind of wish that she would notice my hair and offer to do something about it. I can't quite get up the nerve to ask her to. I'm almost positive she wouldn't laugh 40 at me, but I can't bring myself to take the chance.

  "Molly, don't get up," sighed Mom, because Molly was about to charge across the room to examine the piece of her bra. "Your nose will start up again."

  Molly's flu consists mainly of nosebleeds. Mom says that's because she's an adolescent; Mom says that about almost everything. The doctor from the village says it's because of the cold weather, which damages the nasal membranes. Whichever it is, it's downright messy. Even though her side of our room is still nasty neat, the rug is spattered with Molly's dumb nosebleeds, which to my mind is a good deal more disgusting than anything I leave lying around on my side.

  It was time for dinner anyway. Mom put the quilt away, which ended the argument they were about to have about the bra, and served pork chops and applesauce at the kitchen table. I had to move my salad plate over to the side to make room for Molly's box of Kleenex. Dad didn't say anything, even though he likes a tidy-looking table at dinner, because we've had a couple of unpleasant meals when Molly didn't bring her Kleenex.

  It was a quiet meal, with Molly eating very carefully because of her nose, and Dad and I both a little preoccupied because it isn't all that easy to tuck something into your subconscious and keep it back there. Mom kept starting conversations that ended because nobody joined them. Finally she put down her fork, sighed, and said, "You know, much as I love this place, even in winter, I'll be glad when summer comes. You'll be feeling better about the book, Charles, because it'll be almost finished, and you girls can go to camp and you won't be so bored—"

  "Camp," I said suddenly. "Camp." My mother stared at me. Molly and I have gone to the same camp every summer since I was eight and she was ten.

  "Camp," said my father suddenly, looking at me with a grin starting.

  "How much does camp cost?" I asked my mother.

  She groaned good-naturedly. "Plenty," she said. "But don't worry about that all of a sudden. Your father and I have always felt it was important enough that we've kept the money put aside each month. You girls will be able to go to camp."

  "Mom," I said slowly, "do I have to go to camp?"

  She was amazed. I've won the Best Camper Award for two years running for my age group. "Of course you don't have to go to camp, Meg. But I thought—"

  "Lydia," announced my father. "I'm going to Boston tomorrow. I have to see my publisher, and I'm going to do some shopping. Meg and I are building a darkroom in the storeroom by the barn, if Will Banks doesn't mind. I'll call him tonight, Meg."

  My mother was sitting there with a piece of lettuce on the end of her fork, shaking her head. She started to laugh. "This family is absolutely nuts," she said. "I haven't the slightest idea what anyone is talking about. Molly, your nose."

  Molly grabbed a piece of Kleenex and clutched her nose. From behind her Kleenex she said haughtily, "I don'd know whad anyone is talking aboud either. Bud I'm going to camp, whether Meg does or nod."

  Then she giggled. Even Molly realized how silly she looked and sounded, talking from behind a wad of tissues. "Thad is," she added, "if by dose ever stobs bleeding."

  4.

  All of a sudden I know how Dad feels when he completes a chapter of the book. Or Mom, when one of her plants suddenly blossoms, or she finishes a new section of the quilt, and goes around with a smile on her face all day, even when no one's looking. I know how Molly must have felt when Tierney McGoldrick asked her to go steady, which is what happened two weeks ago. She came home wearing his tiny gold basketball on a chain around her neck, and was so giggly and cheerful and bounced around so much that Mom finally had to tell her to calm down so that her newly normal nose wouldn't have a relapse.

  Molly's nose had finally stopped bleeding at the beginning of March, which is about the same time that the sun came out after a month of gray cold; Dr. Putnam in the village said that proved what he had thought, that the bad weather was causing her nosebleeds. Molly said she didn't care what caused them, she was just glad they were over, glad she could go back to school. Dad said he was sorry he hadn't bought stock in the Kleenex company.

  I've hardly seen the sun at all because I've been in my darkroom. My darkroom! It's finished; it's all
finished, and perfect. My father did it, just the way he said he would, and everything is just the way I dreamed of it. There is nothing that my father can't do.

  The first pictures I developed were the ones of Will Banks. I'd had that roll of film tucked away in a drawer under my knee socks for almost two months. I was scared stiff when I developed it—scared that I had forgotten how, that I would do something wrong. But when I took the strip of negatives out of the tank and held it to the light, there were two pictures of the old house across the field, and then thirty-four pictures of Will, looking at me in thirty-four different ways. I felt like a genius, like an artist.

  When the negatives were dry, I printed them all on one sheet. It's hard to see, from the negatives, exactly how a print will look, so I crossed my fingers again when I developed the contact sheet that would show me the real pictures for the first time. I stood there over the tray of developer and watched in the dim red light as the sheet changed from white to gray, and then saw the grays change to blacks and the shades become the faces of Will; after two minutes, there he was, looking up at me from the tray, thirty-four of him, still tiny, but complete.

  When it was ready I took it, still dripping wet, into the kitchen and laid it on the counter beside the sink. Mom was there, peeling potatoes, and she looked over, first curiously, and then as if she were really surprised.

  "That's Will Banks!" she said.

  "Of course it's Will Banks," I told her, grinning. "Isn't he beautiful?"