Fantasy Summer

by Susan Beth Pfeffer

  Robin thought about Ashley safely back home, and the lengths she was willing to go to avoid returning there.

  “Of course you can tell your families,” Jean persisted. “But that can wait until you’re home too. Why worry your parents unduly? Let them see for themselves what a fabulous summer you all have had, and then tell them about Ashley’s little accident.”

  “Please leave now, Jean,” Robin said. “I’m not in the mood to listen to any more of this.”

  “Certainly,” Jean said, rising from the chair. “By the way, Robin, we were all very impressed with how you handled yourself in this crisis. You scored a lot of points for yourself. I don’t know how Mrs. Brundege plans on expressing her gratitude and appreciation, but I’m sure she’ll think of something appropriate.”

  “Great,” Robin said. “Good-bye, Jean.”

  “Good-bye, Robin,” Jean said. “I’m sure you’ll feel better after you get a little more sleep.” She smiled at Robin and left the room.

  Robin curled back up in bed, but she knew she wouldn’t be able to fall back asleep. Her mind was racing far too fast, thinking about Ashley and the summer and accidents. And suddenly all she could think about was Caro, and there was no point trying to stop the memories from filling her. She didn’t cry, though, which surprised her. She just remembered the pain and the sorrow and the aching sense of loss.

  But then she started remembering the good times. Those were the tricky memories, the ones she usually tried to suppress. Because when she remembered how much she’d loved Caro, and Caro’s pleasure in life, the pain always grew sharper, more cutting. It was easier to remember Caro in her hospital bed than to remember Caro raking the leaves or playing badminton or doing cartwheels in the living room. But today when Caro smiled, Robin smiled with her. When Caro laughed, Robin laughed with her. And while knowing that Caro was gone still hurt, it didn’t lessen the pleasure of the memories.

  Caro was dead, but she had lived, and that was the important thing. She had given Robin so much that Robin hadn’t had the chance to appreciate. She’d given her the strength to face another person’s pain, and courage to search for the right answers. Without that, Robin didn’t know if she could have helped Ashley last night. She might have hung up in anger just at the sound of Ashley’s voice. Or, more likely, she might have panicked, not known what to say, and left Ashley alone, unable to help herself. And then anything could have happened to her. But Robin hadn’t made those mistakes. She had finally been able to help.

  There was nothing she could have done for Caro, she knew. No magic incantations that could have saved her life. And there would probably be a million situations in the future when she would be just as helpless, just as out of control. But she could always know that at least once, she had made a difference. And that was an extraordinarily special feeling.

  She opened her eyes and stared at Ashley’s sad little travel clock. It was close to one, and she was still in bed. So she finally got up, took a shower, and dressed. She’d be going to the hospital later, but first she wanted to see Tim and tell him what had happened. When he answered the phone, she gave him a short version of what had happened since last night.

  “I’ll be right over,” he said. “I’ll meet you downstairs.”

  Robin hung up the phone and realized she no longer wanted to be in her hotel room. She’d rather wait in the lobby, she decided, so she locked the door and took the elevator down. It felt good to be in a public place. As she found a seat in the lobby, she saw Annie enter.

  “I’m waiting for Tim,” Robin told her.

  “Good,” Annie said. “I’ll keep you company until he shows.”

  “I’d like that,” Robin said.

  “You know, I haven’t had a chance to tell you how much I admire what you did last night,” Annie said. “The way you handled Ashley’s phone call.”

  “I did what I had to,” Robin said, but then she smiled. “I do feel good about it, though.”

  “You ought to,” Annie replied. “I left Torey at the hospital so she and Ashley could talk for a while in private. I could see Ashley wanted that.”

  “I’m sure she did,” Robin said. “It was good of you to notice.”

  They sat there silently. “I think you’re pretty terrific,” Annie finally declared. “You’re just about as good as your mother is always telling my mother.”

  Robin laughed. “You hold up your end pretty well also,” she said.

  “I’m glad we’re cousins,” Annie said. “I’m sorry we lost each other, and I’m glad we had a chance to find each other again. I don’t want to lose this feeling.”

  “We won’t,” Robin promised. “There’s been too much loss already. I’m not taking any more.”

  “Good,” Annie said, and gave Robin a hug. “Oh, there’s Tim. I’ll give you a chance to be alone with him now.”

  “Thanks, Annie,” Robin said. Annie got up and walked over to the elevator. Robin walked to the door by herself and joined Tim there.

  They embraced for a moment and then kissed. “I love you,” Tim said. “I love you and I don’t want to lose you, and it’s already Saturday and we have so little time.”

  “We have what we need,” Robin told him. “Come on. Let’s turn a week into forever.”

  Turn the page to continue reading from the Perfect Image series

  Chapter 1

  Annie Stood facing the set and cameras of the Boston Morning television show, waiting for her moment to be one of the guests, and wished with all her heart that she was anywhere else. Even school sounded better than going on television to be interviewed by strangers about her summertime experiences. And the first week of school had been an agony of boredom for her, which was half the reason she’d agreed to be interviewed in the first place. She had spent the week trying to pretend that the summer hadn’t happened, didn’t matter, was just another perfectly ordinary summer, and not the astonishing miracle it had been.

  “Your first time on TV?” someone asked Annie Powell in an obvious effort to relax her.

  “My second,” Annie said, managing a smile at the thought. Her second. Had the first been only a month before? It felt as if it had happened years ago, in a previous lifetime, probably to somebody who had simply borrowed Annie’s body to have a good time.

  “Your second time,” the woman said, giving Annie an encouraging smile. “You’re a pro then.”

  “Right,” Annie said. “This is all old hat to me.”

  The woman, satisfied with Annie’s calm demeanor, walked off. Annie wasn’t surprised. Half her life she’d spent fooling people into thinking she could handle things there was no way she actually could handle. Of course, 95 percent of the time, she did handle them, but that was only out of desperation. When you’re expected to do something, you do it. The alternative was to make a fool of yourself, and that was something Annie was loath to do.

  Take her other time on television. It had been a national cable television show, and all of them—Annie, her cousin Robin, Ashley Boone, and Torey Jones—had been invited to discuss their summer as interns for Image magazine. They’d all been scared before going on, Annie supposed, although at the time she was sure she was the only one suffering from nerves. But when the camera lights turned on, and they were there discussing Image, Annie had held her own. Half of what she’d said had been critical of Image’s editorial policies, but that just added some juice to the conversation. She hadn’t cursed or anything, so what she’d said was fine.

  And then they had sprung a big surprise on the girls. All summer long the interns had been reminded that one of them was going to be on the cover of the February Image. It was the summer intern issue, complete with the girls’ makeovers.

  Annie had suffered for her makeover. She’d spent her first five weeks in New York losing fifteen pounds, on what she regarded as practically a starvation diet. She’d turned down dinner invitations, and half the time when the other girls had gone out for a bite to eat, she’d declined, claiming
to be tired, just so she wouldn’t be tempted. Fifteen pounds lighter, she did indeed look terrific. Worthy of being on the cover of Image.

  And then, on national television, out came one of the Image editors to tell them, and everybody who was watching the television show, that Torey had been selected for the cover. Torey. Even a month later, it was still ironic. Out of the four of them, Torey was the only one who really didn’t care if she made the cover. In fact, Annie suspected Torey regarded it as kind of a nuisance, although she was much too polite to say so.

  “Excited?”

  Annie turned around and saw yet another of the Boston Morning people smiling at her. They smiled so much their faces must hurt by the end of the day.

  “Sure,” Annie said, assuming that was the response they were looking for. No point admitting her mind was on one of the truly major disappointments of her life.

  “There’s nothing to be worried about,” this particular reassurer reassured her. “Dan’s a great interviewer. Just listen to his questions and answer them honestly, and the interview will be a success.”

  “I know,” Annie said. “I’ve been on TV before.”

  “Then you’re an old pro at this sort of thing,” the man said, and walked off to handle some other nerve-stricken guest.

  Annie’s knees were wobbly enough that she figured she’d better sit down until they called her. She sat carefully, trying not to wrinkle her being-interviewed-on-television outfit. She’d worn this very dress the one other time she’d been on television. She’d already put on seven of the fifteen pounds she’d lost, but the dress still fit. The fabulous hairstyle they’d given her for her makeover had long since disappeared as well. It never took Annie long to return to her natural Annie state.

  Still, it had been a kick when Boston Morning had contacted her about being on the show. Annie had called her cousin Robin to tell her that her career as an Image intern still had a little left to it.

  It was funny about her and Robin, Annie thought, as she half watched Dan Patterson interview a local sex therapist. Robin’s mother and hers were twins, and she and Robin were always expected to be close to each other as a result. When they were little kids, they had been, too, or as close as they could be, with Robin’s family living in Ohio and Annie’s outside of Boston. Whenever the families got together, though, she and Robin had always played and confided in each other. There was even a period, when they were both twelve, when they’d actually written letters to each other with a certain amount of regularity. Both Robin and Annie knew just how delighted their mothers were, but the girls maintained their friendship anyway.

  And then the nightmare happened. Robin’s older sister Caro, who had been an idol of Annie’s, was in a car accident, and after two endless weeks, had died. Caro was the only person Annie knew who was consistently nice to her. Caro never teased. She listened to you, and you knew she actually cared, she was interested in you. The world belonged to Caro too. Everybody loved her, and she was bright and beautiful and full of promise. And then, without any reason at all, she was gone.

  Annie knew she would never forget the funeral or that awful sense of futility she’d felt there. There was nothing she could say to Robin, who sat absolutely still, in a state of shock. All the other family members were weeping or cursing or both, and Robin was as still as though she’d been the one to die. And there had been no words that Annie knew to say in comfort or love to her.

  After that, she and Robin had stayed in touch, and seen each other on occasion, but it was only because they were cousins. There was no closeness anymore. Annie was sure Robin must hate her, and she felt self-conscious every time they had to spend time together.

  And then out of thousands of applicants Robin and Annie had both been selected as Image interns. Robin was their photography intern, and Annie was editorial. Image didn’t know they were cousins, and both Robin and Annie were eager that nobody find out. When they’d discovered that Image had assigned them to be roommates, they’d swapped immediately, and Robin had roomed with Ashley, and Annie with Torey.

  But as the summer weeks went by, Annie had realized just how much she liked Robin. They would have been friends if they hadn’t been cousins, and after a while it made no sense not to be friends just because they were cousins. Finally they really talked about Caro and the funeral, and Annie had been able to say the things she hadn’t known how to say three years earlier. Of all the things she was grateful to Image for that glorious summer, the thing that meant the most to Annie was getting close to Robin again.

  Robin had been the perfect person to tell about the Boston Morning appearance. They’d discussed what Annie should wear, and what Annie should say, and how nice it was going to be to be on a television show and not find out you hadn’t been picked for the cover.

  “I really envy you,” Robin had said. “Do you feel a sense of void these days?”

  “Do I ever,” Annie said. “Things are so boring.”

  “I feel like I want to die,” Robin confided. “It’s like being in Oz and then going back to Kansas, and everything is black and white all over again.”

  “I sit in my classes and try to remember that I used to like school,” Annie said. “I used to think school was important, and now it just seems like baby stuff.”

  “I miss the freedom,” Robin said. “I know they watched over our every move, but even so just being in New York gave you so much freedom. And I miss Tim like crazy.”

  Tim had been Robin’s summertime boyfriend. “I miss Harvey too,” Annie said, although if she had to be honest, she thought about him less and less. He seemed almost like a fantasy. But then again, the whole summer was seeming less and less real to her.

  “My first week home was all right,” Robin said. “Everybody fussed over me, and I got to tell all my best stories, and that was fun. But nobody cares anymore, except me, and there’s nobody who asks anymore what things were like, and all I have are my memories, and all this wonderful knowledge about how to take photographs of cupcakes and models, and instead of opening up a studio, and working at what I love, I have to go to school and pretend to be interested in physics and Chaucer. I feel like I’m being tied down.”

  “That’s it,” Annie said. “That’s it exactly. I feel like I’m in bondage.”

  “I keep telling myself things will get better,” Robin said. “After all, I can keep taking pictures, and I’m bound to adjust eventually. And I got my parents to say that I could see Tim over Columbus Day weekend. They only agreed because they’re sure by then I’ll be over him, but I won’t be and I’ll hold them to it, and at least I’ll get out of here, even if it’s only for a weekend. I used to like Ohio too, at least most of the time.”

  “Why don’t you see Tim at his mother’s?” Annie suggested. “Then you and I could both stay at my grandmother’s and we’ll have a chance to visit.”

  “That’s a wonderful idea,” Robin said. “Do you think we could convince Torey to come down too? Long Island can’t be that far from the Catskills. I guess Ashley couldn’t make it, but at least we’d have a little reunion.”

  “I’ll write to Torey and ask her,” Annie promised. “Boy, just the thought of seeing the two of you again makes things seem a little more bearable.”

  “I’m going to do a lot of the photography for our yearbook too,” Robin said. “They won’t let me do all of it, because they said that just wouldn’t be fair, but at least I’ll get a chance to take some pictures again. They’re going to be the best photographs any yearbook ever saw, let me tell you.”

  “I decided against going out for the yearbook,” Annie replied. “They promised me I’d be feature editor of the paper this year, and I figure that should keep me busy enough. I plan to show them a thing or two about editing too. I feel like I know so much, and nobody even cares.”

  “My mother says things’ll get better,” Robin said. “What does your mother say?”

  “She doesn’t say anything,” Annie declared. “I try not to let t
hem see how I feel.”

  “Why not?” Robin asked.

  Annie wasn’t sure she knew how to answer that. “I don’t know,” she finally replied. “I guess it would just bother them and there’s no reason for them to worry.”

  “Whatever works for you,” Robin said. “Anyway, we should probably get off the phone before you end up spending your entire summer’s salary on this phone bill.”

  “You’re right,” Annie said. “I miss you.”

  “You’re not alone,” Robin said. “Let me know how your TV appearance goes. I wish I could be there.”

  “I wish you could too,” Annie said, and forced herself to hang up. Was it possible that their summer in New York was the best time they’d ever have? That didn’t seem fair somehow. Annie didn’t want her life to peak at sixteen.

  “Not much longer,” someone said to Annie, forcing her back to the reality of being in the television studio. “This week’s sex therapist should be over in another ten minutes or so.”

  “Great,” Annie said, and automatically smoothed her dress. She wondered what sorts of questions she was likely to be asked. It had been a thrill when Boston Morning had called to ask her to appear. They were always looking for local young people who had had special experiences, and being an Image intern certainly counted for that. Thousands of girls applied every year, and only four were selected. When one of those four was a hometown girl, then they wanted to hear all about her experiences.

  Annie promised herself that they’d get the interview of a lifetime. Her story, she realized suddenly, was an interesting one. At first she didn’t know if she wanted to say that they’d put her on a diet the minute they saw what she really looked like, so she’d look the way Image thought the average American girl should look. But then she decided she didn’t care. After all, she’d made it. Then she could talk about her and Robin being cousins and interns together. And about Torey, who came from a small town in the Catskills, yet radiated the natural aristocracy of a princess. And she could even offer a censored version of Ashley. It had been a perfect summer, and Annie had been the luckiest of creatures to be allowed to share in it.