By Summer's End

by Pamela Morsi

  He smiled. It felt like the first time he’d smiled in a week.

  She was practicing her signature. She’d said that she was done with him, but she was still dreaming of a future together.

  He was going to make sure that happened.

  In the other room the sound of water stopped. Guilty, Sonny stepped away from the table to stand in the middle of the room. He could hear her movements.

  “We’re getting low on toilet paper again,” Dawn called out. “What they have at the cafeteria is so cheap it’s hardly worth taking. Do you think you could get some from the arena?”

  Sonny knew the question wasn’t for him, but he answered it anyway.

  “No, but I could pick some up at the convenience store on the corner,” he replied.

  There was an instant of complete stillness. Then Dawn stood in the bedroom doorway clad only in two towels, one around her body and the other twisted on her hair. She didn’t look happy.

  “What are you doing in here?”

  “You invited me in.”

  “I thought you were Teresa’s boyfriend.”

  “I don’t even know Teresa,” he answered. “But I’m your boyfriend.”

  She shook her head. “Sonny, no…” she began.

  “I’ve heard your whole story,” he interrupted. “I know that you’ve been lying to me. And I know how you operate. When things get tough, you just run away. But you can’t run away from how much I love you, Dawn. Those kinds of feelings always catch up to you.”

  “Oh, Sonny,” she said. “You should have just cut your losses and moved on.”

  “You and me together, there’s no loss in that. It’s all win-win.”

  She shook her head. “With me, Sonny, it’s more often lose-lose.”

  “Not anymore,” he said. “That’s all behind you.”

  “It is me,” she insisted. “I can never settle down, never be happy. Can never have anyone long-term or let them have me.”

  “I refuse to believe that,” he told her. “You’ve loved me for months. I know you want to be with me, not just now, but forever. Without you, I just feel like the best part of me is missing.”

  Her expression was tender, almost tearful.

  “Sonny, that is the sweetest thing anyone has ever said,” she told him. “But it just won’t work.”

  “Why not?”

  “Your mother hates me.”

  He didn’t deny it, but he shrugged. “From what I hear, you’re not crazy about her, either.”

  “I was really nasty to her,” Dawn admitted.

  “You both love me,” he said. “Eventually that will have to bring you together.”

  “I don’t think life works that way,” she said.

  “It does, Dawn,” he promised. “I know that eventually it does.”

  “I don’t think we have that much time,” she said.

  “We have our whole lives.”

  She sighed heavily and shook her head.

  “I’m pregnant,” Dawn stated flatly.

  Sonny felt his jaw drop open, but no words came out.

  In a perfect world, Sonny thought, he would have continued to date Dawn as he finished college. His parents would have had more time to get to know her, to become accustomed to her, to realize that their impressions of her might be wrong. But Dawn and Sonny didn’t live in a perfect world.

  “I guess that’s why I got so mad at your mother,” Dawn continued. “I was already terrified of losing you. In my whole life I’ve never loved anybody as much as I do you. But I’d made so much stuff up, I’d told so many lies. I knew it would be impossible to convince you I hadn’t gotten pregnant on purpose.”

  “I would never have thought that.”

  She shrugged. “Well, it doesn’t matter,” she said. “I’ve already decided that I’m not going to expect anything from you. I’m keeping the baby, but you don’t need to be a part of it. I’m leaving town as soon as I can get a little money together. You won’t ever even hear from me again.”

  She turned and walked back into the bedroom.

  Sonny hesitated only a minute before following her.

  Dawn was perched in front of the vanity on a swivel stool. She’d removed the towel from her wet hair. It lay along her shoulders, a mass of twists and tangles. She grabbed up a comb and began a determined, almost angry attack on the snagged mass.

  He walked up and stood behind her, watching her face in the mirror. His mother was not right about her. She could care for another person, she could form a loving bond. But very ordinary hope, that most of the people in the world took for granted, was not something she’d experienced. She expected rejection, to be unloved, to be alone.

  Sonny took the comb out of her hand and began easing it through the mess of curls.

  “You’re not a blonde anymore,” he said.

  Dawn nodded. “I thought I’d try brunette for a while, hoping no one would recognize me,” she said. “Sometimes I think that the only thing I can change about my life is my hair color.”

  He continued to comb. Sonny had caressed her many times, but he never touched her as he did now, with such casual intimacy and purpose. Slowly, gently, with deliberate intent to cause not a pain or pull, he sorted out the mess of knots and snarls and laid the smoothed tresses on her bare shoulders.

  For a while she watched him. Then she closed her eyes. He didn’t know if she was trying to blot out the sight or memorize it for a lifetime.

  “Your world is about to change a lot,” he said.

  Dawn looked up at him and acknowledged that truth with a careless shrug.

  “It’ll be great,” she insisted. “I’ll go to a new town, maybe even a new state. Nobody will know me. I can start all over.”

  Sonny nodded.

  “Okay, if that’s what you want,” he said. “I’d better get packing.”

  “Packing?”

  “I’m coming with you,” he said. “If you’re leaving town, then we’re leaving town.”

  Dawn shook her head.

  “No, Sonny,” she said. “You don’t have to do that.”

  “I know I don’t have to do it,” he said. “I want to do it.”

  “You have a life here,” Dawn insisted. “You have family here and a future here.”

  Sonny spun the stool around and squatted down beside her. He laid his hand on her breast. “Dawn, this is my life, my future, my family. In your heart is the only place I want to be. And I want to be there always.”

  “Oh, Sonny,” she said, her eyes glistening with tears. “I could never forget you.”

  He took a deep breath. He went for the brass ring. Everything he wanted in life seemed to be hanging on it.

  “Marry me, Dawn,” he said. “Marry me and live your life with me. We can stay or we can go. I just want to be with you. I don’t care if it’s here in Knoxville or in Kuala Lumpur.”

  “Kuala where? Is that the place with the little bears?”

  “No, the koala bears are in Australia. Kuala Lumpur is somewhere else. Dawn, please say yes,” he pleaded.

  He could see her hesitating.

  He knew she was afraid. It was so hard for her to trust. But that afternoon, that moment, she took a leap of faith.

  “Okay.”

  Dawn and Sonny Leland were married in the Knox County Courthouse with only the judge’s clerical assistants as witnesses. Despite what anyone else may have thought or imagined, both were very happy.

  REAL LIFE

  9

  “What are you staring at, geek head?”

  Sierra’s question jerked me out of my faraway fantasy.

  “Nothing,” I replied.

  “What are you doing out here?”

  I was sitting in the cushioned metal glider on the front porch.

  “I’m watching for Mom,” I answered.

  “She’s still not back from the doctor, huh?” Sierra said, as if she’d just noticed.

  “No.”

  “How long can it take to pee in a cu
p?”

  I rolled my eyes and sighed. “She’s not pregnant.”

  “I bet she is.”

  “I asked her and she said no.”

  “She’s in denial.”

  “You don’t know anything.”

  “Oh, yeah, right,” Sierra scoffed. “I don’t know anything. Unlike Baby Kota, who knows it all.”

  “Don’t call me Kota!” I insisted angrily.

  “Kota. Kota. Kota,” she snottily repeated my most despised nickname.

  One of the Sonnys had given me that name. He was the freckled guy with the big monster truck. I liked him and I thought Kota sounded cute, so I encouraged everybody to call me that. Until one of my nine-year-old classmates transformed it to Kota-X and ultimately to Kotex. I tried to shut that twerp up, but couldn’t. Everybody in school caught on. I lived miserably as a sanitary napkin for almost all of fourth grade. When we moved, I threatened Sierra on pain of death never to refer to me as Kota again.

  I raised my fist with the intention of socking her right in the shin. Unfortunately, I was distracted by the sound of a car slowing in front of the house. I stopped in midmotion and turned, expecting Mom.

  One of those cool little hybrid sedans pulled into the driveway next door. A man got out. He was an ordinary guy, a business kind of guy, wearing tan slacks, a white shirt and tie. Glancing up at us, he gave a friendly wave as if he knew us.

  I was so surprised, I didn’t respond. Sierra, however, waved back with enthusiasm.

  “All right!” she said to me. “Great-looking hunk living next door. This town is improving.”

  I gazed up at my sister in stupefaction. “He’s just some old guy,” I pointed out.

  “So is Matthew McConaughey,” Sierra pointed out. “But with the right clothes and haircut, he’s straight up dishy.”

  I honestly didn’t see it, but I kept looking anyway.

  He opened the back door of the car and a minute later a kid emerged. The boy was blond, skinny, wearing jean shorts and a Wesley Center Day Camp T-shirt. He looked up at us, too.

  What a dork! I thought. He was nearly as tall as me, but he still sat in the back seat with child locks.

  “Bummer!” Sierra said behind me with a sigh. “You’d know the cute ones are already taken. And in this town, how many cute ones can there be?”

  She was obviously still talking about the kid’s father. Having lost interest, Sierra went back inside the house. I watched as the two conversed on the driveway. The boy shot a couple of surreptitious looks in my direction, shaking his head. His father apparently overruled him and he followed reluctantly as they headed in my direction.

  Immediately I sat up straighter wondering what I’d done or why they were coming my way.

  “Hi, there!” the man called out still halfway across the lawn.

  “Hi.” My reply was a little less enthusiastic.

  He came right up to the edge of the porch.

  “I’m Del Tegge,” he said. He looked like he wanted to offer his hand, but with me not moving one inch in his direction, he shoved them into his pockets, trying to be casual.

  “This is my son, Spencer.”

  “Hi,” I repeated.

  There was a moment of uncomfortable hesitation. Sierra was right, the guy was nice looking in a parent kind of way. His hair was thinning in the front, but it was neatly parted and still looked good. His eyes were bright and inquisitive, as if the whole world were fascinating. He was wearing Dockers and a neatly pressed button-down sport shirt. This was definitely not a tattoos and beer-belly kind of guy. This was someone’s dad. For that alone, I immediately liked him.

  “So, you’re a friend of Vern and Phrona?” he asked.

  A yes seemed the obvious answer since I was sitting on their porch steps, but then again I could have been a cat burglar casing the joint.

  “They’re…they’re my grandparents.”

  It felt strange to say that, strange to hear it out loud. And it sure looked as if it came as strange news to the Del Tegge guy. His mouth dropped open so far, he would have lost his teeth if they hadn’t been attached.

  “I…I didn’t know they had children,” he said.

  “My dad died before I was born,” I told him.

  “Oh, I’m sorry,” he responded automatically, as if it had something to do with him.

  I shrugged and turned my attention to the kid. He was as resistible close up as he’d been at a distance. His features were delicate, almost feminine. His mouth was bulging with a latticework of shiny gray metal. He couldn’t meet my eyes. He knew he was a dork. He also knew that his dad was about to humiliate him and there was nothing he could do to stop it.

  “You’re here for a summer visit?” Del asked.

  “Yeah, I guess we’ll be here awhile,” I answered.

  “That’s great! Spence is here with me for the summer,” he said, clapping his son on the shoulder in a camaraderie fashion. “He hasn’t met very many people, so he has nobody to play with here in the neighborhood.”

  Humiliation complete. He’d not only branded Spence as friendless, but the suggestion that anyone of his age would “play” was proclaiming lameness extraordinaire.

  I almost felt sorry for him. Almost.

  “How old are you?” the man asked me.

  “Thirteen.”

  “Spence is eleven,” he told me. “But he’s tall for his age and very bright. He was the youngest entrant to make it to the city-wide science fair.”

  “Science guy, huh?” I said, taking pity on the poor schmuck. “Sure, we can play together some time. We’ll play science, that’s always fun.”

  The kid knew I was blowing. He nodded. It was a weird kind of nod, head down, fatalistic, nothing positive about it.

  But the father smiled, really pleased.

  He had a nice smile. I was glad that I had bothered, even if it was a lie.

  “Great! Great,” he said. “I was hoping Spence would find a friend. I never expected it to be the girl next door.”

  He laughed, like it was a little joke. I managed a warm grin.

  “Yeah, sure,” I continued, more genuinely. “I don’t have any friends here, either. I just have my sister. Maybe she can hang with us, too.”

  The kid’s head was still down, but he was looking up at me.

  “I can’t do it today though,” I told them. “My mom had to go out and she expects me to be waiting here for her when she gets back. But soon, maybe tomorrow or some other time.”

  “Sure, that’s great,” the man said.

  A little clumsily they said goodbye.

  “Bye Del,” I said. “See ya around, Spencer.”

  I watched them walk to their own house and go inside. Spence never looked back. That was good. The kid knew the score. The dad didn’t have a clue. But that was all right. What dads didn’t know couldn’t hurt them. The kid was a real loser. Science geeks usually are, and I can speak from experience on that. As long as the dad didn’t know, then he could be cool with the kid. He could be proud.

  I continued to sit there for a few more minutes. I was wishing that I could finish my book, wondering if there was a library. I still didn’t know where there was a bus line, but all that had taken a back seat to wondering about Mom, out there in Knoxville somewhere in her funeral suit.

  As time stretched on, my imagination was beginning to run wild with speculation…. Somebody’d run a red light and she was lying in the street injured…. The doctor had mistaken her for someone else and she’d be rushed into surgery to amputate a healthy leg…. She’d dumped us here, she was never coming back….

  When the Dodge came cruising up the street, I jumped to my feet. Mom was driving a little too fast and when she turned into the driveway, she jumped the curb. I’d seen some of her boyfriends do worse, but Mom was always very careful with the car. We always needed it for our getaways.

  She came to a stop at the side of the house, just out of my line of vision. I waited, expecting to hear the car door slam fol
lowed by the sound of her heels on the driveway heading in my direction. Nothing. I stood up and leaned forward to see if she’d driven around to the back, maybe to go in through the kitchen. No, the car was just sitting there in the driveway.

  Curious, I approached.

  Mom was sitting in the driver’s seat, her arms across the steering wheel, her head down resting on them. I walked around the car to the open window next to her. Inside me a scared, sinking feeling began to take hold. It was hot outside, but I began to tremble as if I were cold, my teeth were chattering.

  “Mom?”

  She jerked upright. I’d startled her. Her eyes were red and swollen and awash with tears.

  I froze at the sight. It wasn’t as if I’d never seen Mom cry. She often cried during breakups with boyfriends and occasionally she’d boo-hoo at a sappy movie. But this was different. I don’t know how I knew that, but I knew it.

  “What are you doing here?”

  She said it as if it were some accusation.

  “I’m waiting for you.”

  She wiped her eyes on the back of her hand, opened the door and grabbed her purse. She’d given up on the gray jacket in the heat of the afternoon, but she still looked very un-Mom-like in the plain gray skirt and a white shell blouse.

  “What did the doctor say?”

  We were walking along the driveway. Ignoring my question, she wrapped her arm around my shoulder and kissed me on the top of my head.

  “What have you been up to today?” she asked.

  “Mostly just waiting for you,” I told her. “I met the neighbors, played with the dog. But mostly I just waited for you.”

  Together we walked around the car and across the lawn toward the front door.

  “Where’s your sister?” she asked.

  I shrugged.

  “General Hospital, People’s Court, some serious, unhappy place out there in TV land,” I answered.

  Mom laughed a little. I hoped she would.

  “Sierra does love her daytime drama,” she said. “But TV on a day like this. That’s just an absolute waste.”

  “Yeah, I guess so.”

  “You girls need to get out and explore the city,” Mom said. “Would you like that? Knoxville is a really nice place to be a kid.”