Summer Boys

by Hailey Abbott

  The picture had been taken when Jamie was nine. In it, her black hair was even curlier and wilder than it was now, and hung all the way down to her butt. She was dressed in short shorts and a pink tank top, perched on the front stoop of their old house. Her hands hung at her sides, her belly poked out, and her arms and legs were as skinny as twigs. Her eyes were gently tilted like a cat’s.

  There was something reserved about the girl Jamie had been. But she’d also been happy. The look on her face was something so unfamiliar—she was inquisitive, optimistic, innocent, and blissfully naive.

  I’m nothing like that anymore, Jamie thought. She felt like throwing petals at herself.

  Oh God. She sat up, shaking out her ratty, unwashed hair. Ella had been right that day in her room. Jamiewas falling into a void. She had to get out.

  She stood up and headed for the back door, grabbing her cotton sun hat from its peg and walking out into the yard, then down to the water. George’s birthday bonfire wouldn’t be until that night, so she had lots of time to kill.

  There was a border of rocks between the lawn and the shore and Jamie carefully picked her way around the barnacles, stepping onto the sand uncovered by low tide. At this time of day, the ocean that usually backed up to the house was more like a shallow lagoon—a finger of water cutting through the marsh and the dunes.

  Jamie didn’t know she was planning to wade in until she’d taken the first couple of steps. The water was so shallow and clear, she could see the hermit crabs dotting the sand underneath. Each time she bent to pick up one, its eyes and claws disappeared into its shell. She dropped one, then another, behind her, and moved deeper into the water, wading up to her thighs, just below the hem of her overalls. That was as deep as the water went. It then sloped up to the shore across the way.

  Jamie followed the slope, emerging on the other side and picking up her pace. It felt like her legs could carry her on forever if they wanted to, without consulting any other part of her body for permission.

  The shore petered off into a collection of dunes, dotted with patches of sea grass. It was all private property, but Jamie trudged through them, anyway. She made it so far into the dunes that when she did a 360, she couldn’t see any houses anywhere. She wondered what it would be like to yell at the top of her lungs.

  When she emerged on a new stretch of beach, she kept walking. Eventually, sea grass became houses—a Spanish-style terra-cotta villa, two ranches. And finally, Ethan’s house.

  She climbed the stairs of the deck and cupped her hands against the glass, staring in. The house was empty and immaculate. She knew Ethan was away for the writing course, but his parents were probably still in town. She walked back to the railing, leaned on it, and stared out at the water, thinking. Then she walked over to the Weber grill and knelt beside it, feeling underneath for the magnetic compartment. She slid it open, and pulled out the silver key inside, feeling strangely calm.

  When she cracked open the door, its echo bounced back at her. She wiped her feet on the mat before stepping inside, her heart pounding in her ears. I’m a stalker. She carefully closed the door behind her and walked upstairs.

  Ethan’s room was sparse—a single bed with a plain off-white comforter, a metal bookshelf he’d put together himself. His books lay all over the place, facedown and pages open, dog-eared and stacked in random piles.

  Jamie sat down on his bed gently, as if it might collapse underneath her. She lay back, listened to the sounds of the empty house and then, relaxing, pulled the covers around her. They still smelled faintly like Ethan. She lay there for several minutes, letting herself hurt. And then she pushed herself out of bed. Being here was worse than lying around at home. She walked back into the hallway and down to the kitchen, then down to the den.

  The Millennium Falcon was in its usual spot on the table. Jamie slid onto the couch and stared at it. It stared back at her.

  “What are you looking at?” she asked darkly.

  Jamie nibbled on her pinky. She leaned toward it, picked it up and held it in her hands. She studied the places where tiny dots of clear glue stuck everything together. There must have been hundreds of miniature plastic parts, all connected intricately to make the final product. It was beautiful. She was mesmerized by the thought and effort that had obviously gone into it—she could see the places where he must have had to use tweezers to put the pieces together.

  She put her finger on the little door on the left side. And then she pulled it off.

  Wow, that felt good, she thought.

  She stood up, pulling the pieces off one by one, gently at first, and then carelessly. Using both hands, she snapped the bridge in half. She crunched up the pieces in her fingers. The rest she dropped onto the floor. She didn’t even realize she was crying until she looked down at the blurry mess at her feet.Shit. She let out a small moan, and swooped down to gather up the pieces. She dumped the splinters in handfuls onto the coffee table, then ran upstairs to the kitchen. Everybody had glue. Every family in the world had glue.

  It was stupid, of course. Glue wouldn’t do any good. She looked through two drawers, then gave up, walking back downstairs and sinking onto the couch.

  “I’m such a psycho,” she said out loud. She was mortified, as if Ethan and his family were standing there watching her have her breakdown.

  She frantically tried to find a way out of this situation. What if she just took the pieces? That way, he’d think he’d taken it home, or that it had been misplaced, or something. No, he’d know exactly where he’d left it, wouldn’t he? But at least he wouldn’t see what she’d done.

  She just had to fix it. She cast her eyes about the den. Maybe he still had the box it came in. Maybe it had instructions.

  She ran back upstairs to his room and whipped his closet door open. Then she got on her knees and swung an arm under his bed. Her hand slapped against a cardboard box and she pulled it out. It wasn’t the box for the kit. It was a box of Ethan’s writings. Jamie leaned forward on her knees, lifting out a handful of paper. She was still sniffling. She rubbed at her nose with her arm and separated the top sheet from the pile, reading it.

  What can be said?

  The great arboreal oak is dead.

  Behind my house it fell today

  And more I cannot say

  Because I’m lost in apathy, and you in ignominy.

  I do not care for thee, my memory of tree.

  Jamie remembered this one. Ethan had shown it to her last summer with particular pride, and she’d been impressed with the big words, which she would never have used in her own poetry. She scratched at her runny nose. Somehow, the poem seemed kind of stupid right now. Pretentious.

  She sifted through the papers, pulling out another she remembered, one that was about her. She’d been sitting on Ethan’s deck, drinking lemonade and drawing the ocean when he’d written it. Jamie remembered feeling so flattered.

  She leans back, a goddess drinking nectar

  Aphrodite or maybe Demeter

  Sketching summer on her palette

  The nectar summer on her palate

  Her hair a mass of sea grass

  And Poseidon in her eyes

  Jamie started flipping through the poems more quickly, the disaster downstairs momentarily forgotten. Not one of Ethan’s poems failed to include either Greek mythology or words likearboreal. Jamie had never noticed before how overblown it came across.

  Finally, she laid the papers down, confused. Carefully, she tucked everything back into its place and slid the box under the bed. She stood up and drifted away, ghostlike.

  At the top of the den stairs, she paused. She could still go down and pick up the pieces of the destroyed model. She could just make the whole thing disappear, and maybe Ethan would never suspect her of being the one who’d made it happen.

  But she turned back into the kitchen instead.

  Silently, she slipped out the back door, leaving the mess where it lay.

  20

  Ella stood
in front of the mirror, pumping the applicator of her mascara in and out of the tube. She never went to a bonfire without mascara. It made her eyes stand out in the dark. Finally, she got enough on the wand to coat the lashes of both eyes. She leaned back and studied herself, smiling.

  She’d gone through four outfits so far. As frustrating as it was to change so many times, she felt a little charge at thinking she was dressing for Peter. Pulling the clothes off, tugging them on, all with his face on her mind, made her feel sexy. Now she stood in just the cranberry strapless demi-bra and a pair of short shorts, admiring her body. She didn’t know why she was wearing the new lingerie, except that she was riding a wave since what had happened at the park, and the wave required her to wear sultry stuff.

  After putting on the black halter top she’d finally decided on, she walked out into the hall. “Kels?”

  Her sister hadn’t even started getting ready yet and the bonfire began in five minutes. PMS was a definite possibility. It was one of Kelsi’s few imperfections—she got it bad. Maybe she wouldn’t go to the party at all. That would be a blessing , Ella thought. It had been misery being around Kelsi all week, ever since what had happened at the haunted house.

  Every night since Peter and she had shared their taboo kiss, whenever Ella was lying in her bed, Peter occupied her mind as a separate entity from Kelsi—like there were no strings attached. He just seemed so right for Ella, so meant for her.

  But, in the daylight, when Ella looked at Kelsi, she felt different. The guilty knowledge that she’d betrayed her sister was weighing heavily on her. She hadn’t been sleeping. She’d hardly been eating. Her body temperature ran in hot and cold waves. But she knew if she had the chance to kiss Peter again, she’d do it in a heartbeat.

  She walked toward the other end of the house, into the kitchen. Kelsi was there, sitting on a chair against the wall, talking on the phone, looking down at her feet. She was rolling her toes against the hardwood floor, saying “No,” “Uh-huh,” and “Yes,” solemnly.

  Ella poked her head into the living room, where her father was reading the newspaper. “Who’s she talking to?” she asked.

  He shrugged, looking uncomfortable. Ella knew that whenever there was drama involving either of his daughters, he tended to check out.

  Ella listened to Kelsi’s voice echoing down the hall. “I can’t say over the phone.…” Kelsi whispered. The chair squeaked as it was pushed across the linoleum. And then there was the loud click of the phone being replaced on the hook. Ella hurried back to her bedroom and sat on her bed. Kelsi’s footsteps sounded down the hall, and she appeared in the bedroom doorway. Her eyes were wide and bewildered. Her shoulders were stooped when she sat down on the bed.

  “Kelsi?” Ella touched her arm. “Kels, what’s wrong?”

  Kelsi stared at her knees for a long time. She shook her head. “I broke up with Peter.”

  Ella’s hand flew to her mouth. “Oh God.” Her first impulse was to hug her sister. She wrapped her arms around Kelsi before she could even begin to process the information.

  “He said if I wasn’t ready to take the relationship to the next level, he wasn’t interested.” Kelsi pressed her left hand against her forehead. “Can you believe that? I mean, can you believe how cliché?”

  Ella kept holding her sister tightly.

  “He said he was tired of waiting.” She stared at the mirror in front of them. “I told him he was an asshole.”

  Ella’s heart was pounding while different thoughts vied for a position in her brain. Kelsi had actually called someone an asshole. Kelsi wasn’t with Peter anymore. Kelsi and Peter hadn’t had sex. Her mind flew to the French cancan ensemble Kelsi had bought. “But, I thought you were going to…”

  Kelsi’s shoulders heaved. “I thought I was, too, but then I changed my mind. I mean, I started to feel that that was all he wanted from me, and there’s no way…That’s not how I want it to be the first time.” She fell back on the bed, her eyes went glassy, and tears started to dribble out and roll down the sides of her face. Ella had never seen her sister so ill-composed.

  “Kels, I’m so sorry.” She really, really was.

  “It’s okay.” Kelsi pinched the area between her eyebrows with her thumb and forefinger. She sniffed. “I don’t think I’m gonna go to the bonfire.”

  “Yeah, of course,” Ella said, curling up next to her. “Do you want me to stay with you?”

  “No,” Kelsi whimpered. “I’d rather you go. Make an excuse for me. If he shows up…”

  “He won’t show up.” He wouldn’t, would he?

  “But if he does, looking for me or something, just tell him I went away for the weekend. I don’t care. I just don’t want him to come here.”

  Ella nodded. She wanted to stay. She wanted to go. She wanted to see Peter so badly now, worse than she had before, and she hated that.

  “I really just want to be alone,” Kelsi said, sniffling. “I don’t know why I’m crying. I guess I wanted him to be the one. But he’s not right. He can’t be the first one for me.”

  Ella looked around the room, searching for her favorite silky pillow. It was lying beside her bed. She picked it up and tucked it between Kelsi’s arms.

  Kelsi rested her cheek on it. “Thanks, El.” She looked skinny and frail and beautiful. Ella turned off the light and turned on the fan so that Kelsi would be more comfortable.

  In the hallway, Ella checked herself one last time in the mirror. On top of all the other emotions racing through her body—elation, sympathy, and nervousness—she felt something nagging and angry gnawing at her insides. It was half covered up by her wondering if she looked okay, in case Peter really did show. It wasn’t something she wanted to think about.

  But if she had stopped to dissect it, it wouldn’t have taken long to figure out that—at least a little—she was hating herself.

  “Where is everybody?”

  Beth was the only one at the bonfire when Ella arrived. Ella looked at her watch. It was 9:43.

  “Who knows?” Beth said. She sounded pissed. “You want a beer? Thanks for getting it, by the way.” She popped open a blue cooler and held out a can of Bud Lite. Ella took it and sat on the sand. She looked both ways down the beach.

  “Where’s Kelsi?” Beth asked, drawing a frowning face in the damp sand with a stick.

  Ella cast around for an excuse. She didn’t know what Kelsi would want her to say. “She’s not feeling well. Cramps.”

  “That sucks. But she’ll be okay. It’s not something a little Advil can’t cure,” Beth said, sounding annoyed.

  Ella bit her lip. Beth had made her and Kelsi promise they were coming. Now even George, the birthday boy, wasn’t here, and Beth’s expression—in the flickering, meager light of the fire—was thunderous. The air was so thick with the moisture of impending rain that Ella’s skin felt damp, reminding her she should have worn something warmer. Maybe the night was doomed in general.

  “Well, here’s somebody,” Beth said, looking inland to where the houses met the beach. Ella turned and her heart caught in her throat. Peter was coming toward them with one hand in his shorts pocket, the other holding a cigarette. He was wearing a baseball cap, and as he walked, the breeze blew his loose navy blue T-shirt, exposing a tiny sliver of tan stomach. He tapped the cigarette as he arrived at the edge of the fire.

  “Hey,” he muttered, his eyes on Ella.

  “Kelsi’s not feeling well,” Beth offered. “She’s back at the house.”

  “Okay.” Peter sat down next to Ella and without waiting for an offer, pulled the lid off the cooler and grabbed a beer. Beth stared at him, her head tilted quizzically.

  Anybody else would have made small talk, or made some excuse about why he was here with people he didn’t know when his girlfriend wasn’t coming. But Peter just cracked open his beer and stared at Ella while Beth stared at him.

  “Well, in case you’re wondering where the rest of the crew is, Peter,” Beth said dryly, breaking the silence,
“George and Cara are probably fooling around somewhere. Jamie is most likely hiding in her bed.”

  “Oh, yeah?”

  “We knew we could count on Ella here. She’s always up for a good time,” Beth said.

  The way Peter smirked when Beth said this reminded Ella of every place where her skin met the silk of her lingerie. Peter stubbed out his cigarette and took a couple of long gulps of beer.

  “Well, I’m gonna head down the beach,” he said, standing up. “Thanks for the beer.”

  He gave a casual wave before sticking his free hand back in his pocket, and then he started walking. Ella’s gut wrenched. Kelsi had gotten small in her mind over the past few minutes, and Peter had gotten big. Now it seemed like the line that always stood between Peter and her had vanished. She was free to do what she wanted.

  Ella eyed Beth, who was staring off into space. It would be beyond suspicious if she followed him.

  “That guy’s weird,” Beth said flippantly, flopping onto her back, her blonde hair spilling out behind her on the sand.

  “I forgot something,” Ella said, standing up abruptly.

  “What?” Beth asked.

  “Um, I have to go to the bathroom.”

  “You forgot you had to go to the bathroom?”

  “Yep. I’ll be back.” She started backing away. She ignored the disappointment on Beth’s face. There were much bigger things she could feel guilty about.

  Ella headed up the beach toward the cottages, the opposite direction that Peter had gone, checking first to make sure his car was still in the parking lot. Once she reached the lot, she walked an extra block inland, then doubled back along a street that ran parallel to the ocean. Her breath was coming in short gasps, like when she used to play hide-and-seek as a kid. She didn’t turn back toward the beach until she was sure she’d passed the bonfire. Then she headed down to the sand and pulled off her platform flip-flops. The light was dim, with the sky being so cloudy, but the street lamps helped illuminate the beach. For as far as she could see in either direction, it was empty. Had she gone too far?