A Summer to Remember

by Jessica Gunhammer

  “What about girls from Brant?” I took a sip of my soda.

  “Same thing. They come and go. You’re the first serious relationship I’ve had since Kim.” It made me feel a little better hearing him say he’d only had one other serious girlfriend before me.

  “Well, what about Sam?” My heart began to race. I didn’t want to ask, but I knew we had to lay it all out on the table before we could put it behind us.

  “Sam and I met the summer going into my sophomore year at Brant during one of Shane’s parties. We hung out one night and then it sort of turned into a summer thing. At the end of the summer, she went to Florida, where she goes to school, and we continued on with our regular lives. When she’d come back again in the summer, we’d end up seeing each other and things just kind of picked up where they left off. Over Christmas break when she came back, I found out she was seeing one of my teammates behind my back and I freaked out. I couldn’t really get mad at her because we never considered ourselves official, but after that, things were never the same.” Knowing everything he just told me made me feel a little better, but it also made me sick to my stomach knowing they had so much history together.

  “Then why did she seem so happy to see you?”

  “She was drunk. After you left, I went into the kitchen to get a drink and I heard her telling her friends that after she found out I was with you, she decided she wanted to try and start things up with me again.” The waitress came to back to our table and brought our salads.

  “Did you say anything to her?”

  “I told her she was out of her mind and things between her and I could never work out. Even if you left me, I would never be able to be with someone like her again. I can’t see myself being with anyone other than you.” He reached across the table and grabbed my hand. “I love you, Ava, I really do, and I’ll do whatever it takes to get you to trust me.”

  “I love you, too. Even if you’ll be leaving me in a few weeks.” The thought of him leaving always found a way to cross my mind.

  “I really wish you would just come with me.” He rubbed the top of my hand with his thumb.

  “I can’t. I’m already enrolled at Brant and I’m not ready for that yet. That is a big step to take and we’re still trying to work out this whole thing. I can’t just up and leave before we work out the kinks we have in our relationship. Moving is stressful and so is finding a job and new friends and a new school. It wouldn’t help our situation.”

  “You’re right. I’m just really going to miss you.” He squeezed my hand.

  “I’ll miss you, too. We just have to remember, if it’s meant to be, it’ll work itself out.” I was feeling more relieved after our conversation and more confident. This was right, for now. I was going to have to learn to trust Adrian more and enjoy what little time we had left.

  “Then we don’t have anything to worry about.”

  Chapter 24

  It felt good to be waking up in his arms again. I was a little disappointed knowing that this would be the last day we’d be spending together before he was going to be working all week again. I loved hanging out with Lily but I always wished I had a little more time with Adrian. I felt like the time he spent working was wasting time we could be spending together but I knew he needed the money before the move.

  Since he always made me breakfast in the morning, I decided it was my turn to return the favor. I had to carefully slip out from under his arm. I grabbed my pink robe off the hook behind the bedroom door and pulled it on.

  “Where are you going?” he asked sleepily, barely opening his eyes enough to see me.

  “I’m just going to the bathroom. I’m coming right back,” I lied.

  “Okay.” He turned over and was out in a matter of seconds.

  I tip-toed out of the room, closed the door quietly behind me, and went into the kitchen. I pulled some biscuits out of the fridge and pre-heated the oven. I knew biscuits and gravy were his favorite breakfast, so I had picked up the ingredients when I went grocery shopping last week. I put the biscuits in the oven, pulled a frying pan out of the cabinet, and started cooking the sausage. It didn’t take long before the smell of sausage lured Adrian out of the bedroom.

  “Is that biscuits and gravy you’re making?” He yawned and stretched on his way over.

  “How did you know?” I grinned.

  “I would recognize that smell anywhere. And I may or may not have noticed we just so happened to have all the ingredients to make it.” He kissed me softly on the forehead.

  “I guess someone might notice that.” I laughed as I dumped the sausage bits into the gravy. “Breakfast is served!” We dished up and took our plates to the couch.

  “So what do you think about going to dinner with my parents tonight?” He stuffed a fork full of food into his mouth.

  “Tonight?” I almost choked on my food.

  “Yes, tonight.” He smirked at my reaction.

  “A little short notice, don’t you think?” I wiped the gravy from the corners of my mouth.

  “Well, I was going to tell you Friday night, but, yeah.” He paused to take another bite. “I already made plans with them, but I can cancel if you want me to.”

  “No, that’s fine.” I could feel my stomach turning with nervousness. I suddenly didn’t feel so hungry.

  “Don’t look so stressed out. They’ll love you.” He placed his hand on my knee. “I promise.”

  When dinnertime rolled around I wore a black knee-length dress with a scoop neck and quarter-length sleeves. It was the most conservative thing I had. I put my hair up in a neat bun on top of my head and slipped on a pair of heels just before we went out the door.

  We walked down the stairs of the apartment and through the small backyard. There wasn’t anything special about it. It had a chain-link fence and there weren’t any trees or bushes, just some small shrubs by the deck. We walked up the two steps on the deck and Adrian slid open the sliding glass door and gestured for me to go in before him. I walked into the dining room. The space was tight, so I took a few more steps in so Adrian could come in and close the door.

  I glanced around the room. We were standing in a small dining area. To the right was the kitchen, which had the same wood floor as the one we were standing on, and in front of us was the living room. There was a staircase that led to the second floor.

  “Mom! Dad! You guys ready?” Adrian yelled through the house.

  “We’ll be down in a second!” a lady’s voice responded from upstairs.

  “Let me show you around.” We walked around the downstairs of the house while we waited for his parents. The hallway was lined with all sorts of family pictures and it led to a bathroom and two bedrooms. He pointed out his brothers and sisters to me and with each photo he had a story to tell about when they were kids.

  “We’re ready,” a lady’s voice said from behind us.

  “Hey Mom, Dad, this is Ava.” I plastered on my best smile and I tried to hide the fact that I was extremely nervous. “This is my mom, Cheryl.” He gestured to the lady standing in front of me. I reached out and shook her hand. She was shorter than me with natural blonde shoulder-length hair and blue eyes. You’d never be able to tell she had five kids with her petite frame. She wore blue jeans and a nice purple top. “And this is my dad, Craig.”

  “Nice to meet you guys.” Craig was tall and had dark tanned skin. You could tell he’d spent a lot of years working out in the sun. He had a thick gray mustache and matching gray hair that stuck out from under his baseball cap. He wore blue jeans and a nice green and black button down collared shirt.

  “So you must be the owner of the mystery vehicle in the driveway,” Craig joked. I could feel my checks becoming warm.

  “Yes, that would be me.”

  “We’ve heard a lot about you.” Cheryl smiled at Adrian.

  “Good things, I hope.” I looked at Adrian.

  “Of course.” He smiled at me. “You guys ready to go?”

  “Yep. I just have
to grab my purse,” his mom answered.

  It didn’t take long before we were at the restaurant. When we got inside, we sat at a tall table in the bar. I felt a little overdressed, but it was better to be safe than sorry.

  “So your parents don’t mind that you two are living together?” Cheryl asked after the waitress took our orders and collected our menus.

  “I thought they would, but when we told them, they were a lot more understanding than I thought they would be.” Adrian grabbed my hand and I smiled at him. Craig wasn’t paying much attention to our conversation. He was busy drinking his beer and watching the baseball game on the big screen behind us.

  “Are you close with your family?” she asked.

  “Yes.” I nodded and took a drink of my soda. “Very close, actually.”

  “How do they feel about you moving to Florida?” I looked at Adrian, trying to figure out the best way to answer this question.

  “Actually, she’s not going to Florida. She’s staying here since she’s already enrolled at Brant.” I was relieved Adrian answered for me.

  “Really?” Cheryl sounded surprised.

  “Just for the semester!” I blurted out. Adrian looked over at me with a confused look on his face. “I mean, I’m just enrolled at Brant for the semester, and we’ll see where things go from there.” I couldn’t believe I just said that out loud. I wasn’t really thinking of going to Florida, or I didn’t think I was. It crossed my mind, but I didn’t want to say anything or make any decisions until the semester was over.

  “Good for you guys. Long distance relationships can be hard, but if you really want to, you’ll find a way to make it work.” The waitress brought our salads and sat them down in front of us.

  The rest of dinner went pretty smoothly, and by the end of the night we were all cracking jokes and having a good time. On the way home, we listened to Cheryl tell us about the latest news on Adrian’s siblings. I found it interesting that Adrian didn’t spend much time with his family. His parents seemed great, and the way his mom talked about his family, it made it seem like they were all really close. They seemed like the type of family that would get together for family vacations and holidays. I felt like I must be missing something. When we pulled into the driveway, we said our goodnights and headed our separate ways.

  “Well, that seemed like it went well,” I told Adrian when we walked in the door.

  “Yes, it did. I’m pretty sure they loved you, just like I said they would.” He picked me up and sat me on the kitchen counter. I slipped off my heels and tossed them on the floor.

  “Why don’t you guys spend more time together?” I asked.

  “Well,” he sighed, “it’s kind of a long story. So to make a long story short, we don’t all get along. For as long as I can remember, we’ve never been able to get together for a dinner, holiday, or cookout, without a blowout argument. Someone is always fighting with someone, so then so and so wouldn’t come because so and so was going to be there. Over the years, family gatherings turned into nothing because no one wanted to pick sides or get involved in more arguments. So it’s just better we do our own things.” I could tell it made him a little irritated that they couldn’t put their drama aside even for one day.

  “I’m sorry to hear that.”

  “Yeah, me too. Maybe someday everyone will learn to grow up, but until then, I’m fine spending dinners, holidays, and cookouts with you.” I wrapped my arms around his neck and kissed him gently on the lips.

  “Me too.” Before I knew it, he had me off the counter, wrapped around his waist, and heading for the bedroom.

  Chapter 25

  The workweek may have come too soon, but luckily it passed quickly. I was really excited when Friday night finally rolled around because the local fair was in town. It wasn’t anything special, but it was always nice to have something new to do.

  Adrian showered up after work and we made our way down to the fairgrounds. The smell of the fried food and the lights from the rides always made me happy because it brought back so many good memories from high school. When we were freshmen and sophomores, Lily and I used to come down here every night. Back then it was the place to be.

  Now that we were older, we didn’t go for the rides anymore, but for the beer tent and the concerts. The social scene was still pretty much the same though; you were guaranteed to run into a hundred people you knew, especially on the weekends. The concert tonight wasn’t anyone we wanted to see, so we decided to head for the beer tent. It was a short walk from the entrance to the tent, but we still had to walk through a few rides and game tents to get there. By this time it was mostly high school kids, so the only rides running were the roller coasters and the Ferris wheel. The carnies were even closing up most of the game tents. When we reached the red and white striped beer tent, there wasn’t a line, so we got right in. I’m not twenty-one yet, but let’s just say it isn’t hard to get into places like this, most of the time you didn’t even need a fake ID, if you were pretty.

  “Ava!” Right when we walked in I saw Lily waving at me from a picnic table across the room. She didn’t look drunk yet, surprisingly, but from the look on Steven’s face, it wouldn’t be long before she was.

  “Hey!” Adrian and I made our way across the room, weaving in and out of groups of drunk people standing around. When we reached her, I leaned down and gave her a hug.

  “Here, come sit.” She scooted closer to Steven and I sat where she patted the bench beside her. “Adrian, we saw your friend Brian over there.” She pointed to the far right corner. Brian and a few guys and girls I didn’t know were sitting at a table.

  “I’m going to go say hi, okay, babe?” He leaned down to me.

  “Okay, I’ll be right here.” I tilted my head up so he could kiss me before he made his way over to his friends.

  “Well, it looks like things are going a lot better.” Lily said with a giddy smile on her face. “I take it you guys worked things out?”

  “Yes, we did. He told me everything and I told him everything. It wasn’t nearly as bad as I expected.” I smiled to myself, remembering how smoothly our conversation had gone.

  “See! I told you!” she said a little too loudly.

  “Keep it down, will you?” I put my finger up to my lips.

  “Sorry.” She giggled and looked around at the people staring in our direction.

  I glanced across the room and saw Adrian still talking and laughing with his friends. As I was scoping out the place to see if there was anyone else I might know, my eyes stopped at the entrance. There was Jason.

  “Oh great,” I said under my breath.

  “What?” Lily followed my gaze until she saw him.

  “He’s not seriously coming over here, is he?” I whispered to Lily, well, not actually whispered, but the closest I could get to a whisper over the loud band playing in the background.

  “Well, we are kind of sitting with his brother and all their friends, if you haven’t noticed.” I looked down the table and she was right. When I looked back across the table, he was standing right in front of me.

  “Ava.” He nodded at me. Did he really just give me the head nod?

  “Hi.” I looked across the room to see if Adrian had noticed my situation but he was still in conversation with one of his friends. Jason looked over his shoulder to see who I was looking at.

  “I see you’re here with the new boyfriend.” He leaned in so I could hear him over the music. He made sure to move in a little closer then he needed to, though. “How’s that going?” I could smell the alcohol on his breath.

  “Great, actually.” I glanced over toward Adrian again. I was a little scared he might just come charging over here when he saw Jason talking to me and who knew where things could go from there.

  “That’s good. I’m happy for you and I hope one day we can be friends again.” He sat down across from me. “I really miss you, Ava. I feel like I lost one of my best friends.”

  “You did that to yourself,
you know.” I wasn’t about to sit here and fall for his self-pity party like I had before. He knew my weaknesses and he loved to push my buttons. I hated to see people sad.

  “I know. I’m really sorry. I’d apologize a hundred times if that’s what it’d take for me to get you back.” The look on his face was genuine but I didn’t want to fall for this again.

  “Jason, what don’t you get about you will never get me back? You’ve hurt me so many times, and you think if you just apologize, it’s going to fix things! It never does! It just mends them and then you find a way to break me down again and again! You can only break something so many times before it’s finally un-repairable! We are un-repairable! Get that through your head!” I stood up from the table and realized everyone was looking at us. Normally I’d be embarrassed, but I’d wanted to say those things to him for so long I actually felt at peace, like that’s what I needed to do in order to have a clean break from him. I looked across the room and saw that Adrian finally had his attention focused in my direction.

  “We’ll see how un-repairable we are when your boyfriend runs off to Florida. I know you felt something when we kissed the other night at Chad’s. You’ll come back to me. You always do.” I couldn’t fathom what he just said. Was he actually serious? Or was he just saying it to show off to his friends? Either way, I was pissed off beyond belief. How dare he sit there and tell me I’d come back, I always do. Was that really how he saw me now? As the poor little helpless girl who couldn’t get anyone else so I’d always go back to him?

  Adrian was heading in our direction. He must have been able to tell by the look on my face I was pissed. When I looked at Adrian, he had a way of sending some kind of calmness through me. Thank God or I would’ve said some pretty mean things to Jason right then, but I decided to take the high road.