The Summer That I DrownedA Story by L.A.Drowning isn't entirely a bad thing.The
Summer That I Drowned
I thought I saw you today. I didn’t, of course--the auburn hair just tricked
me, like most little things do. (Today it was some redhead in Dollar General.
Tomorrow it’ll be a teal sedan, or the smell of incense, or the way Duncan
Schuster leans back in his desk and crosses his arms behind his head and
laughs.)
Sometimes it’s hard to remember what you looked like from a distance. Sometimes
I forget the way your face softened whenever you told a story, the set
expression of your mind in deep concentration. Sometimes I’ll see a pair of
hazel eyes and I’ll remember how yours used to dance, and I can almost convince
myself that you’ve been here all along, that you never really went away, that
I’m not still struggling to surface from beneath the waves you left in your
wake. ***
Charlotte Krebs somehow manages to convince me to go on a double date with her,
her boyfriend Davis, and one of Davis’s friends I’ve never met--Micah, who’s
apparently in some underground band or other.
“You’ve been moping around too much lately,” she tells me in the hallway after
second period. “It’ll be good for you. Besides,” she adds, slamming her locker
shut and turning around to stare at me with those big blue eyes. “He plays
guitar.”
I offer a hesitant shrug.
“Oh, come on!” she begs. “You need this! Just forget about everything for one
night. Please.” There’s her puppy dog expression again. She dramatically places
a hand over her heart. “Please. For me.”
“All right, I guess,” I respond, fiddling with the zipper on my hoodie. “But
only because Dad and April will be out.”
That night, Micah arrives at my house an hour and twenty-two minutes late, in
some giant white SUV with the music blaring. I stand at my window and watch as
the vehicle shoots into our driveway, the too-bright headlights glaring and
bouncing off the sides of my house. The clunker jolts to a stop inches away
from the garage. I quickly close the curtains.
A car door slams. Five seconds later, the doorbell rings. Twice.
I open the door to see a lean figure with squinty green eyes and a shock of
dark curls. Despite the below-freezing temperature, he only wears a black
waffle-print shirt and jeans.
“Hey. Sorry I’m--” His freakish eyes rake over my body. “Jesus, you’re skinny.”
I stare at him blankly for a moment, then step past him, close the door behind
me, and stride over to the SUV.
“Char mentioned you don’t talk much,” he says, once we’re both situated in the
front seats. He leans over the console to fiddle with the radio and his eyes
roll up to look at me, as if seeking some sort of affirmation. I nod. His gaze
returns to the controls. “Funk okay?” Without waiting for another answer, he
turns on the music full-blast. We lurch back out of the driveway and head
toward Charlotte’s house, the hum of bass guitars paving the way.
“So… Good week?” he asks, his voice raised several octaves to be heard
over the sounds from the speakers. Didn’t
sleep much, I’m almost tempted to say. Kept having these
dreams that I was drowning. Instead I simply nod again. “Sure.”
“What?” he shouts. I shake my head and stare out the window. “My band just
finished making the last song for our EP this week,” he continues to yell.
“We’re performing at The Malt on the third. You should come.” I feel him
looking over at me once more. I shrug.
By the time we reach Charlotte’s neighborhood, my ears are ringing and temples
are throbbing, and Micah’s voice is hoarse from trying to start more
conversations. The pounding in my head pulses down to my stomach, which begins
to churn.
Char pops out of her house, arm linked with Davis’s, both of them laughing. They
walk over to the SUV, thrust open the back doors, and climb in. “Turn that s**t
off!” Char immediately hollers. Micah’s jaw clenches, but
he lowers the volume and leans further across the seats to grab at something in
the open glove compartment. He fishes out a pack of cigarettes, then looks at
me imploringly. “Want one?” I shake my head. “Remy’s a
good girl,” Char calls from the back. I don’t have to turn around to know she’s
grinning. “Didn’t I tell you? Her dad’s a pastor.”
“I’ve seen my fair share of ‘good girls’,” Micah scoffs, pulling a lighter out
of his pocket. He fumbles with the switch a few times before he gets a good
flame going. The end of his cigarette burns red-orange against the darkness
inside the car. “Trust me, they’re no different than anybody else.” He shoves
the stick in his mouth and careens out of the driveway.
I stare out the window as residential neighborhoods give way to the small
downtown area, buildings and fast food joints alive with neon signs. At a
stoplight, I find myself wishing I could be sitting in one of the sticky,
ripped up booths at Los Burritos under the haze of the blue-green fluorescent
lights, being served by a waitress with a greasy ponytail. But for now I suffocate
in Micah’s smoke and try to tune out the sounds of Char and Davis kissing in
the backseat.
Micah ends up taking us a short distance to Rickey’s, an
entertainment-and-lounge kind of place where all the college kids usually hang
out. The entrance is down a flight of stairs that used to lead into a train
station from the street. As Micah pushes open the door and we enter the den,
we’re immediately greeted by a huge flatscreen TV and several large sofas. To
the right of us is a small counter. On our left are foosball tables, a claw
machine, jukebox, and rows of pool tables. Fifteen bowling lanes, half of them
occupied, lie beyond.
Char, Davis, and I hang up our coats on some hooks by the door while Micah
strides over to the front counter to pay for a set of billiard balls. We all
regroup at one of the pool tables in the far corner. Davis grabs four cues off
the shelf on the back wall and distributes them.
“Ready to get your asses kicked?” Micah asks Char, smirking. He sets up the
rack and performs a perfect break, the balls smacking each other like a clap of
lightning. He pockets two solids right off the bat.
“Shut up,” Char grunts playfully. “Will Remy and I get to play, or will you and
Davis just go at this all night?” She pouts a little. “That was so boring last
time.”
Micah walks over to the other end of the table and leans forward, readying his
cue. “Of course you can play,” he assures her, his eyes fixed on his next
target. “If you’re not too good to play a gentleman’s sport,”
he adds, looking up at me and winking. Char nudges Davis, whispers
something in his ear, and giggles. The ache in my stomach starts to twist
around me more tightly.
By the time Charlotte and I get to shoot, Micah and Davis have only left four
balls on the table. But neither of us can hit anything, despite impatient
lessons from both the boys. Finally, our dates just finish off the round. Then
we decide to bowl.
“Five bucks says at least three different guys have jacked off into these
shoes,” Micah announces, approaching us at a bowling lane with four pairs of
rental sneakers.
“Shut up,” Char repeats. Her tone isn’t light this time.
Micah holds up his palms in mock surrender. “Sorry, Princess.”
I curl up in one of the seats in front of the bowling lane and start untying my
shoelaces. Char and Davis plop down behind the little computer screen and begin
to enter our names, wrapping their arms around each other and chuckling. I
stare at them and remember the last time I was here. Because if I
forget you, then I forget how to swim, how to--
A hand suddenly curls itself around my waist. Micah’s face leans close to my
ear. “Having fun?”
I bob my head up and down.
“Good.” He uses his other hand to turn my body toward his. “Then why don’t you
kiss me?” Before I can respond, he juts forward and slams his lips against
mine.
I spring up, pushing him backward with a force I didn’t even know I had. “Get
away from me!”
His eyes widening, he loses his balance and bangs his head on the corner of the
seat next to us. Char and Davis turn around and stare in horror as a small
stream of blood begins to trickle down his neck. “F**k,” he spits. “F**k!”
I take off for the exit.
“You stupid b***h!” he yells. “Those aren’t even your shoes!”
Without turning around or bothering to grab my coat, I sprint out of Rickey’s
and up the stairs leading to the street. I pause for a moment as the cold of
the late-winter night settles into my skin, readying myself for the three-mile
trek home. Then I run away from the building and into the dark.
I don’t realize I’m crying until I’ve burst through the front door of my house
and hot saltwater is stinging my cheeks. I slam the door shut, stumble down the
hallway, and throw myself into the bathroom. I stare down at my red-and-blue
bowling shoes, knees wobbling and vision blurring.
The memories come in swarms. Remy’s a good girl. Micah’s lips
forming a perfect ‘o’ as he exhales smoke. If I forget you-- The
smacking of lips from the backseat. The clap of billiard balls colliding.
Char’s resounding laughter. Jesus, you’re skinny.
I collapse onto the bathroom floor, shaking all over, thinking of the greasy
ponytailed girls in Los Burritos, the stupid funk music trumpeting out of the
SUV’s loudspeakers, Micah’s breath on my neck. If I forget you, I
forget how to breathe, how to keep my head above the water.
My hands flip up the toilet seat. I grab onto the rim, tremble, squeeze the
last of the tears out of my eyes. And I heave. ***
I thought I felt you today, but it was only the early spring breeze blowing in
through my bedroom window. Sometimes it’s hard to
remember your embrace. Sometimes I forget the smooth warmth of your palm
pressed against my own, the grip of the fingers that could pull me up from
underwater. Sometimes just the wind is enough to fool me.
So this afternoon, I closed that window and pulled the curtains tight. ***
Right after church one Sunday, Char calls me for the first time in over a
month. I stare at her name flashing across the screen of my phone and hesitate.
But on the fourth buzz, I decide to pick up. “Hello?”
“Hey. It’s me.” She breathes heavily into the receiver. “Can we go for a
drive?”
Thirty minutes later, we’re tearing across the country roads in her dad’s red
Ford Escape, the midday sun beating down through the windshield. Char adjusts
her gigantic pair of sunglasses and sighs.
“I think Davis is going to break up with me,” she says. “He’s been acting weird
lately. All silent and stuff. He doesn’t even protest when I want to watch Say
Yes to the Dress.” She props her left elbow on the inside of the door and
runs a hand through her hair. “Do you think he knows about that one time when I
went with John to…”
I gradually tune her out, staring at the gray pavement--still slightly bleached
from last winter’s salt--as its bumps and potholes unravel before me. And if
I--
“Remy?” Char says. “I asked you a question.”
“What?”
She lets out another sigh. “This is about Micah, isn’t it? I told you I was
sorry. But you know,” she puts in, turning to eye me, “He was cuter when I
first met him. And don’t be too harsh--his mom’s in the hospital and can’t pay
rent. He was probably stressing out about it.”
I think of him dishing out dollar bill after dollar bill to pay for everything
at Rickey’s, and snort.
“What?” Char asks icily.
I shake my head.
“Ugh.” She shakes her head too. “You know, you’re too quiet. It probably
freaked him out a little.”
I suck in a deep breath. Char seems to have forgotten that she and I originally
became friends because she used to be just as quiet as I am--until she
discovered how much sex she could have by talking and laughing and flirting. I
turn toward the window again.
“I mean, it can’t be healthy,” she continues, “holding stuff in like that. We
all saw you snap last month.”
“Maybe I just don’t have anything to say.”
“Even so, it’s like--it’s like you’re dead, almost, or just asleep.” She pushes
up her sunglasses again. “You need to wake up.” It’s
hard to wake up when I’m so far below the surface. But you don’t know what it’s
like to drown, what it’s like to--
“I know things have been hard because of Andy,” Char says. “But that was months
ago. You need to move on. I mean, God.” Her palm smacks the top of the steering
wheel. “Just because someone took his life doesn’t mean you need to waste
yours.”
“What?” I hiss. My body shifts to face her.
Her blue eyes remain calm at first, but eventually they start to grow bigger
and bigger. “Well,” she says, half certainly. “It’s true.”
“Don’t f*****g talk to me.” I cross my arms and return my gaze to the
windshield, where it stays. Char lifts her foot from
the gas pedal for a moment and looks over at me. The car engine sputters. After
we slow down to about 40 and neither of us has said anything, she goes heavy on
the gas. The Escape lurches forward, shooting down the most recent beat-up road
we’ve encountered. And we keep going. ***
I thought I heard you today. Maybe it was something about the last of the ice
on Lake Michigan finally cracking, melting, releasing a steady flow that surged
past the docks. Maybe it was the shrieks and laughter of children by the shore
as they tried to outrun the wind. Maybe it was that snap of lightning right
before the first spring storm, the way the sky nearly split in two to unleash a
downpour.
The rain chills me to the bone. I’m growing sick, sick of having to fight this
constant monsoon just to keep my head above the water. Each day is a struggle
to prevent my memories from spiraling down the drain--because if I forget you,
then I forget how to swim, how to breathe, how to be. I almost wish I’d never
learned to begin with. ***
When April bursts into the upstairs bathroom and catches me with my fingers
down my throat, I threaten to kill her.
“How many times do I have to tell you?” I snap. “When a door is closed, you
knock first. F*****g knock!”
Even the obscenity goes over her head. “Wh-what were you doing?” she asks, her
little face a reflection of complete horror.
“None of your business.” I step closer to her and look down. “And no one needs
to know about it. Got it?”
“But--”
I push her away from the doorframe. “Okay. Good. Now go away.” Slamming the
door in her face, I leave her to stand there unsurely. I turn to face the
mirror, rub my temples, and listen as April scampers back downstairs. After a
few more minutes of silence, I turn on the faucet and splash some water onto my
face. Then I dump our toothbrushes out of a cup, fill it to the brim with
water, take a long swig to get everything going.
“Remy?” Dad calls from downstairs.
I wrench my hand out of my mouth. Little b***h! I whirl around
and grab for the doorknob, but my body is already seizing.
Two pairs of footsteps sound on the staircase: the light skip of my sister, the
heavier beats of my father. “Remy?” he repeats, louder this time. I crumple onto the bathroom
floor, gagging. If I forget… “Remy!” I hear Dad running up the last few steps and down the
hallway. “Remy!”
My fingers reach out to clutch the edge of the toilet bowl, pulling me toward
it just in time. I’m vaguely aware of the door swinging open behind me, of my
dad saying, “Remy,” again and again.
Stomach acid scalds my throat and my eyes start to water. Dad falls to his
knees behind me, making a feeble attempt to pull back some of my hair. I wretch
for what feels like hours.
“Oh, Remy,” Dad says, his voice soft, his other hand stroking my back.
I sit up, preparing to wipe my chin, turn around, and tell him that I only have
a bug. But I can’t even think about forming the right words with this new
searing pain in my chest. “Sorry,” I choke out, tears
suddenly spilling over. “I’m sorry.” My mouth hangs open; drool dribbles down
and onto my neck. I start to shake with sobs. “I’m so sorry. I just miss him.”
It feels so weird to finally say it that I cry even harder. Dad presses me back against
his chest, rocking us slowly. “It’s all right,” he murmurs. “I know. I know.
It’s okay.” He rubs my arms and holds me closer. “I’m sorry,” I repeat. “Shh. Shh.”
I’m not sure how long we stay there, but the next thing I know, he’s carrying
me out of the bathroom, down the hallway, and into my room. I find myself
struggling to stay awake as he tucks me into bed.
“Everything’ll be all right,” he says quietly, kneeling by my bedside. He folds
his hands together and begins to pray softly. The slow whispers lull me to
sleep, eventually mingling with my dreams.
When I wake, it’s well into the next day. I slip out of bed, make my way over
to my closed window, and run a hand along the sill. A thin layer of dust covers
my fingertips. I brush them together and blow the remaining debris off the
wooden ledge. Then I slowly reach up and tug on the plastic draw-pull and the
curtains finally open, flooding the room with light.
© 2017 L.A.Author's Note
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Added on April 17, 2015Last Updated on June 18, 2017 Tags: summer, drowned, laura wolfskill, short fiction AuthorL.A.ILAboutHopefully a better person than I used to be. I don't write nearly as often as I should, but I'll try to post when I can. UPDATE: A lot of this writing is now outdated. Proceed at your own risk.. more..Writing
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