Page 3 of The Dead of Summer
It’s hardly anything, but this moment is a tiny treasure to me.
“I’m scared,” I admit. A few tears have been hiding behind my eyes all day, and they finally make a run for it.
My mom wipes them away. There is so much I’ve been holding back about my doubts, about what I read online about our island’s trends of sickness, about why I can never face my friends Bash and Elisa again after what happened between us.
I want my mom to ask me about all of it, and to really listen, but Gracie smiles instead.
Smiles biiiig , and I know she’s going to shut me up with another clich é .
“Don’t be scared, baby. The only ship that unsinks is the friendship!” Gracie wraps me in a hug that smells like alcohol and bubble gum. “We’re going to have the best summer ever, right?”
“Right.”
I love my mother, especially when I hate her, but most of all when I miss her, which is constantly. I hold on to Gracie tight, but then someone elbows me in the back hard .
“Hey—” I’m cut off by a chorus of shrieks. It’s the bachelorette party, jostling us aside as they try to snap their thousandth selfie.
“Dakota, you’re missing it! Hurry! Get the lighthouse. The lighthouse! ” The bride flaps her hand at Dakota—poor Dakota—who is juggling three phones.
“Wait!” one of them yells. “Shouldn’t Dakota be in the photo, too?”
The group gleefully rearranges, shoving Dakota into the middle, then looks around with dismay as no one takes their picture. Like a giant spider, all their eyes land on Gracie and her bright blue wig.
“Do you mind? Do you mind?” they all ask at once.
Gracie shoves her drink at me and says, “Certainly, ladies. Let’s see some smiles!”
Oh no. I brace myself. Gracie is no good at photos. She gets way too close, causing the bachelorette party to physically recoil, and then she takes just one photo. Sinful.
“Get the lighthouse,” the bride barks, and I nearly toss both drinks at her. No one snaps at my mom but me! But before I can say anything, Sam reappears.
“May I?” He swipes the phone from Gracie, but he’s a perfect gentleman about it. Everyone relaxes as he snaps a jillion photos of the bachelorette party. Another! Another! Now a silly one! The ladies pose and pose and pose, and I protectively drag Gracie behind me.
“How fun,” she says, but she sounds smaller now. Unsure.
“Get the big boat,” demands the bride, pointing.
What boat? My eyes pass through the bachelorette party and return to the darkening horizon, where a massive, ghost-white boat has appeared. It has a giant red cross on the side, bloody and bright as a fresh brand. I’m not sure, but I think it’s a naval hospital ship. But what is it doing here?
Sam is at my side, easily chatting with Gracie as the ferry sidles up to the pier. Welcoming parties clot the wooden dock, waving us in.
Gracie tugs at my arm. “Oh, Ollie, do you see Bash and Elisa? Did you let them know we made the early ferry?”
This is the question I have been dreading most, the one I know I can’t smile through.
“Who are Bash and Elisa?” Sam asks.
Gracie answers as she waves at random people.
“Ollie’s best friends. Everyone calls them the Suds ’cause they’re always stuck together, like bubbles, and slippery as hell when they’re in trouble.
Which is all the time. Oh, you’ll love them.
Elisa has all the boys on their knees, and Bash probably could, too—he’s as handsome as our Ollie, everyone says—but he’s timid.
More nervous than a deer in dune grass, that Bash.
Honestly, Ollie, I’m surprised he and Elisa didn’t visit us, but I guess I can’t blame them.
Between school and college applications and working for their families all summer.
Hey, Ollie-baby, are you going to get your old job back at Pizza Monster? ”
“Pizza Monster?” Sam asks, intrigued.
“Where are they?” Gracie’s waving has slowed. “Maybe they think we caught the late boat?”
“I’ll go grab our stuff,” I say, burrowing my way backward into the crowd, past bikes and strollers and at least a dozen seasick dogs.
Gracie is wrong; no mistake has been made.
Anchor’s Mercy is tiny enough that I’m sure the whole island knows this is the last ferry for the weekend.
Maybe that’s why everything feels so electric, and final, and important, like we’re all riding one big, last chance.
And add in a tropical storm? A flutter of dread pulses in the soft skin behind my ears.
No , I stop myself. Be happy. You are going to have the best summer ever. Or else.
I reach the back deck and I’m alone. Finally.
Without anyone to smile for, I permit myself one last look out to sea before the storm takes it all away.
I find myself watching that strange white ship on the horizon, its immensity punched out of the sky like a hole in heaven.
It scares me, but I shove this new fear down, too.
Down, into my own fathomless depths. By the time I find our suitcases, the ship is forgotten, but a ripple of anxiety remains.
“Get ready to live, laugh, love like your life depends on it, Ollie,” I tell myself as I lug our suitcases to the lower deck.
But something flickers in my depths, something rising from my darkness for a fleeting, frigid moment. A question: If this is our brand-new beginning, why does it feel like it’s about to end all over again?
Then it’s gone, and I step off the ferry.
Into the best summer ever.