Summer, Beginning: Chapter One

I stared at my reflection in the mirror. A week since graduation, and still, it felt weird. An image of myself, almost frozen in time, because so much had changed, and

yet there I still was. Same face, same pajama bottoms. It had felt, for so long, that the day would never come. That high school would keep its grip on me forever, but then one

day I’d walked across a stage, and then just like that, it was over. And all I had to show for it was a rolled-up piece of paper. Reaching for my toothbrush, it hit me, suddenly, just how much had changed over the last few years. Sure, this was when kids developed the most of their personalities, and I knew that if I ran into my younger self it’d be like talking to a

completely different person, but it was still odd to reflect over all of it. All the little things that had come and gone, and left their marks on my life in little chalk marks and pencil

shavings.

Last year, after five years of struggling against it, my mother had succumbed to her breast cancer. It had taken so much from us already, the cancer. It had cost her her

mobility, her hair, her ability to participate in my life the way a mother should. She must have resented it so much, I know I did. And then, finally, it took her, and when I dressed

in my cap and gown and received my diploma, it was only my dad who got to see me do it.

Still, sometimes I found myself forgetting her, little by little. Her laugh, her little mannerisms that I’d grown so used to. And that scared me, the loss of it. How much more was I going to lose, as I got older? How much more was going to change?

I started my day off in a bit of a trance, pulling my work uniform on and driving over to the cafe I worked at in nearly full autopilot. That was what the beginning of my

summer had been, so far. Just going to work, earning my money, and then hanging out in my room. Most of my friends were doing the same thing, we didn’t see each other

much. It seemed like everyone was going through a post-graduation mental health crisis.

I got home after my shift and immediately passed out. As usual. Rinse and repeat. Except this time, I was jolted awake in the middle of my nap by my phone ringing. Pushing myself up in bed, I answered it. It was my friend, Brian.

“Hello?” I mumbled sleepily.

“Kath?” he asked, his voice crackling on the other end of the line. My house had a terrible cell connection.

“Yeah? I just got off work, what’s up?”

“A few of us were going to go down to the lake tomorrow night. Have a bonfire, you know, like the old days. Do you want to come?”

“I- you know what? Yeah, I’ll come. Been a while.” It really had been. I’d started to miss my friends already, and none of us had even really left yet.

“Yeah. Been a while. See you then? Seven thirty.”

“Okay. Sounds good.”

There was a click, and he hung up.

* * *

That night, since my dad was pulling a late shift at work, I decided I’d make us dinner. It had been weeks of takeout up until recently, what with me cramming for finals, preparing myself for graduation, and with him being out more and more. Big dates like that were only a reminder of all the other things my mother was going to miss.

Opting for simplicity, for both of our sakes (I was lazy, and also not a very good cook), I decided to just boil a pot of spaghetti and defrost some store-bought meatballs.

Tearing through the packet of pasta with my teeth, I pulled out everything I needed, and got to work.

It didn’t take very long. That was kinda the point, the goal of picking something simple, and by the time my dad was pulling into the driveway, I was setting a steaming bowl of spaghetti and meatballs onto the table. Setting it didn’t take all that much time either, though I had to stop myself from reaching for a third plate out of habit. A full year later, more really, since before she’d died she had been shacked up in the hospital

disintegrating for months, and still I was having trouble shaking these habits. Little things that kept reminding me my mom was gone.

“Aw, did you make dinner?” my dad asked, setting his briefcase down onto one of the dining room chairs.

“Yeah, I thought it’d be something nice to come home to. Since you had a long day.”

“You’re right, honey, it’s been a long one. Thank you.” he seated himself and pulled the pot closer, quickly filling his plate.

“There’s a salad in the fridge, too, if you want some kind of side dish.” I told him, sitting down too. He nodded, his mouth already full. We spent the rest of dinner in silence.

It’d been like that for a long time now, too. Everything seemed to lead back to my mother’s passing. She died, and my dad fell silent. It was like he drew into himself, like I did, pulling away from the things round him to cope. It made me sad, seeing him lose part of himself like that, but it was also just kind of what happened. I hadn’t expected

anything different, no one had, he’d lost his wife after all. Still, it was hard to watch him deteriorate the way he did.

The next morning was the same stifling routine. Getting up, getting dressed, staring at myself in the mirror and wondering who it was that was staring back. Was it this new, more mature version of me, the Kath everyone seemed to expect me to have turned into (everyone including myself), or was it just the same stupid kid I’d always been?

The coffee shop I worked at was a small, family owned business. It was tiring, of course it was, but it was also a fairly simple, monotonous job with a nice view, so at the same time, it was oddly calming. The store was made up of a single room. The windows at the front took up almost the entire wall, like a display stand showing off the interior.

Inside, the walls were lined with greenery. Little plants grew in pots lined up on shelves. Each table had a tiny succulent on it, and one of the back walls was taken over by a large growth of ivy. It was, all in all, very picturesque. The wallpaper was a pale, peeling yellow, and the cushions arranged on each chair were soft and downy. It had exactly the atmosphere I wanted my future apartment to have, so each shift was a nice time to

daydream about the life I’d have once I got out of the tiny town I’d grown up in and finally made something of myself.

I’d help my dad with rent, make it so that he didn’t have to pull so many late shifts. Give him a chance to go to therapy and figure his life out. So much that I hadn’t been able to do, wouldn’t be able to do while I was still here.

My shift that day went by quicker than usual. Maybe it was because it was a very introspective day, maybe I was in my head for longer than I realized. It was busy

enough that I was constantly doing something with my hands, busy enough that the clock seemed to do a lap around itself as time passed. A blink, and I was clocking out,

pulling my work uniform off in the car and slapping on some hasty makeup as I prepared to make the drive down to the lake.

The lake. A constant reminder of childhood. I hadn’t been down there in years, busy with everything. Senior year had been a whirlwind of anxiety, breakdowns and preparation for what was going to decide the rest of my life. Afternoons that we’d have spent down there were instead spent filling out college applications, proofreading each other's essays like our lives depended on it. Which, in a way, they did.

Before that, before all the panic, and the insanity of preparing to leave town (for me, hopefully forever), we’d spent nights down at the lake. It was a nice group of five, me, Brian, Polly, Nina, and Oliver. We’d all known each other since elementary school, grown up together. Weekends spent gathered around a bonfire, laughing. A little inebriated, sometimes, when we wanted to be, but it wasn’t really for that. We could do

that any time we wanted. Bonfire nights were more for unwinding from the stresses of life. They were a reminder of an easier time, a time when a hard test meant we all got to

get together and complain, instead of worrying about what the grades meant for our futures.

As I pulled up to the lakeshore, I could already see the smoke rising up from our old meeting spot. Oliver and Brian were already there, stoking the fire with branches. Oliver waved at me as I got out of the car and made my way over.

“Kath!” he grinned, tossing me a pile of picnic blankets. “Here, do you mind spreading these out around the fire?”

“Is it a marshmallow night?” I asked, shaking one out. Marshmallow nights, for

us, meant sobriety. Making smores and catching up, with nothing in between. “Nope,” Brian said, pointing at a case of Miller Lite on the ground. “Beer.”

“Beer.” I repeated, making a face. The worst type of alcohol. Perfect. “I’m driving everyone home,” Oliver added, tossing another stick into the fire. “Brian and I caught a taxi over, and Polly and Nina are getting dropped off by Nina’s

uncle.”

“Perfect,” I spread out another blanket, kicking a couple of stones away to make room. “You can use my car, just bring it back tomorrow morning if you can.” As the sun continued to set, spreading a beautiful array of reds and oranges across the darkening sky, Polly and Nina finally pulled up. We hugged, and then gathered onto the blankets, passing cans of beer around. The fire chased away the quickly cooling air. “How’s it been going at the bookstore, Nina?” Oliver asked. Nina took a sip of her drink and shrugged.

“It’s been going. You?”

“Oh, I quit my job.” Oliver laughed. Brian leaned over, throwing an arm over his shoulders.

“Me too!”

“We’re the only employed ones.” I said, cracking my can open. Silence fell around us. It was like we’d forgotten how to interact with each other, after so long. Polly cleared her throat and reached over to the bag of marshmallows someone had brought, spearing one. Almost immediately, it burst into flames.

“What’s the- what’s the plan now? After summer ends? I know most of us are staying here.” Nina sighed, stretching her legs out as Polly blew the burning marshmallow out.

“No way in hell you’re going to eat that.” Brian giggled, elbowing her in the side.

Polly flipped her middle finger up at him and bit into the charred remains on her stick, leading to a chorus of groans from all of us.

“I’m getting out of here. As soon as I can,” I pulled a couple of marshmallows out of the bag, sticking them both on. “There’s nothing for me in this town.”

“There are jobs.” Oliver protested.

“Not good jobs. Not the kind of jobs that can help my dad.”

“I know what you mean, Kath.” Brian piped up.

“Really?”

“Yeah, I mean, this place is tiny. There’s only so far you can go, and then you hit a wall. All our parents did, that’s why we’re still here.”

Another silence fell, just silent sipping. This one, though, was more comfortable.

Everyone seemed to be contemplating. We sat there for a long while, long enough for most of us to reach for the second beer. Brian had necked his, and was already on his

third.

“I’m glad we could do this.” Nina said.

“I missed you guys.” I said, letting myself fall onto my back. The warmth from the beer was crawling up my limbs, a comfortable fuzziness. Someone giggled, a light

sound that mixed in with the crackling of the fire and floated up with the smoke.

“We have the whole summer ahead of us.”

“We have the rest of our lives ahead of us.”

“Finally, we get to say that and it’s kind of true.”

“It’s always been true, Brian.”

“Someone shut Nina up before I do.”

The light banter left me feeling breezier than I had in a long time. Staring up at the flickering stars, I found myself grinning. My friends were right, there was so much

time ahead of me. So much time, that I could do anything I wanted with. It was almost freeing.