bitter apple summers
PG-13; pre-series/slight AU; Dawson, Joey, and Pacey spend the summers watching movies, playing by the creek, and growing up.
"Even in this cabin full of fever,
tonight I'm catching nothing but the lightning bug.
My body is a mason jar, transparent as a jellyfish.
I wish for a heart
you can see straight through,
for a voice that glows in the dark, and a few really good friends
to skip moon rocks to."
- Andrea Gibson "Jellyfish"
He doesn't see it coming.
One minute he's chortling gaily with Dawson and the next he's on his ass, a sob working its way up his throat as he feels his eye socket sing. Through his one good eye, he can see his mortal enemy, Josephine Potter, standing in front of his form, chest heaving, and red in her terrible, terrible face. A softball rests at her feet. That softball just bounced off his face. That softball hurt.
It takes all his strength to haul himself up and not cry. There's blood dripping down from a cut on his brow, but he simply wipes it with the back of his hand, smearing crimson across his forehead and mixing it with his sweat.
"Nice arm, Potter," he says and stalks off.
He can hear the start of Joey's annoyingly tinkle-like giggle and the hushed scolding of his best friend (and her best friend) Dawson Leery.
"Go inside! Mrs. Potter will help you!" Dawson yells to his back.
He can imagine Joey stomping when she cries, "Shut up, Dawson! No she won't!"
It's not like a he has much of a choice. He has about five seconds before he bursts into tears in front of the Potter household and his friends (well, friend and the Toad they like to pretend is a girl). He can either row himself down the creek towards home or he can escape inside the cool recesses of the Toad's house with only her admittedly nice mother to know the better of his pain.
It takes him only three of the five seconds to hop up the porch steps and swing open the screen door. When it slams behind him, he finally lets out an agonizing moan and falls to the floor in a dramatic heap.
Give him a break. He's only eight.
"Pacey Witter, did my little monster do this to you?" asks the comforting voice of a woman.
"If I lie and say no, will this be less hu-mull-iating?"
Mrs. Potter crouches down next to him on the floor, the hem of her yellow dress brushing up against his arm and smiles, "The word is hu-mil-iating and the answer is no. Don't lie, Pace. I know it was Jo. Believe me I'll punish her later; let's fix you up first. Come on."
"I thought hu-mul-iating had to do with that stupid mullet haircut and how stupid it is," Pacey mutters, but complies and heaves himself up off the cool wood floor. Mrs. Potter is already in the kitchen leaning against the sink with band-aids watching him lumber over with a small grin on her face.
"It is a stupid haircut, isn't it? Hop up on the counter."
Jumping, he settles himself on the tile and rests his head back against the cabinet. Pacey watches Mrs. Potter grab a bag of peas out the freezer and snatch a clean dishtowel from the sink.
"Your kid is mentally unstable."
"I believe it."
"She's nuts. I didn't do anything. She just went Norman Bates on me and threw a ball at my head."
"Psycho? Were you watching scary movies at Dawson's again? Last time Joey came home and slept in my bed for a week!"
Pacey snickers. "Naw. My sisters were watching it while they were babysitting me last week."
"Oh," Mrs. Potter says and leans in to inspect the broken skin above his bruising eye. She wets the towel and dabs it against the wound. He winces. "Sorry, Pace, this might sting a little. I have to it clean out."
As she focuses, Pacey takes the time to observe the person that created the Toad. She's got the same large, expressive eyes, the same shaped berry-colored mouth and the same apple blushing cheeks. In fact, they look a lot alike, but instead of the disgusting scowl that Joey has painted on her face every time she's around him, Mrs. Potter has this winsome look as she works. She looks half melancholy and half blissful, or maybe she just looks like a woman with a bright, shiny secret buried deep, deep inside, but whatever it is about her, Pacey is startled to realize that he finds Mrs. Potter to be beautiful.
As she leans over to grab a band-aid, he's surrounded by the scent of strawberries or something fresh like that. Pacey closes his eyes and takes a whiff, wishing his mother smelled like this and looked at him like that. That winsome look. It hurts his heart. When his lashes peel apart, he's embarrassed to find Mrs. Potter studying him.
"Whatcha thinking about, sweetheart?"
"Nothin'."
He drops his gaze to the top of her dress where a decorative sunflower is stitched on. Without thinking, he reaches out with grimy, creek muddy fingers and plays with the petals.
Mrs. Potter gently places the cold bag on his eye and he holds it place as she says, "They're my favorite."
"Flower?"
"No! Animal, ya dummy…of course flower!" He's not hurt by her calling him "dummy," because her tone is so different from when his family calls him a name. She's got giggles in her voice and it makes him feel all warm like a fresh baked cookie.
"Flowers are lame."
"Flowers are not lame."
"Flowers are so lame."
"I suppose you'd say poetry is lame, or oil paintings, or Bach, or anything of beauty and aesthetic worth."
He doesn't know what aesthetic means, but he answers in a piggish tone, "Lame!"
He glances back up at Mrs. Potter and her nose is just inches from his. Her delicately long hands are situated on the counter on either side of his body and one of her knees is bent and knocking against his shoe. No, it's definitely apples—what she smells like—yes, ripe apples...and then Pacey's attention is back to her syrupy smile.
"You're not a philistine, Pace. Don't pretend to be."
"What's that?"
"Look it up!"
"Not fair!"
"So fair! It's a challenge!"
"It's work!"
She's full on grinning now, lovely, slightly crooked teeth in full view. Her eyes are bright and Pacey feels like he's ingested helium. "From what I hear from Jo, you're a bit lethargic. Maybe some work will do you good, hmm?"
"You're as bad as my teacher."
Gasping, she looks down a moment and when her face comes back up her eyes have turned comically sad, "I'm not that bad, am I? Mrs. Ziggers was the worst."
He finds himself laughing at that, because Mrs. Z was the worst and the fact that a parent just admitted to that fact is awesome. He really can't believe this wonderful person belongs to the Toad.
"Fine," he sighs with exaggeration, "I take it back. But just because you're being so nice to me."
Her head tilts to the side and some sort of emotion that Pacey can't indentify passes over her face. "Well, it's easy to be nice to you."
"I think you're the only one who believes that."
"That's not true."
"It is. No one but Dawson likes me."
His eyes are burning and he's long since dropped the peas. They lie on the counter melting. His head hangs and he feels like melting too, but not in a good way. In a way that would mean Mrs. Potter would have to mop him up with cleaner and dump him in the sink. He feels like disappearing.
A pair cool lips land on his forehead and a hand smoothes his hair.
"I like you, Pacey Witter."
Mrs. Potter has him by the nape his neck, her fingertips pressing into the skin below his ear. Her breath smells sweet against his nose and it dries the lone tear that has escaped from him. He shuts his eyes and pretends that this is something that happens regularly, that there is always a beautiful woman that holds him close when he feels like cow shit. He misses his mother terribly for one moment, but the moment passes quickly when Mrs. Potter gathers him up in her arms and gives him hug. He clings to this embrace and Mrs. Potter must notice his anxiety, because she stays put.
"Mrs. Potter, we've still got to punish Josephine," he mumbles into her shoulder. She let's out a big guffaw and then her whole body shakes with laughter as she pulls away.
"You're impossible!"
"But," and then he grins a real genuine grin that is lit from the inside out, "you like me."
"I do like you. A lot."
There's a moment of silence that passes over the kitchen and it's a really nice minute of sunlight streaming in through the windows, lighting floating dust, so it looks like tiny fireflies are moving hazily about them. It's a comfortable warm, the heat of summer settling into the humidity of the late afternoon. They can hear Dawson and Joey outside playing Indiana Jones—Joey in the title role Pacey absented and Dawson as director, of course—and Joey's older sister Bessie's voice comes floating from her room as she chats on the phone. A hunk of ham is in the oven and the faint tick tick of the timer sounds loudly, while Pacey's sure his thumping heart echoes louder.
"I like you too, Mrs. Potter."
She's quiet for just another moment, placing the peas back up against his black eye and leaning into the counter next to him where she sighs contently.
"Pace?"
"Yeah?"
"Call me Lillian when it's just us, okay?"
He turns to her in surprise. You don't call grown-up, especially beatific ones like Mrs. Potter, by their first names. She turns to him with a half-smile quirked.
"Sure thing, Lily."
She throws her hands up towards the heavens in mock indignation and they both laugh.