Dark Night, Hold Tight, part 20

Two days after her mother's "tragic accident", Neil Roberts had insisted that Summer return to school, despite protests that were whimpered, plead, screamed. Her mother was barely in the cold, hard, ground and already her father was moving on, moving away. He dropped Summer off on the front steps twenty minutes after the funeral ended; she had missed her first two classes.

She was still wearing the frilly blue dress that her great aunt Lydia insisted that she wear, though Fadia Roberts had hated that pale baby blue, and Summer liked it even less. It did absolutely nothing for her complexion. When she walked in the front door of Harbor Middle School, the bell rang signaling the beginning of the fifteen-minute break between second and third period that was their mid-morning "recess".

Summer walked calmly to her locker, though she was fighting waves of nausea that were pulsing underneath her skin. She'd spent the last sixty hours juggling sleeping and weeping, her face was still red and splotchy. She hadn't spoken to Marissa in days, despite numerous attempts on the latter's part. Talking with Marissa meant talking to Holly, and Megan, and Annabel. Talking to Marissa meant jumping back into her life as Harbor Middle School's Queen Bee.

Summer wasn't ready for that, not for any of it. She just wanted her Mommy. Not the Mommy that had moped around the house for the last several years, sullen and uncommunicative. She wanted the Mommy of her youth; the Mommy that baked cookies that were still warm when Summer got home from school. She wanted the Mommy that read Summer's favorite bedtime stories to her every night, no matter how tedious it became to do so. She wanted the Mommy that her Daddy had loved, the Mommy that had made them a family.

Like evil teenaged Harpies, her friends arrived, swarming around her, drowning out her thoughts with vapid, insincere murmurings. Only Marissa remained silent, her hands tucked underneath her arms, her bony legs sticking out at awkward angles. Marissa never stood up to Holly, and Summer didn't figure that she would start anytime soon.

"Oh, my God, Summer…we had like, no idea," Holly gushed, running unwelcome fingers through the hair that fell down to the middle of Summer's back.

Summer was immediately wary. "No idea of what?"

"Like, the whole school is talking about it," Annabel chimed in.

"Talking about what?" Annoyed, now.

"Your mom," Megan answered, as it was obvious. "I mean, everyone knew she died…which I'm so sorry about, by the way, but we had no idea that she was one of those people."

Summer rolled her eyes, sighed. "One of what people?"

"You know…a towel-head," Holly giggled after the last word.

"A…w-what?"

"A towel-head. A camel jockey. You know…an A-rab."

Summer felt the blood draining from her face, her throat constricted painfully. "How did you know that?"

"It was written right up in the paper," Megan said, distracted, adjusting her ponytail in the mirror Summer kept on the inside of her locker door. "Had her name, and your name, and everything. My mom, had like, no idea. She always called Mrs. Rob…your mom… 'Fay.' You know, everyone did."

Holly's gum smacked loudly, Summer felt weak in the knees.

"So did your mom keep it like a big secret? I mean, did your dad know?"

"Did my dad know that my mom was Muslim? Of course he did," Summer responded irritably, clanging her locker door closed after she'd removed her English and Algebra textbooks. Megan frowned.

"Do you like, miss her?" Holly asked.

"No, she was a real downer," Summer retorted, then after a beat, "…of course I miss her." She turned away from her cronies, shot Marissa a grateful look for her silence. Her gaze moved from Marissa's face over her shoulder to a boy that was standing in the hall, staring at her, a look of deep melancholy across his features. His dark hair was clinging to his scalp in desperate curls; his pale skin was almost translucent.

Crabtree…Cartwright…Copeland…Cohen. The florescent light in the hallway glinted off of his braces when he opened his mouth to breathe. One of the eighth-grade soccer players walked by and shoved him into the nearest locker, bloodying his lip. Summer looked away.

"…I just know if I had to go around with a name like that, I would totally change it." Megan was saying, her tone haughty.

"Huh?"

"Summer, haven't you been listening? I said that now that your mom is dead, your dad would probably let you get your name changed."

"My name?" Summer asked, dumbly.

"Yeah, the Summer and Roberts parts are fine, but all that gobbeldy-gook in the middle? Just get a nice, normal name, like Michelle, or Jennifer or something," Megan elucidated in her charming, regal manner.

"I'll think about it," Summer said absently, drifting away from her friends. She was feeling faint, not for the first time in the preceding few days. She looked for a bathroom, but she found herself lost in the crowd, lost in the confusion. She reached for the nearest doorknob and yanked on it, the people around her swelling and ebbing against her like tides. She escaped into the sanctity that the broom closet offered. She turned around on her heel and sank to the floor. To her surprise, she found herself face to face with a bruised and split lip…the blue rubber-banded braces…the dark, dreamy eyes. The kid from the hall, the one who'd just gotten trampled.

"Hi," she offered, tears shining in her own quiet eyes, matching his in depth and intensity. "You're probably in here because they're beating up on you, huh?"

In response, Seth took a long pull on his asthma inhaler.

"I'm in here because my mother died."

He nodded, he knew. Of course he knew, everyone knew. He probably thought she was a Muslim towel-head camel-jockey freak like everyone else did.

"All I want to do is go home and get under the covers," Summer sniffled, wiping away fresh tears. "I want my Nanny to bring me some cocoa, and I want to read the rest of To Kill a Mockingbird for English class…and I just want to sleep," she sighed, frustrated. She pressed her cheek against her knees, which were pulled up on her chest.

The boy across from her still said nothing. After about ten minutes, the closet began to get stuffy with both of them in there, just breathing. The bell rang, and Summer cocked her head.

"You going to class?"

He nodded in response.

"Me too," she replied, dismally. "Might as well."

He didn't move to stand, so she shrugged and rose to her feet.

"See you around." She left the broom closet without waiting for an answer, and then walked home.

"Oh, Sum-mer!" Seth called in a sing-song voice.

Summer rolled her eyes. Leave it to Seth to disturb her positive flow. Nevermind that she was vibrating at a totally high frequency. She had been relaxed. She had been meditating. Of course Seth would come barging in, like a bull in a china shop.

A moment later, he barreled through her bedroom door. She was atop her pilates ball on her stomach, her palms pressed together and pointed to the floor as if she were a swimmer preparing for that perfect dive. Her legs were spread, bent at the knee, and the soles of her feet were also pressed together, posed perfectly in mid-air. She was balanced on the ball, and until the minute before, had been deep in concentration. Her ch'i had been harnessed, damnit.

"Summer!" Seth exclaimed, startled.

"What if I had been in here naked? Can't you learn to knock?" She snapped, not really meaning it.

"That would be a beautiful, holy moment. Let's envision it for a moment," Seth rocked back on his heels, silent.

"Let's not," she retorted dryly.

"What, exactly, are you doing?" He swallowed hard as she shifted on the ball.

"Yogilates. Your mom taught me."

"My mom," Seth parroted, disbelieving. "My mom taught you how to be that…stretchy?"

"Your mom's in great shape, Seth," Summer told him matter-of-factly, rolling off the large bright-blue rubber ball. She wilted a little, "…at least she was the last time that I saw her."

"She still is," Seth assured her quickly. "But it just blows my mind…I mean, she's almost fifty."

Summer laughed. "Fifty is not that old. For some people, that's not even half of their life."

Seth remained silent, watching her wander into a swath of late afternoon sunshine that was creeping across the carpet from the window behind her. He gazed at the caramel warmth that haloed her shining hair, his throat tight.

She flushed, "…what are you staring at? Have I got something in my teeth?"

"No," he whispered, his mouth suddenly stuffed with cotton.

The thin strap of her tank-top slid off her shoulder and down her arm. Wisps of her raven hair were slipping out of her ponytail. Her yoga pants were tight, hugging her hips.

"Then what?" she demanded.

"Nothing," he insisted, though even after he forced himself to look away and she no longer felt his scrutiny, she was suspicious.

"Why are you home so early? It's barely four o'clock," she wandered over to her vanity and pulled her hair back up, securing the dark locks back into the cotton-covered rubber band.

"Well," Seth rubbed his hands together. "I have the day off tomorrow, and I decided to play hooky this afternoon. So I rented To Kill a Mockingbird, and Some Like It Hot.

"To Kill a Mockingbird," she mused quietly. "I haven't read that book in years." She stared sightlessly at her own reflection.

"I know, I didn't understand the symbolism until I was in high school, even though they made us read it in what…the sixth grade?"

Summer cleared her throat, "Seventh."

"Seventh grade…I mean…Sure, I got that Heck Tate was protecting Boo Radley and not Jem, but it never really occurred to me that he was the mockingbird until I had read it like the…fifth time."

Seth had drifted across the hall to his own room and was removing his tie and dress shirt, his voice barely audible as he dug around in a drawer for a t-shirt.

"And then, the whole part about Jem and Mrs. Dubose and her flowers, the…"

Summer had stopped paying attention. Her fingers gripped the top of her vanity, her knuckles white. The last time she'd read about Atticus, and Scout and Jem had been the afternoon after her mother's funeral. She cried her eyes out that afternoon, unsure if she was crying for Arthur Radley, her mother, or her own mortality.

Her father never found out that she had skipped school that day, or for the week afterwards. No one noticed, no one except Seth. He'd told her one night when they were laying on the beach together, the summer after their graduation from high school.

She had almost forgotten all about it, but he reminded her of their whispered conference in the janitor's closet, in which he was so amazed that she was even speaking to him that he couldn't gather the wherewithal to say anything intelligible back.

"Maybe if you had, I would have thought you were a big stud," Summer had teased him, poking him in the ribs from her supine position under his arm.

"Yeah, right," he had answered quietly, a little sadly. She hated for him to be sad about the past, so she kissed him and reminded him that she was there, that moment, and that she wanted him.

"And then the scene in the courtroom, it's just so powerful, and I think the film just demonstrates the tension better…" Seth was in the bathroom now, speaking around a mouthful of toothpaste, not to mention the bristles of his toothbrush.

"I mean, not to criticize Harper Lee in any way, because I fully believe she's amazing…" Spit, gargle. "But no one, not even Atticus Finch, could hold a candle to Gregory Peck."

Summer's shoulders were shaking, her memories welling up in her like a dam about to burst.

"And Robert Duvall…I think that was one of his first roles…" Seth reappeared in her doorway, clad in tan corduroy pants and a soft green polo. Summer was bent over her vanity table, quietly laughing hysterically, tears streaming down her face.

"What?" Seth asked, mystified. Summer couldn't explain it, either. The combination of Holly, Annabel, Megan…the sheer pretension of suggesting she change her name before her mother was even cold in the grave…the ludicrousness of spending a half an hour in a broom closet with Seth Cohen, of all people, never realizing that he would one day grow into a tall, intelligent man, with whom she would be madly in love…To Kill a Mockingbird, Scout pointing the gun at Miss Maudie Atkinson's rear end, Atticus yelling out a warning.

"What? What did I say?"

Summer shook her head, beyond speech. She choked, put a hand to her breast, and took a deep breath, before bending over and whooping in laughter again.

"Well, damned if you do, damned if you don't, around here!" Seth muttered, wandering off towards the living room, shaking his head.

Summer finished laughing, wiped the moisture from her eyes, caught her breath, and then followed him down the hall.

To be continued…