“Yeah,” I say, rubbing my neck. “Let’s go.”
He leads me through the touch tank room, where a father is comforting a sniffling child, and through a door marked STAFF ONLY that leads to a long white hall. The rest of the aquarium tries its best not to look bleak and institutional, but this hallway isn’t even pretending. The signs next to the doors have official-sounding titles—SENIOR MARINE SPECIALIST, ASSOCIATE MANAGEMENT—and all the offices are empty.
When Toby pushes open the door at the end of the hall (EMERGENCY EXIT, DO NOT OPEN, ALARM WILL SOUND), I find myself on a wide stretch of concrete, beyond which are trees, brown grass, and, far to the right, the back edge of the parking lot. The building might offer a little shade in the morning, but not now. The sun is high in the sky, and it is oppressively hot.
The JAC counselors have spread out pool towels in a haphazard square, and five of them are clustered around five boxes of pizza right in the middle. Their COUNSELOR shirts are flung in a pile off to the left. The girls are in bikini tops and the guys are shirtless, their boxers barely showing above the waistbands of their khaki shorts. Their skin is alternately tanned or red with the sunburn that comes before tan, all shining with sweat.
“Everyone,” Toby says, “this is Caroline. Caroline, this is Matt, Dave, Serena, Devin, and Georgia.” He points around the circle as he talks. I recognize most of them from the figurine chaos yesterday, but I know I’m going to forget their names as soon as his finger passes. Georgia, though, I remember specifically. I didn’t recognize her at first, her head laid sideways on interlaced hands while one of the guys—Matt? Dave?—talked to her.
When Toby says my name, her head pops up, black hair piled in a shaky bun on top of her head. She licks her fingers and grabs another slice of cheese from the box directly in front of her.
“We met yesterday,” she says, swatting away a hand that has crept toward her pizza box. “Caroline?”
“Yeah,” I say, awkwardly folding my arms over my chest. I wonder if I’m supposed to take off my shirt too. I wore a lacy black bra today, something only Jake has ever seen on me.
“Matt, scoot over,” she says.
“Hi,” he says to me, sticking out his hand, which has a not insignificant amount of red sauce on it. I shake it anyway, which is awkward given that he’s reaching up from the ground and I’m still standing.
“Hi,” I say. “Caroline.”
“Matt. Welcome.”
“Matt, move,” Georgia insists. He scoots over a few feet. “Do you like cheese?” she asks me.
“That’s really nice of you, but I’m not that hungry.”
“Well, you should still sit down.” She pats the ground next to her.
I walk around the circle and lie down on my stomach like the rest of them. Down here, the air smells like pizza grease and chlorine.
“Morning pool time?” I ask.
“Yeah,” Georgia sighs, taking a bite of her pizza. She chews and swallows. “It was great. They’ve all made friends already. They’ve invented this very elaborate game where half of them are mermaids and half are pirates, and basically it can keep them occupied for hours. Most of the time they’re fighting against each other, but any time we try to make them do something, we’re sea monsters and they team up against us.”
“I’m a shark,” Matt adds, raising his eyebrows. He gestures toward the only other girl in the circle, who is lying on her back, wearing sunglasses and headphones and holding a thick book open above her head, its library plastic shimmering in the sun. “Serena over here is the whale, which is—”
“Offensive and inaccurate,” she cuts in without looking at us. Her voice is surprisingly low.
“The most beautiful whale that’s ever lived,” Matt says affectionately. She ignores him.
“I’m the kraken,” says one of the guys across from me. “My kraken name is Glorb. But my actual name is Dave.”
“And I’m a walrus of some type,” says the guy next to him. “Devin.”
“Nice to meet you both,” I say.
“I’m…a giant octopus. I think. It’s sort of hard to tell,” says Georgia.
Toby, who has squeezed in between Serena and Dave, sighs. “If only the children on my tours gave me the same kind of honorific,” he says. “I swear, kids these days have no interest in learning.”
“Maybe it’s your teaching methods,” Georgia suggests.
“Nonsense. Yo, Serena, move so I can stretch out.” Serena closes the book without speaking and delicately scoots farther away from the circle, combing her fingers through her pale hair as she goes.
Toby rolls his eyes and unfolds his long legs. He opens the only box still closed, revealing a large pepperoni pizza. “Oh my God, yes. Now, Devin, what is this I hear about you going to the beach with your parents instead of attending the excursion to Great Adventures at the end of the summer? You may not know this, being new, but that simply won’t do.”
As they start to talk, Georgia ducks her head and turns over onto her back, squinting up at the sun. She puts one arm over her face and looks at me.
“One of the guys told me that Toby and Serena used to date,” she says quietly. “That’s why she seems like such a bitch. Supposedly he cheated on her.”
“I’m not surprised,” I say. I turn over on my back too, and close my eyes. The sun warms the cotton of my shirt. After the stale cool of the aquarium tour and the sharp air conditioning of the gift shop, it feels good.
“Did you know him before you started working here?” Georgia asks.
“Toby?”
“Yeah.”
“Yeah. He kind of got me this job. I’m dating his cousin. Jake? You know him?” As always when I talk about Jake to someone new, I feel a tiny thrill traveling from my toes to the top of my head: the fact of us being a couple.
“Nah. But that’s cool. With Serena, though…why not surprised?”
“Oh, Jake says Toby cheats on his girlfriends all the time.”
Georgia sighs. “He’s an asshole,” she says. Behind us, Toby’s voice is rising louder and louder, something about Great Adventures, tradition, on and on.
“I don’t think he’s an asshole,” I say. “I mean, he’s a good guy.”
“How? He cheats,” Georgia says, and I can hear her readjusting herself, turning on her side to face me. I turn too, and her dark eyes look right into mine. “Asshole.”
“Maybe you’re right,” I say.
“Well,” she says, “maybe you are. You know him better than I do, anyway.” She grabs another piece of pizza. “Want any?”
“I’m good,” I say.
“Are you sure?”
“Oh…” I hesitate. “Sure, I guess. Yeah. Thank you.” I take it from her, warm and slippery with cheese. I haven’t had pizza in ages. For a second, I am on the porch with my parents, some late summer Saturday last year, our family night.
Then I open my eyes and see Georgia, smiling at me. Her eyes are bright and curious, and even though she’s eating most of a box of pizza, shirtless in front of a bunch of people, she doesn’t look ashamed or self-conscious in the least. I can’t tell whether I’m envious or confused. Maybe both.
“You’re welcome,” she says and laughs. “Any time. You looked like you needed it.”
“Are you a rising senior or junior?” I ask as I slowly eat.
“Senior,” she says. “Late summer birthday.”
“Yeah, me too. It sucks. Last year my mom and I planned this whole party, and then no one came except my boyfriend.”
“Shit. That’s horrible.” She’s silent for a second. “When’s your birthday?”
“August twentieth. Usually right before school starts.”
“Hey, mine’s the thirteenth!”
“Oh yeah?”
“Yeah. We’ll make them have a party for us here,” she
says. “Like we have for the JAC kids, with the little hats and dolphin plates and everything.”
“That’d be great,” I say, imagining—for one embarrassing moment—the counselors toasting us with glasses of juice. “What school do you go to?”
“Eastern Academy. You?”
“Jackson. That explains why I haven’t seen you around.”
“Yeah, Eastern kind of sucks, but it’s also nice. It’s pretentious as hell, but I have friends there, you know? That’s something. Although,” she adds, looking around the circle, “Katie and Priya are both at camp or visiting family practically all summer, so for the most part I’m stuck with this crowd of jokers for the next few months. Hey, Matt, can I trade you a pepperoni slice for some sausage and mushroom?”
I don’t say anything. I don’t really have friends at school, not anymore. Ever since I started dating Jake, all the girls who used to come over to my house for sleepovers have stopped talking to me as much. They’re still nice to me, but we’re not as close. They grew closer to each other and found other people, so slowly I didn’t even realize it was happening, until one day in March I didn’t understand the inside jokes they were making at lunch. I didn’t even know some of the girls at the table.
I’m not sure why it happened. When Jake and I started dating, they squealed and giggled over him as much as I did, and now they barely pay attention to me. But Jake never liked them—said they were superficial and boring—and now I guess he’s proven right.
“Whatever, though. I’m out of here soon,” I say.
“I know,” Georgia sighs. For a second, I panic. I shouldn’t have said that. Even Toby doesn’t know about our plans to leave. So far it’s only me and Jake. We want to keep it an absolute secret, just in case. But then, Georgia speaks again. “College. I can’t wait. I’m so excited.”
“Oh,” I say. “Yeah. Me too.”
“I can’t even decide where to apply. I’ve got like twenty schools on my list. There are so many factors to consider, you know?” As Georgia talks about research positions and major fairs and SAT scores, I turn onto my back and stare up at the sun until I have to close my eyes. I pull up my T-shirt to the bottom of my bra. Her words turn into a soft blur in my ears while the heat presses down on me, warming me from every angle, until I hear her say, “Anyway. There’s a lot to think about,” and the two of us are silent together.
Chapter 4
Jake has the late shift at the grocery store on Wednesdays and Thursdays, so today, at 5:55, I’m lying on the sidewalk near the curb with my eyes closed, waiting for my dad to pick me up. Normally I would worry about someone seeing me, but it’s been a long day, the sidewalk is warm, and there are no benches. Besides, no one has come out of the aquarium’s double doors since I got outside. Jenny left abruptly around three o’clock, saying she had to go home early without an explanation, and the last few JAC babies were all picked up ten minutes ago.
My phone buzzes. It’s Dad.
Got caught at office. Testers found another bug!!!!! leaving in 5. be there son
If only his company knew that their best software developer could barely operate a phone keyboard.
I close my eyes again and run my fingers along the crease between sidewalk panels. Twenty, thirty minutes of learning the way the grass grows from the dirt in the cracks. I text Jake hi?, but the evening is always busy for him, and I don’t expect a response.
A door slams and I sit up quickly. Georgia is standing over me, thumbs hooked into the straps of her flimsy JAC backpack. She squints down at me.
“You okay?”
“Yeah, I’m…well, I’m waiting for my dad to pick me up, and he probably won’t be here for a little while, so I was just…resting,” I finish feebly.
She cocks her head. “Where do you live?”
“Meadow Valley.”
“Off Millhouse?”
“Yeah.”
“I can take you home, if you want,” she says, extending a hand to pull me up. “My parents are out at some charity dinner tonight anyway, so I don’t have to be home any particular time.”
“That would be so great,” I reply, a little surprised. “Really? Are you sure?”
“Yeah, don’t worry about it. It’s not far from my house.”
“You have a car?”
“Yep, over there,” she says, tilting her head to the last remaining car in the parking lot: a gleaming black sedan with a blue paint scrape on the fender.
As we climb into the car—which is boiling hot—I text my dad.
Girl from work is taking me home.
Don’t worry about picking me up.
Are you ok? Does she have a license?
I can still pick you up. Really sorry I’m late
He always takes longer to type than I do. I wait for him to read what I’ve written.
Ok. Tell her to be careful driving.
I do not tell Georgia, turning on Top 40 radio full blast, to be careful driving.
She’s a counselor for the camp, don’t worry. All of them have to have licenses.
“Thanks again for driving me,” I say to Georgia, who is humming along to the music. “Jake would pick me up, but he works a lot of evening shifts.”
“You’re welcome,” she replies, smiling. “But it really is no big deal.”
My phone buzzes with Dad’s response:
Is she a new friend?
Does she want to come to dinner?
I can’t decide whether to grimace or smile. My parents want me to make more friends, ever since the girls from school stopped coming over. They say they like Jake, and though I know they’re not a fan of his age or his smoking habit, I think they’re at least okay with him. But Mom told me in halting language as we washed dishes after dinner a few weeks ago, “We just want to make sure you have people to talk to who are, you know, not boys, and maybe closer to your own age.” At the time, I told her Jake and I were only two years apart, and I sulked until we finished the dishes, but she wasn’t wrong. It would be nice to have someone to hang out with in the evenings when Jake is working. And it would make my parents happy.
“Do you wanna stay for dinner?” I ask Georgia. “After you drop me off?”
“Yeah, sure!” she says, eyebrows arching up. “Oh, wow, thank you. I was gonna order in pizza again, but I’ve had pizza for lunch every day this week and last week, and I’m trying not to get sick of it.”
“How—” I start, but then I stop. It would be rude.
“What?” she says, glancing over at me.
“I mean, how do you eat pizza all the time and not, like, gain a ton of weight?”
“Well, I’m kind of fat already,” she says all matter-of-fact, “but I’m on the swim team at school, and we’re basically on our feet all day at camp, so—”
“You’re not fat,” I say quickly.
“I am, kind of. It’s cool. I like how I look. My mom worries about it more than me.”
She turns into my development, past the faded Meadow Valley sign and the tiny pool swarming with kids and teenagers. The neighbor boys who were my childhood friends are all lifeguards now, swimsuits slouched low on their skinny frames, jaws working around their gum. I stopped going to the pool last summer, when those boys’ gazes would linger on me and my friends a little too long.
“Turn here,” I say, and Georgia curves the car onto my road. The houses line up neat and orderly, alternating the colors of their doors: red, blue, green, red, blue. Not for the first time, I try to imagine a life in which I do not come back here at night, leave here in the morning. But the future is foreign to me, and so bright I can’t make out its shape.
“Which one?”
“Right here, 1621. You can park on the curb.”
Georgia is over a foot from the curb when she turns off the car, but I don’t say anything. I only got my license a
month ago, and since I don’t have a car, I rarely use it. I’m not that great a driver.
“This seems like a really nice neighborhood,” she says. “Really friendly.”
“It’s all right,” I say. “It was fun when I was little because there were a lot of other kids to play with.”
“It seems like it would have been nice,” Georgia says and unbuckles.
The door to my house is unlocked. “Mom?” I call as I walk in. “I brought home someone for dinner, did Dad tell you?”
“In here,” she calls from the kitchen at the end of the hall.
We walk in. Mom has the curtains thrown all the way open, and the sunlight is streaming in, coating the whole kitchen in a soft yellow glow. The somber voice of the classical music DJ drifts from a radio in the corner. She looks up from a cutting board overflowing with broccoli, and a big wide smile—the one my dad always talks about when he tells the story of how they met—washes over her face.
“Caroline! This is your friend from work your dad was telling me about?” She sticks her hand across the kitchen island. “I’m Cathy. You can call me Mrs. Weaver if you want, but Cathy’s okay. Or Mrs. Caroline’s Mom, if you want.” She winks. Georgia shakes her hand. In the two days I’ve known her, I haven’t gotten the impression that this girl is particularly shy, but next to my mom she seems almost meek.
“Georgia,” she says. “It’s very nice to meet you. Thank you for having me for dinner.”
“Oh, you don’t need to be so formal,” Mom says, brushing the chopped broccoli into a pot. “We’re not fancy here. Do you like chicken and pasta? I like to put some veggies in there too. Complete the bowl of nutrients, if you will. I’d offer to leave them out if you don’t like broccoli and peas, but honestly, I think y’all eat too much crap as it is, so you’re gonna have to suffer through it.”
“No, I love broccoli. That sounds great,” Georgia says. She shoots me a look. It’s one I’m used to. I get it every time I bring home new friends. The last time I saw it was on Jake’s face a year ago, the first time he met my parents. Part scared, part amused, and part amazed, it is the standard reaction to my mother: This is too much. I used to find it embarrassing, but I’ve come to accept that anyone I bring home has to have a strong constitution.
The Goodbye Summer Page 4