Silver Meadows Summer

by Emma Otheguy

  Tía Cuca taught her how to line up the scraps, right sides together, piecing together a fabric large enough for curtains. The patchwork had a busy, cozy look, and Tía Cuca told her stories as they sewed each piece: the scrap with the tiny purple-and-white flowers had been a dress for Gabriela, and the seersucker had been a bench cushion. Tía Cuca said it had been a bad choice, dingy after only a few washes.

  “Caro,” Mami said when Tía Cuca went to put away the sewing machine, “maybe you could do something with your cousin today. She had such a hard night, I’m sure she’d love to play a game with you.”

  Carolina wondered if Mami knew just how hard the night had been for Gabriela, if Mami, too, had heard Gabriela crying in her room.

  “It would be a nice gesture,” Mami added.

  “I’ll ask her when I see her,” Carolina agreed.

  By the time Gabriela came downstairs, everyone was busy getting ready for the day. The coffeepot was gurgling cheerfully, and Mami was fixing breakfast. When the phone rang, Uncle Porter picked it up. He talked for a moment, then held his hand over the mouthpiece.

  “It’s for you, Carolina.”

  Carolina walked over slowly, dragging her fingers along the counter as she went. She took the phone from Uncle Porter and perched on one of the high kitchen stools. “Hello?”

  Jennifer sounded like she’d been up since dawn. “Sun’s out, do you have a water bottle? Want me to fill one up for you?”

  Carolina fiddled with the pad of paper her aunt and uncle kept by the phone, and clicked the top of the pen open and shut.

  “Carolina? Are you there?”

  “Yeah, I’m here.” She looked over at Mami, who was whisking eggs. Carolina loved watching Mami cook: she did it always the same, cradling the bowl in one hand, craning her neck to the side. She did it enthusiastically, like she did everything, like she was trying to conquer the scrambled eggs. But right now, the thought of eggs made Carolina sick.

  “I’m supposed to hang out with my cousin,” she said softly.

  “What? I thought we were going to work on the cabin!”

  It was a clear, bright Saturday. There would be fresh air and white light, and Jennifer’s mom was working—they could have all day at the cabin without anyone ever finding out.

  “Well—let me just ask my mom. I’ll call you back.”

  Carolina set the phone down and asked Mami.

  Mami looked up from her eggs. Wisps of hair had come loose from her ponytail. “Well, I guess it is a Saturday—maybe Gabriela wants to go?” Mami seemed to have decided that if Caro had to have weird friends, maybe she could at least get Gabriela to be weird with them.

  Gabriela rolled her eyes and grabbed a bunch of berries off the table. “That’s okay, Tía Ana. I’m hanging out here today.”

  Uncle Porter closed his newspaper. “I thought I was taking you and Alyssa and Jamie to the mall today, Gabs. You must have reminded me three times this week.”

  Gabriela popped a raspberry into her mouth. “Nope. Not going,” she said with her mouth full.

  Mami looked worriedly between Gabriela and Carolina. “Caro, if your cousin is staying home, maybe you should keep each other company—”

  Gabriela slid off the kitchen stool. “Don’t worry about me, Tía Ana, I’ll be in my room. Carolina can do what she wants.”

  Mami sighed. “All right then, Caro, just— What do you even do over there, anyway?”

  Carolina shrugged. “We hang out. We explore the woods behind Jennifer’s house.”

  “Is that safe, Caro? What does Jennifer’s mom think about that?”

  “I mean, I’m sure she’d rather we stayed in and read or something—”

  Uncle Porter laughed loudly. “This is the country, Ana, kids play in the woods.” He folded his newspaper and grabbed the keys off the counter. “Come on, Caro, I’ll give you a ride over there; I have to run some errands anyway.”

  She turned back to Mami. “Can I go, then?”

  “Okay,” Mami agreed finally.

  Uncle Porter winked and headed for the car.

  * * *

  —

  “I’ve always loved this part of Larksville,” Uncle Porter said. They passed a cornfield set close to the road, and the stalks were full and green. “We had some good memories here, Gabs and Cristina and I.”

  “Then why did you move?” Caro asked.

  Uncle Porter considered. “The old house needed more care than we could give it. The roof needed fixing, and it’s hard to cook in a very old kitchen like we used to have. Our new house is easier. More comfortable. Besides”—Uncle Porter smiled at her through the rearview mirror—“our new house has space for our family.”

  Carolina hadn’t thought about it that way before, and it gave her a prickly anxious feeling. What would have happened if Uncle Porter and Tía Cuca hadn’t had a place for them to stay? Suddenly she was nauseous. When you’re new, you care a lot about your family, Mami had said.

  “All the same,” Uncle Porter went on, “it’s nice to come out this way and see all the farmland—but don’t tell Lance Rogan I said that.”

  “Because he wants to build new houses here?” Carolina asked.

  “Exactly why. A lot of people want the houses, too—there are some new businesses in the area, and of course everyone who works there needs places to live.” Uncle Porter shrugged. He dialed off the air conditioner and pushed the switch to roll down the window. “There’s a local conservation organization that’s been buying up rights to farmland around here. Lance says it’s bad for business.”

  But he breathed in the air from the window, fresh and sweet, and Carolina wondered if he really minded.

  Uncle Porter stopped the car in front of Jennifer’s house. “I’m glad you’ve made a friend, Caro. They’re good people.”

  “Can you tell my mom that?” Carolina blurted out.

  Uncle Porter guffawed. “She’s just a worrywart. She’ll come around. Look at Cristina and Gabriela. If your tía Cuca can get used to a daughter as messy as Gabs, your mom can deal with your friends.” He motioned to the door. “Hop out and enjoy your day.”

  Carolina grinned, and she ran all the way to the front door.

  Weeds poked out of the cracked concrete of Jennifer’s driveway. Jennifer yanked the garage door by the handle, and it rolled open with a groan.

  “Let’s see what we can find.” Jennifer dusted off her hands, and Carolina followed her in. The garage was crammed with stuff. Gray sunlight filtered in through the rectangular windows near the roof and made Carolina think of the castle in Sleeping Beauty, just as the spell was being lifted and everything was awakening.

  They poked around, searching cardboard boxes, slightly damp, for things they could use in the cabin, especially a curtain rod. Carolina kept hoping for a tea set, but after thirty minutes, all they had found were some slightly rusty hooks, which Jennifer said they could use to balance the string they had been using to hold up the curtains.

  Carolina fanned herself. She was sweating, and the dust stuck to her skin every time they moved a box. They cleared a narrow path by stacking boxes on top of one another, then walked sideways, making themselves as small as possible, to the back of the garage.

  There were two chairs back there, metal porch chairs with a design of crawling vines on the armrests. They badly needed a new coat of paint, yet they reminded Carolina of the furniture on the terraza in Puerto Rico, with their grated-metal seat bottoms. Even the whinnying noise they made when Carolina tried to lift one up was the same.

  Finally, way in the back of the garage, underneath a faded kite, they found scrapers, brushes, and a stack of cans: house paint. Carolina’s heart beat fast as they sorted through them. One of the cans had been opened, and dry white paint was caked around the seal. The rest were pristine, completely unused.

&n
bsp; “I remember these,” Jennifer said. “My dad was thinking of painting the house white, with mint-green trim.”

  Through the rectangular window, Carolina squinted at the little bit of Jennifer’s house she could see. As Mami had pointed out, the paint was flaking off, leaving the house with a pockmarked surface.

  “I guess we can’t use it, then.”

  “Don’t be silly.” Jennifer heaved up one of the heavy cans. “I was five then.”

  * * *

  —

  Carolina pushed open the door of the cabin. “We’ll have to clean up in here too,” she called over her shoulder. She dropped two paint cans and a canvas bag full of trays and rollers on the tiles outside the cabin, and Jennifer took one of the metal chairs inside.

  They started with the outside walls in the front, taking the old paint off with a scraper in long, thin curls. Next, Jennifer pried open a can of paint with a screwdriver, and the strong chemical smell mixed with the earthy scent of the forest. It wasn’t like an art studio, not like Señora Rivón’s, or like Gavin’s. Instead it reminded Carolina somehow of Mami, rubbing her nail polish off with acetone and slicking on a new color. But the feeling of painting was similar, and after weeks of sketching in her small drawing pad, Carolina let her arm fly across the door, swishing the minty-green paint back and forth.

  They did as much as they could, balancing on the chair to paint the tallest parts of the little cabin. When their backs ached and their paint ran low, they went inside and surveyed their abode.

  “It’d be better if that window wasn’t broken,” Jennifer said, pointing to the left-hand window, the one covered by the tarp.

  “I kind of like it.” The window glowed greenish blue, as the sun shone through first the blue tarp, then the yellow curtains. “It’s almost like stained glass.”

  “When we hang those curtains properly, and bring up the other chairs, it’ll be like a real clubhouse.”

  “More like an artists’ house,” Carolina said. “After all, we use it for art.” Carolina leaned back against the wall. “Hey, Jenn…”

  Jennifer beamed at her. “You called me Jenn.”

  “Is that okay? I heard your dad, the other day.”

  “Of course it’s okay! Can I call you Caro? I heard your cousin call you that, but I didn’t know that was a nickname; I’d never heard it before.”

  Carolina laughed. “Really? There were two Caros in my grade in Puerto Rico.”

  “But here in Larksville you’re the one and only super-special”—Jennifer extended her hand in a sort of bow—“Caro!”

  Carolina hugged her sketchbook close to her. “I could get used to that.” She turned her sketchbook toward Jennifer, showing her the drawing of the flamboyán tree.

  “Whoa, what kind of tree is that?” Jennifer snatched the sketchbook.

  “It’s a kind that grows in Puerto Rico—and in Cuba, which is where my grandparents are from. My dad told me that every person in his family has had a flamboyán, no matter where they lived.”

  “They sure don’t grow around here,” Jennifer said, examining the drawing carefully.

  “Do you think—when I get canvas and paints and all—maybe I could make a painting to hang in here?”

  “If you made a painting of the tree for the cabin, then there would be a flamboyán here too.” Jennifer set down the sketchbook. “Would that make it almost like a home?”

  Carolina breathed in the scent of paint and pine needles, of leaves decaying, and in her imagination the trees of this forest stretched out their tall trunks and long branches, to where they reached the flamboyán tree at home, and their dark greens and browns mingled with the flame-red blossoms.

  “Yes,” Carolina said, “I think that would make it a home.”

  While the paint dried, they searched the woods near the cabin for a thin, straight stick, one they could use in place of a curtain rod. It was proving nearly impossible to find. Every stick they picked up seemed to be too bendy, or else thick and knobby. They wandered around, searching farther and farther from the cabin, and Carolina started to worry about getting lost, but just then they stumbled upon what seemed to be a treasure trove of sticks, as if they had been broken off and trimmed expressly for Caro and Jenn.

  Carolina was just picking up one of the perfect sticks when Jenn put a hand out and stopped her in her tracks.

  “What is it?” Carolina followed Jenn’s gaze to a ruin of a stone wall, a stretch of piled rocks only a few feet across. A ripped piece of yellow police tape was stuck between the rocks, and it flapped back and forth: CAUTION CAUTION CAUTION.

  They inched toward the wall holding hands, and Caro realized that once, not recently, but maybe a century ago, or maybe when the forest had belonged to the fairies and elves, the wall must have marked some kind of path, or the edge of someone’s land.

  They came close enough to see beyond the wall, where the land fell away steeply and a stream ran through the bottom of a ravine. Perhaps it was the same stream that cut across the foot of Cooke’s Hill, or maybe another one altogether. They stared down at it, and went no farther.

  “This is it,” Jenn said. “This is where Paul fell. I can feel it.”

  Carolina could feel it, too, the way the wind here slinked around, slapping the police tape and rushing by them, as if it had something to be guilty about.

  “We’re not supposed to go off of the trail,” Jenn said, repeating the words as if she’d never heard them before. “Because of this. Because of Paul.”

  * * *

  —

  They moved more quickly through the woods on their way back to Jennifer’s house. Carolina didn’t worry about getting lost anymore: she was starting to recognize individual trees, their knobby spots and the particular twists of their branches. The ribbons Jennifer had tied easily marked the way down the hill. It was a little cumbersome carrying the empty paint cans, but the cabin was so small, and they wanted space for their art supplies. They tucked away the paint cans in the garage and headed inside.

  Jennifer’s mom was in the kitchen drinking coffee. “You must be Carolina! I’m Fiona. Have a seat. I’ll make you kids some sandwiches.” She started spreading peanut butter on toast. “Jenn, what are you working on? You have white paint all over you.”

  Jennifer turned beet red. “You know. The same thing as always.”

  Fiona sighed. “You’re not onto those elves again, are you, Jenn? You’re practically a teenager, honey.” She pulled the jelly out of the refrigerator. “What are your interests, Carolina?” She said it hopefully, like maybe the answer would be “algebra.”

  “Carolina’s a painter, like Daddy.”

  “That’s not true,” Carolina said quickly. “I just like to paint.”

  “Now that’s the kind of art a young woman should be interested in. What do you like to paint? Landscapes or figures? Or abstract?”

  “L-landscapes,” Carolina stammered.

  “My favorite!” Fiona exclaimed. “That’s why I fell in love with Jenn’s dad. He kept painting me these landscapes—first it was the ocean, then it was farms: green pastures and red barns, and before I knew it I was packing my bags and moving out to the country with him. A landscape artist.” Fiona propped her chin in her hand and looked at Carolina in a way that made her a little uncomfortable, and also bubbly inside, like she’d just heard some unexpected and wonderful news.

  Caro took a bite of the sandwich that Fiona had made for her, and set it down on her plate. She liked how everyone was eating however they wanted; Fiona was leaning over the counter, and Jenn was perched on a kitchen stool. “I think Jenn’s elves are cool. I wish I could do something like that, but I only know how to paint.”

  “You keep doing your painting. And show Jenn’s dad your paintings next time you see him. He loves talking to other painters.”

  Caroli
na didn’t bother to tell Fiona that they weren’t paintings, that she hadn’t done anything but draw in her sketchbook for weeks and weeks. Instead she shoved the rest of the peanut butter and jelly sandwich into her mouth, and washed it down with a big gulp of milk. “Okay.”

  Jennifer patted Carolina on the back. “Don’t choke on that sandwich, Caro, my mom will never forgive herself.” She leaned forward, her braid swinging in front of Caro’s face, and whispered, “You should show my dad, though. Then you can get to work on the painting—for our cabin.”

  After Fiona left for her afternoon shift, the house was quiet, and the girls stayed inside for a while, enjoying the empty space and the dusty sunlight, how cool and still it felt.

  “There’s a stand down the road that sells flowers,” Jennifer said after a while. We could go get some.”

  “Or we could clean,” Caro said. “The cabin needs it.”

  “If you put it that way, then I definitely want to go buy flowers. Come on, let’s go now.”

  They turned off of Jennifer’s street and walked on the main road. After the shade of the forest, the sun made Carolina feel bare and exposed. She felt like an ant, crawling single file along an endless stretch of blacktop. The dashes of yellow paint were new, starkly marking the way to Larksville, and the new houses just beyond.

  Jennifer tented both hands over her forehead to shade her eyes. There was a smell of hot rubber and new blacktop. “My mom worries a lot,” she said suddenly. “She thinks I’ll get made fun of at school if I talk about elves, and when I walk on this road she gets nervous. She thinks I’ll get hit by a car just because there’s more traffic now.” Jennifer kicked a loose bit of asphalt. “But I used to walk on this road all the time before they built all those new houses.”

  Carolina edged a little more to the side of the road, closer to where the weeds and the grass grew. “Moms are different with their own kids,” she said, and as soon as she said it she knew it was true. “It’s like how for my mom, Gabriela always does everything right, and no matter what she does, it’s what my mom says I should do.”