Not Our Summer

by Casie Bazay

K. J. stands nearby, gazing out into the depthless blue. I wonder what she’s thinking about right now. I watch as she edges deeper into the water, and it climbs to the bottoms of her cutoff shorts. I think she might stop there, but she wades in farther, until just the very tops of her shoulders and her mass of short, unruly brown hair are visible.

  The water feels so incredible that I consider joining her, but I really don’t want to walk back to our hotel sopping wet. I’d also hate for my new shirt to get all stretched out, so I stay where I am. For the briefest moment, I’m envious of K. J. She doesn’t seem to share any of my concerns about what people think or worry about any consequences, and I can’t imagine what that kind of freedom must be like.

  When she finally wades back my way, I could swear there are tears shining in her eyes. I pretend not to notice as I turn to walk back toward shore, my feet squishing in the soft sand. We walk up to the sidewalk and follow it back to the hotel in our usual silence, but this time, something feels different, like we’re not really ignoring each other but maybe just needing a moment to ourselves.

  I still don’t know what to think about this change between us, but that’s okay. For some reason, I feel like I’ve got plenty of time to figure that out.

  CHAPTER 21

  K. J.

  “SO WHAT WAS GRANDPA LIKE?” I ASK, STARING AT the ceiling of our room. It’s past midnight, but Becka and I are still awake on our separate beds.

  “Strange, but you already knew that.” She lets out a sigh and the bed springs creak as she moves to adjust her pillow. “He was so stuck in his ways. Never liked to do anything different.”

  “What’d you guys do when you went over there?” We used to go on walks in the woods near his house when I was little, but I don’t remember doing much of anything the last time I went. Usually, he and Mom would get into an argument and then we’d jet.

  “Most of the time, we watched his nature documentaries, and he’d tell me about his latest insect finds. He always made soup and sandwiches for us.”

  I smile. “Chicken noodle, right?”

  “Uh huh.”

  We’re both quiet for a while. Voices carry through the door as people move past in the hallway outside our room, but I can’t make out what they’re saying. There’s a loud “Oh shit!” followed by a peal of laughter. We’re probably in bed early compared with some other people around here—it’s a party town, apparently—but we’ve got to be at the dive center early tomorrow morning.

  “Did he ever take you bird-watching?” Becka asks, interrupting my thoughts.

  “Once, I think.” Honestly, I don’t remember much about it other than having to be really quiet for a long time and pressing binoculars to my eyeballs until they gave me a headache.

  “That was my favorite thing,” Becka says quietly. “The bird-watching. I didn’t really care to search for bugs, but looking for birds was fun. There was this one bird called a Yellow Warbler that I loved. I told Grandpa all the other birds were boring colors, but that one was beautiful. It looked like it belonged in the rainforest—not Siloam Springs.”

  Listening to Becka talk about the bird makes me wish I had more memories of my own with Grandpa.

  “He talked about you, you know,” Becka continues.

  “He did?”

  “Mmm hmm. Used to annoy me so much.”

  My curiosity piqued, I turn her way, but in the dark I can only make out the outline of her face. “What’d he say?”

  “Oh, just how you were so smart, and how he wished the two of us could be friends. He showed me a drawing you made for him once.”

  “What was it?”

  “A bumblebee. It was really good, and I remember I was a little jealous, actually. I’ve always sucked at drawing.”

  Hearing her say this sparks a weird sensation inside me. Becka, jealous of me? How ridiculous. I’m the one who should be jealous—she’s the one who’s always had it all. “I think I remember drawing that,” I say instead, trying to mask my surprise. “I was really into art when I was younger.”

  “You should have stuck with it. You were good.”

  I turn to stare at the ceiling again, thinking of the Grand Canyon sketch I started but never finished after our first trip. “That was about the only thing I’ve ever been good at,” I mumble.

  “Grandpa was a good artist,” Becka continues. “Did you ever see his sketches?”

  I search the recesses of my memory, vaguely recalling a sketchbook full of insects and birds. I must have been pretty young when he showed it to me. “I don’t really remember.”

  “Grandma was, too. I’m sure you saw that painting she did in the living room.”

  “I don’t think so, no,” I admit. It’s sad, but I can’t remember anything specific from Grandpa’s house. Other than the Bug Room, anyway. I close my eyes, trying to think of the last drawing I completed. A motorcycle or a car maybe? It would have been back in middle school or freshman year at the latest.

  “We should probably try to get some sleep,” Becka says, interrupting my thoughts again.

  “Yeah, probably so.” I roll away from her and over onto my side. “Night.”

  “Good night.”

  Sleep doesn’t come easy because I’m still thinking about how fast things have changed between me and Becka. We might be getting along at the moment, but I know it isn’t likely to last. When this is all over, we’ll probably go our separate ways and never think twice about seeing the other again. We’ve made it eighteen years living completely separate lives, after all.

  The sun hasn’t been up for long when we set off on a big, white catamaran to our snuba diving destination, a coral reef a few miles off the island. I yawn and gaze out at the ocean while Becka sits beside me, sipping coffee from a to-go cup from our hotel. Everyone on the boat is pretty quiet because we’re all still half asleep and it’s super peaceful being on the water like this. Unfortunately, that peace can’t last forever, though.

  “Who’s ready for some fun this morning?” a male voice calls over a loudspeaker. The crowd gives a weak cheer. “I said, who’s ready for some fun?” he repeats.

  Becka grimaces but I’m starting to liven up some. “Woot, woot!” I yell as the crowd cheers again, a little louder this time.

  “All right,” the guy continues, “everyone meet me up on the back deck in five. We’ve got some procedures to cover before we start having the time of our lives. You guys are in for an awesome experience today!”

  An overly tanned guy in red swimming trunks and a white T-shirt hurries down the steps, giving several people fist bumps as he passes. The announcer, no doubt.

  Everyone makes their way toward the back deck and gathers around our guide. Aside from being the tannest white guy I’ve ever seen, he also has gleaming white teeth, which he apparently loves to show off. He goes over our equipment and some instructions for snuba diving, grinning after every other sentence. “Everyone got it?” Mr. Smiles asks, giving a double thumbs-up.

  “Got it,” we answer in unison. Becka and I exchange a smile and an eye roll because he’s cheesy as all get-out.

  “How many Red Bulls do you think he’s had this morning?” I ask her.

  She eyes him again and smirks. “At least two.”

  We’re fitted with masks and the rest of the equipment we’ll need to snuba dive, and next comes breathing practice into the mouthpiece, which is a little freaky at first, but I finally get the hang of it.

  Now wearing swim fins, Becka and I move clumsily toward the edge of the boat to peer into the water. I can see the reef in the distance—a big dark patch in the middle of all this sparkling blue—and I start to have a few second thoughts about this, because how do they know there aren’t sharks around here?

  “Now remember, everything you’ll see in the reef is living, even if it doesn’t look like it,” Mr. Smiles says, and we turn back around. “So please don’t touch anything. Let’s leave things the way we find them.”

  He gives us a few more ins
tructions, and then guides come around again to double-check our equipment as the boat comes to a stop. We separate into our assigned groups of two or four and head down a set of steps leading into the water, where a bunch of blue rafts with our air supply await. Once every group has claimed a raft, the crew swims around, connecting our breathing hoses.

  As we all push our rafts away from the main boat, I want to ask Becka if she’s nervous, too, but I’ve already got my mouthpiece in and I’m afraid to take it back out. Treading water nearby, Mr. Smiles reminds us how to check our air consumption and what we should do if we need help underwater.

  “Everyone ready?” he finally asks, face splitting into his biggest grin yet.

  People give him a thumbs-up.

  I’m not really sure if I’m ready or not, but what the hell. I let go of the raft and sink into the lukewarm water. My breath comes in shaky gasps as I blow in and out of my mouthpiece, but I suppose everything is working like it should. I force my muscles to relax and swim toward the patch of darkness below. Becka is just a little ways ahead of me.

  The view outside my mask is so unreal that my nerves quickly begin to fade. Light dapples the sandy floor and bright fish dart between chunks of coral. I swim closer to find the reef isn’t dark and spooky like it appeared from the surface. Instead, it’s a lighter tannish gray color with seaweed sticking out from between the rocks. A neon orange fish peeks out at me and I point to it before realizing no one else is around to see. I swim back to Becka and tap her arm.

  Together, we make our way along the edge of the reef, checking out the creatures hiding in nearly every nook and cranny. Yellow, red, blue, green, and even purple—the colors of the fish are unbelievable. The ocean floor dips downward and we follow it, going as far as our twenty-foot hoses will allow. For a second, I’m frustrated that I can’t go deeper but then I remember that this is still freaking amazing and way better than just snorkeling from the surface.

  It feels like we’ve only been down here for a few minutes when one of the guides approaches in full scuba gear and points to his watch. Crap. We’re almost out of time. I want to squeak out as much as I can from this experience, so I swim away from Becka, trying to get a closer look at a weird crustacean I’ve spotted on the ocean floor, but the next thing I know, she’s tapping me on the shoulder and pointing toward the surface.

  We kick our way back up to the raft, where even the fresh air doesn’t keep my disappointment at bay. I was just getting comfortable down there.

  “That didn’t last nearly long enough,” Becka says as we push our raft back toward the catamaran.

  “No joke.” For once, we’re both in complete agreement.

  Back on land, we grab hot dogs and drinks from a beachside vendor and find plastic lounge chairs under a palm tree to sit and chill. If we can’t be underwater, at least the view of the surface is a pretty good consolation.

  “I could totally live here,” I say, taking another sip of my lemonade. “I mean, what’s not to love about Key West? Chickens. Snuba diving. The ocean. It sucks so much that we have to go home tomorrow.”

  “Agree.” Becka heaves a sigh and fiddles with the hem of her cover-up. “Speaking of home, have you applied anywhere? For college?”

  “Yeah, NorthWest actually.”

  “Community college?”

  “Yep.”

  “You didn’t want to shoot for any of the universities?”

  “I figured it was too late for that at this point,” I admit. And truth is, I had serious doubts any four-year colleges would accept my less-than-stellar transcript. “But maybe eventually.”

  Becka sweeps several crumbs from her lap and reaches up to tighten her ponytail. “You should do something with art or design. You’d probably be good at that.”

  “I haven’t really thought that far ahead. Just want to get my basics out of the way first. But thanks.” Once again, the compliment catches me off guard. I’m not sure if it’s because I’m not used to them in general or just more shocked when they’re coming from Becka.

  I’m admiring the ocean view again when a tiny orange dragonfly lands on the end of my chair right next to my ankle. I study it for several seconds because it looks different than the ones I’ve seen back home. Grandpa probably would have known exactly which species it is. In fact, I can imagine him telling me all about it if he were sitting here right now. The dragonfly takes off toward the water and I watch until it disappears from sight.

  “Oh my god,” I say, turning to Becka. “I just got the best idea ever.”

  “What’s that?” Her brow crinkles with that skeptical look I’ve learned to recognize by now.

  “We should get bug tattoos. In honor of Grandpa.”

  “Tattoos?” She spits the word out like she’s never heard it before.

  “Yeah, what do you think?” I run my fingers through my hair, wondering if maybe it wasn’t such a great idea after all. “I could design them… if you want,” I suggest, like this might actually convince her.

  Becka sips from her water bottle and appears to mull this over. “Like on our hip or something? My mom would never see that.”

  “Who cares if she sees it. We’re eighteen. And plus, it’s for Grandpa. I’m sure she’d be okay with that.”

  “Yeah, maybe.” Becka grows quiet again, considering things.

  “Let’s go swim and you can think about it. How about that?”

  This seems to appease her, so we strip back down to our swimsuits and head for the water.

  Sometime later, after having our fill of swimming, we’re back in the shade, this time with ice cream cones. Becka still hasn’t given me an answer on the tattoos, and I haven’t brought it up again, but I can’t get the idea out of my brain. So while she’s busy scrolling through her phone, I dig out the pen and stationery pad I’d swiped from our hotel room from the bottom of my bag and start sketching a dragonfly, similar to the one I’d seen earlier.

  “Whatcha drawing?” she asks after a while.

  “My tattoo design.” I tilt the pad of paper her way.

  Becka studies it for a second, taking another lick of her ice cream. “So… if we were both going to get a bug tattoo, what would mine be? Hypothetically speaking, of course.”

  I lower my sunglasses to peer at her. “You want my opinion?”

  “Sure. Why not?”

  I click my pen shut and tap it against the armrest of my chair absentmindedly. “I’d say something sophisticated. Maybe a butterfly?”

  “I love butterflies, but isn’t that kind of basic?”

  “Okay, how about a ladybug, then?”

  She licks her ice cream again and nods. “A ladybug. I could maybe live with that.”

  “Hold on,” I say, clicking the pen back open and flipping to a fresh page in the notepad. I complete a new sketch and show it to Becka. “You’ll have to imagine it with colors, but maybe something like this?”

  She actually looks a little impressed. “Nice.”

  “So… do you wanna do it?”

  “You’re being completely serious?”

  “Completely.”

  “And you think we could just walk into a tattoo parlor, show them those pictures, and get it done?”

  “That’s what I’m hoping.”

  Becka shakes her head and smiles. “You know, I never do things like this. Spontaneous, crazy things.”

  “If you want my opinion again, then I’d say you’re in the perfect place to try something crazy and spontaneous.”

  Becka’s lips pinch together and I prepare myself for a letdown. She’s way too straitlaced for this kind of thing after all.

  “You know what?” she finally says, straightening in her seat a little. “I’m down for it. Let’s go get ourselves a bug tattoo.”

  “Really?” I can’t contain my grin now. Or my surprise.

  “Really,” she says, eyes twinkling.

  We find a tattoo place back on Duval Street, and, lucky for us, the guy is able to get us right in.
He studies my sketches while Becka and I fill out the paperwork, and when he says he can make a copy of my designs and use them as stencils, I smile and give Becka a playful told-you-so look. How cool is it that my drawings are going to be a part of us both?

  “You can go first,” I tell Becka, mainly because I’m afraid she’ll back out if she doesn’t.

  “I changed my mind,” she says, and I inwardly groan. “I think I want it on my wrist instead.”

  Relief floods through me, though I’m not really sure why I’m making such a big deal about this. “Great idea,” I tell her. “I’ll do that, too,” Honestly, I don’t care where mine goes because I’ll probably get more tattoos at some point anyway.

  Becka only winces at the beginning and then stares out the front window while the guy works. The nice thing about tiny tattoos? They don’t take all that long. The ladybug comes out just like my drawing, only in red and black, and it’s pretty adorable.

  My dragonfly takes a little longer, and I’d be lying if I said it didn’t hurt. But I keep my mouth clamped shut, wondering how Becka made it through so calmly. Once it’s finished, we hold our wrists side by side to compare.

  “Mine’s better,” Becka taunts.

  “No way. This dragonfly is sick.”

  “Okay, they’re both pretty great,” she admits. “My mom’s gonna freak, but I think she’ll love it. Once she gets used to it, at least.”

  After getting aftercare instructions and some ointment, we set off, still staring at our wrists. Mine’s starting to sting a little more, but no way am I going to complain.

  “I can’t believe I have an honest-to-god tattoo,” Becka says, pulling out her phone to snap another picture of it.

  “Believe it,” I say. “’Cause it ain’t coming off!”

  For dinner, we choose a French restaurant and sit outside at a table for two. Even though they have American food as well, I only order stuff I associate with France, like escargot, soufflé, and a strawberry creme-filled crepe, since this might be my only chance to eat at a place like this. No more fancy restaurants courtesy of Grandpa after this trip, especially since we used our cards to pay for the tattoos.