Someone Like Summer (10 page)

“G
ET IN
,” K
ENYON SAID
. He was waiting for me in front of the library, driving a new Cooper. Red with the white top down. His graduation gift from Dad. I'd promised I wouldn't drive until I was eighteen, even though I could have gotten a junior license.

If
I
wasn't out on the road, Dad said, that meant one less worry for him. If I kept my promise, said Dad, we'd talk about a secondhand car he'd get me for summers and vacations from college.

Kenyon said, “Dad and Larkin are going out for a lobster dinner, so I thought we could go for a fish fry. Are you free?”

“Yes, Esteban's working.” I got into the front seat.

“Is he your whole life now or something?”

“Sure, Kenyon. He's my whole life. I'm never without him.”

“You don't have to be so sarcastic.”

“Do you realize how little time Esteban and I have together?”

“I think stolen moments make a new relationship all the more intense,” Kenyon said. “Maybe if you could see him every night the way you did Trip, he wouldn't be—”

I didn't let him finish. “I didn't see Trip every night. I saw Trip every night he decided we'd see each other. He wasn't in love with me, and now I know I wasn't in love with him, either. I was in love with his boat, his car, the restaurants we could afford to go to—all the superficial stuff.”

“Don't you miss any of that, Sis?”

“I don't yet.”

“That's an honest answer. I was hoping we could discuss this without me saying something gross or something that would make you angry.”

“Why?”

“Because I know you can tell me things you can't tell Dad. Remember, Sis, I'm part of the team looking out for you. Mom would want that. She'd want me to make sure you're not getting in over your head.”

“I'm trying not to. It's different, though, with Esteban. He's not Trip. He's not like any boy I've ever dated. He really feels the same way I feel about him.”

Kenyon looked so handsome, tall and tan, wearing white shorts, a red T, and a Yankees cap. I had the thought that we looked like some steady couple off for an evening of fun, in a convertible where everyone could see us. How long had it been since that had happened? Maybe I did miss that life a little bit, but what I had with Esteban was unique. I had never seen someone look at me the way he did. I had never felt myself
tremble when he just strolled toward me with that look in his eyes.

Kenyon said, “Since we're on the subject of Esteban, Sis, I have to tell you something. I can't offer my apartment to Esteban anymore. If Charlie found out, he'd be mad as hell at me for helping a Latino, and also for keeping you and Esteban secret from Dad. It'd all come out.”

“I know. I thought of that. Sometimes I think I should just marry Esteban. I'll be eighteen next winter. He'd be a citizen automatically, and if we were married, Dad would have to accept him.”

“
Marry
him?”

“Don't get excited. That just popped into my head from nowhere. We've never talked about getting married.”

“I hope not. That would be a sure way to get him deported if he has no papers. He probably doesn't.”

“Kenyon, I'm not serious.”

“But be serious about what can happen to your Esteban if he needs identification for
any
reason.”

“He hasn't any papers. He's very vulnerable, isn't he?”

“
Very
, honey. There's something else.” He sighed. He said, “Charlie's afraid there's some Ridge Road revenge in the cards because of coming upon Esteban a few weeks ago.”

“He has no idea who it was, Kenyon.”

“But he thinks it was someone from Ridge Road trying to get even. Now he's stirring things up trying to defeat the hiring hall. That could be trouble too. That's one issue Dad and he don't see eye to eye on at all!”

In Seaview a lot of people were sick of seeing Latinos waiting for jobs down by the railroad station. They wanted them to be in a hiring hall. There was a plan to buy the old police station and turn it into a place where they could congregate, where there were rest rooms and where they weren't conspicuous. Of course, Charlie Annan opposed it. He didn't want to encourage Latinos to live in Seaview at all. There were plenty of people who agreed with him. Dad didn't, because he needed Latinos to stay in business.

“Charlie Annan had that idea way before anything happened at Ridge Road,” I said.

“I know he did. But he's really going to push it now. So Dad and Charlie are going to be at odds,” said Kenyon. “I just thought you ought to know. Not that there's anything anyone can do about it.” He looked across at me and smiled. “Hey, let's put this behind us and have a fun evening.”

“There's just one thing. Can you get Esteban's holy medal back, Kenyon? Charlie grabbed it when they fought.”

“If there was any way I could, I would. But how would I do that?” Kenyon said.

He drove out to Fish Eddy's on the highway near Montauk. We took our food to Lookout Point and ate dinner watching the kayaks in the bay on one side, and the huge ocean waves on the other. Kenyon said he knew it was corny to park there, that not many locals did, but it was the one view he'd longed for when he was back at Cornell during one of upstate New York's winters.

I told Kenyon my plan to have Esteban to dinner one night.

Humongous sigh.

“Good luck!” he said.

“You don't have to come. Just Larkin and me and Dad.”

“I said, good luck!”

“You aren't really cheering me and Esteban on, are you?”

“It's just so much trouble to go through,” Kenyon said. “He's unskilled and undocumented.”

“All of which can be fixed with time,” I said.

“And if it
can
be fixed, what happens then? You don't even look at the college catalogs anymore. I see they're piled up in the hall at home.”

“When school's out, it's hard for me to think about college. I need people around me who are thinking about college.”

“No danger of that now,” Kenyon said sarcastically. “Even if he can become legal, what does that mean to the two of you?”

“I don't know, Kenyon. I just know we have
this chemistry. Right from the start we've had it. Remember you taught Mom and me
coup de foudre
?”

“Mom wasn't talking about someone from South America nobody knows anything about! Anna B., he may be a great guy; he probably is. But what I'm concerned about is
you
. You're getting into something with someone who isn't accountable. He could be here today and gone tomorrow. Where would that leave you?”

“He's accountable. He is unless your boss sics Immigration on him.”

“Well, that's Charlie's bugaboo. He's a little crazy on the subject. Yesterday he told me he was composing a petition to stop the library from buying books in Spanish. He said taxpayer money shouldn't be spent on anything that promotes languages other than English.”

“How do you stand him?”

“He's a very skilled vet, Annabel. He can do surgery a lot of New York doctors don't know how to do. And he's an old friend of our family's.”

Who wanted to hear accolades for Charlie
God-awful Annan? Change the subject, Anna B.

I said, “Kenyon? Mom would like Esteban!”

“What would she like about him, Sis?”

“He's a believer. She'd like that. He says without God life doesn't make sense. I don't ever ask him what sense it makes
with
God.”

“Don't start on that subject,” Kenyon said. “Tell me what else Mom would like about Esteban.”

“Give me time to think.”

“You brought it up. I imagined you'd given it some thought. You don't even know him, Sis.”

“I'm trying to get to know him. It's not easy with both my father and my brother down on him.”

“I'm not down on him, Sis. And Dad is clueless about you two. His head is in the clouds, thanks to Larkin. I see he returned your cell phone.”

“Yes, I have it back. Kenyon? Wait until
you
fall for someone,” I said. “I don't think you've ever been in love.”

“I already have fallen for someone,” Kenyon
said. “Her name is Maxine, and she'll be staying with me for a week, in two weeks.”

 

When I got home later, Larkin was watching an HBO movie about Jackson Pollack, the abstract artist who put his canvas on the floor and threw paint at it.

She turned it off, and I said, “Larkin, keep watching it. I'll watch with you.”

“I've seen it, Annabel. Poor Pollack. Do you know, before he was famous,
Life
magazine called him Jack the Dripper.”

“At least he got into
Life
magazine,” I said.

“That was his beginning.”

Dad was at the kitchen counter on the phone, handling a work emergency, trying to get a crew together for a new job. Even weeks later he was still missing fellows from Ridge Road. Some had left Seaview and some were relocating to a house down near the train station. Esteban was planning to relocate there too.

Dalí was up on the couch, his cast finally off,
wagging his tail because I'd entered the screening room.

I thought of telling Larkin that it was Esteban at Dr. Annan's that night, but I still wasn't sure yet how much she told Dad. I didn't want to get Kenyon in trouble, either.

“Poor Kenny can't ever relax,” Larkin said. “Do you ever cook dinner, Annabel?”

“I cook a few things. Dad likes my meat loaf.” (Of course—Mom's recipe.) “Has he complained that I don't cook?”

“No. Your father has nothing but praise for you. It's my idea that he should come home to a good meal at night. I'd do it if there was any way I could, but I'm mounting a show now.”

“We've always managed, Larkin.”

“He's never been so stressed, though. Now there are rumors Dr. Annan is causing more trouble.”

“Kenyon says he wants the library to stop buying books in Spanish,” I said. “And he's back opposing the hiring hall.”

“Poor Charlie. Sometimes perfectly nice people get these fixations. Your father says Charlie needs a woman.”

Larkin was wearing a white skirt with a backless green blouse and high-heeled white sandals. She was drinking a bottle of Stewart's low-calorie root beer with a straw.

“I'm still seeing him,” I said in a whisper. I didn't need to whisper. Dad was barking into his cell down at the other end of the room.

“I had an idea you were,” she said.

“I can't help it, Larkin.”

“I know, Annabel. I do know.”

“I don't like sneaking around. Do you think I could have him to dinner with you and Dad?”

“Well…why not?” she said.

“Do you
mean
it, Larkin?”

“I mean it, Annabel. But don't expect a miracle.”

“Meaning?”

“Your father isn't against Esteban because there's anything wrong with the young man. Kenny's
afraid
, Annabel. He thinks he could lose
you. I remember when I wanted to go to UCLA to study, years ago, my father was upset because he thought I'd fall in love with someone from California. He was afraid I'd spend all my holidays across the country in California, because wives went home with their husbands then.”

“Times have changed, Larkin. We're not that sexist anymore.”

“We're not that changed, either. Oh, honey, Kenny is probably never going to approve of Esteban. He comes with too much baggage.”

“Will you help me? I think if he came to dinner and Dad could hear him talk about music and films and his own home, Providencia, he'd see he's not that different from guys around here.”

Larkin said, “Guys around here
live
around here. It's that simple. This boy lives in the wrong place. What kind of a future do you envision with him, honey?”

“I don't envision anything but having him come to dinner.”

“Your father says you used to have your
friends over a lot, but now you don't.”

“Well? I have to sneak around to see him. If Dad approved of him, I wouldn't have to sneak around.”

At least I'd go with Mitzi for her appointment at Seaview Hospital, in ten days. She said we'd have a lot to talk about when she saw me. She'd tell me everything.

“If you want to have him to dinner, Annabel, Kenny and I will be here. You name the date.”

“Thanks, Larkin!”

Dalí picked up my excitement, jumped up, and began licking me, wagging his tail, his nails scratching my bare legs.

Larkin said, “Down, Dalí!” She turned back to me and said, “Maybe it would be a good idea just to say you're having a little dinner party, and we're invited. You don't have to tell Kenny that Esteban is coming.”

“You're learning, aren't you?” I said.

We both laughed.

“Wait! I have an idea,” said Larkin. “Let's have Kenyon's new girlfriend to dinner too. She's
coming here soon, and she'll take the spotlight off anyone because of what she does.”

“What does she do?”

“Hasn't Kenyon told you?”

“He hasn't said much about her at all.”

“She runs Green Pastures,” Larkin said. “That's the new environmental kind of cemetery. It's located down the island. You'd never know it's a cemetery, but it is. Green Pastures specializes in green burial.”

“The kind without a coffin? I read something about it somewhere.”

“Without embalming, without a coffin: The body just goes,
pffft
, into a hole in the ground. That's her profession.”

“You're right,” I said. “That would take the spotlight off anyone.”