Summer Dreams

              We were only children then, living in a world where time didn’t exist.  We would spend summers running barefoot through the milkweed fields.  Nothing could touch us, it was as if we inhabited a parallel universe where we were alone.  Her golden sun kissed skin drew me in like a moth to a light.  She would never pull her long blonde hair back no matter how hot it was.  It would just drape down with the sun bleached blazes glistening like satin.  We were only thirteen years old, we knew nothing of love, all we knew is that we enjoyed each other’s company. It’s hard to believe that twenty years have passed since then.

 

         At night we would sneak out through our bedroom windows and meet beneath the moonlight. We would chase fireflies in the humid southern night air, showing each other each one that we had caught.  She loved to look at the stars.  We would spread her ragged red quilt out across the grass and lie on our backs and point out every star in the night’s sky.  We made a wish on every falling star that came streaming through the atmosphere.  We made a promise to never tell anyone, not even each other, what we had wished for in fear that it may not come true.  We were just two kids with a world to ourselves.



         It was beside the cool spring creek that we shared our first kiss.  We had been running through the summer heat all day and decided to cool off in the clear stream.  We would take turns swinging into the water off of the rope swing that hung from the giant weeping willow.  She was scared the first time, so we went together. I promised her that I wouldn’t let any thing happen to her.  So I placed a white knuckled grip around the rope and we embraced each other as tightly as our bodies would allow.  I whispered in her ear “ Are you ready?” She didn’t say a word, she clinched her eyes shut and nodded her head.  I stepped off of the ledge and we let gravity do the rest.  We both splashed into the water with our arms wrapped around one another.  We sank into the abyss of the frigged liquid and began to kick our legs violently to breach the surface.  We finally broke the surface of the water and we both took a huge breath simultaneously. We then looked deeply into one another’s eyes and began to laugh uncontrollably.  She spoke softly when she leaned in and said, “ Thank you for holding me.”  Before I could register what she had just said, she pressed her gentle pink lips against mine.  Though it only lasted for a moment it felt as if it could’ve lasted for centuries and I was still left wanting.  We spent the rest of the day jumping in and out of the creek.



         I walked her home that evening.  The heat had broken some and she began to chill.  I took off my shirt and handed it to her.  She took it from my hands and smiled with a slight bashfulness.  She pulled the tattered t-shirt over her head, you could barely make out the Violent Femmes logo that had once graced it.  I said, “ It looks good on you.”  She responded, “ Really! I’ll give it back to you tomorrow.”  I smiled at her and said, “ Just keep it, it looks better on you anyway.”  She smiled so brightly that it would shame angels for not being so joyful.  We came upon her home and stopped at the gate of her white picket fence.  We embraced for a moment and then our lips met once again.  I stood there and watched her walk up the steps to her covered porch and did not leave until I heard the creaking screen door slam shut.



         I walked home that night feeling different.  I felt that something in me had changed.  I hoped that the feeling would never evade me.  I felt that for once in my life there was a person that connected with me on the deepest level. Every dream that I had was of her. Every thought that crossed my mind was of her. The summer ended and I returned to boarding school and we eventually drifted apart, but I never stopped thinking of her. It’s amazing how one day can change your life forever.  First loves are the best.  They tower above all others because they are comparable to nothing.  Every experience is a new one and there is nothing to judge it against, so every experience seems beautiful.  To this day I have not found a love that could compare to what I felt that summer.  She definitely made an impression on me.



         I never knew if she had felt the same about me.  But as I looked down at her body in the beautiful pecan casket, I saw that she was still wearing that old Violent Femmes shirt. When I saw that tattered shirt I could barely keep my composure. Tears began to well up in my eyes and I found myself short of breath. All of the emotions of that summer came rushing back to me and I fell in love with her all over again.  I only wished that I could’ve had a few more summers with her, if not the rest of our lives. 



         After the funeral her mother asked me to take a walk with her. We took a walk along the banks of the same creek where we had formed so many memories. It was under that old weeping willow that she told me that as her body deteriorated from the rounds of chemotherapy she made one thing abundantly clear, that she would be wearing that shirt to the grave.  I know now that what we shared was real, it was not just a series of choreographed memories dancing through my thoughts.  I’m just thankful that we got to have that feeling and I know that she felt it for the rest of her life, I just hope I can feel it for the rest of mine.