The Summer I Walked Away

The Summer That Wasn't:

I had such high hopes for this summer. And it’s almost over.I haven’t done anything I said I would. Actually, that’s a lie. I made the one big purchase I allowed myself to make. Even though I had hoped for help in the form of birthday gifts, it came entirely from my savings, cutting them in half.

I haven’t been swimming. It’s been about a hundred and ten degrees, give or take, for nearly a month. I did get heat sickness at work.

I did apply for several new job opportunities. I got one interview, and didn’t get the position. I didn’t celebrate my birthday because I was too busy preparing a presentation for the interview.

We didn’t buy rings. His work was cancelled for all of July. It was too dangerously hot for outdoor entertainment, apparently. I can’t really blame them–I didn’t go outside much either.

I remember my childhood–hiking all summer long, playing in the backyard. If it got above eighty-five, it was too hot. The shade felt delicious. We swam in lakes and stood under waterfalls.

Nowadays, kids run wild through the grocery stores, smashing bottles and throwing berries into the air like grains of rice at a wedding. They can’t stay outside too long, their parents are working from home offices and are desperate for some semblance of peace and quiet. Three boys ran in front of a pickup truck a few weeks ago. Those same three boys wandered town, breaking into people’s cars. An old lady collapsed in the parking lot and almost got backed over by another old lady in her car. People complained all the time, as though those of us working minimum wage jobs were somehow responsible for climate change.

I want back the summers of my childhood. I don’t want to live in fear of martial law, of war on the soil of my homeland. I regret wishing I had been born in more interesting times. I want to live in the boring, peaceful times, where hard work is rewarded and the majority of the population isn’t facing starvation and homelessness every month. This longing twists my mind and heart into a tangled knot of pained longing. A knot I will never be able to untangle by myself. Every issue is so much bigger than me, whenever I think about starting, my head starts to spin and my stomach rises, acid burning the back of my throat. Oh, how I wish I could roll back the clock to those carefree days in the shade.

I tilt my head back to look up at the sky, drawing in a deep breath of stupidly hot and humid air. Half the country is determined that the unreasonable heat and misery has to be the fault of any and every thing except climate change. We’re not likely to be making progress any time soon. My lips tilt upwards as I recall an angry woman declaring that the heat was the result of sin, that it was the Devil burning our world, and all but her and hers were to be purged from existence.

If only she knew the Devil sat beside me, desperately fanning himself with his tail, trying to shelter me with one of his wings, and muttering not-so-subtle complaints that not even Hell was this miserably hot and humid. He has a list of all the things in the human world he finds worse than in Hell. It’s quite the entertaining list, to be honest. I watch the streaks cross the sky, chewing my lip as I wonder whose home will be going up in flames next. None of them seem to coming right for us, so we don’t move. I swing my legs, tapping my heels against the crumbling stone fence surrounding the cemetery.

“Can we go now?” The soft interruption nearly slips my notice. He tugs at the hem of my shirt. I turn my head slightly towards him, eyes sliding in and out of focus.

“I swear…” I mutter under my breath. “I swear there’s something here worth saving.”

“I believe you. But sitting here isn’t going to help us find it.” He gently pats my shoulder, and I’m impressed he’s willing to make contact with me at all in my sweaty, sticky state. “We can come back tomorrow.”

“What if it’s not here tomorrow?”

He stops, his lips moving over sharp teeth as his otherworldly eyes flit over my expression. Realizing I’m serious, he sighs. “I’m pretty sure it will be, little star.”

“How sure is pretty sure?”

“Sure enough. You shouldn’t be out in this. Let’s go home.”

I cast one last long look over what had been my whole world, now dead and brown and barren. I search for the children biking along the street, the green surrounding bursts of colorful flowers in the meadows. But then I blink, and it’s all brown and dead again. I let the Devil take my hand and lead me away, uncertain if the tracks of salty moisture down my cheeks are from sweat or from tears.