Leave the Lights On

Chapter 16

As you're driving your mom to Brittany's house, you warn her. "Be nice, Mom."

"I like Brittany," she says, fixing her lipstick in the mirror, "I'm nice to her."

"Just," you sigh, "She's already been through way more than her fair share of parental insanity on my part. I just want today to go really smoothly for her. She needs to relax."

"I promise that I'm not going to go crazy," your mom assures you as you pull to a stop in front of Brittany's house.

"Thank you," you say and get out of the car. You smile when you remember that you get to spend the entire evening to spend with Summer. You don't really have a plan of what you want to do with her, but you'll probably just let her decide.

You knock on the door with your mom behind you and Brittany opens it. She smiles and hugs you. Then she hugs your mom.

"Summer wanted me to tell you that you are going to play hide and seek and she is already hiding," Brittany jerks her head toward the couch where there is a noticeable lump under a blanket on the couch.

You smile and nod, "Awesome. I'll definitely try to find her."

Brittany turns to your mom, "Are you ready?"

"Of course," your mom grins.

Brittany kisses you goodbye and tells you to call if you need anything. Your mom does something similar and picks some lint off of your shirt before they leave.

When they're gone, you walk over to the couch and sit down next to the lump. You pretend to yawn loudly, "I'm tired. I think I'm going to take a nap." You lay your head on the lump and then hear her giggle.

"You're not supposed to nap. You're supposed to find me," Summer states, throwing the blanket off of herself.

You smile and tickle her. She squirms and giggles. When you're done, you ask, "Is your homework done?"

Summer frowns and that alone gives you the answer. You tell her that when she's done with her homework you can play. So as she's sitting at the kitchen table, doing her homework, you do the few dishes that are in the sink and clean the kitchen a little. It's not dirty; you're just doing daily maintenance type things. Sweeping and wiping down counters.

"I'm done," Summer tells you as she puts all of her papers in her folder and then puts that in her backpack.

"Alright," you pick her up as she hops over to you and sit her on the counter. "What are we going to do?"

"Let's dance," she cheers.

You smile at how her eyes light up when she says that. Just like Brittany's do when she dances. You can't help, but follow her to the studio and rock out with her for as long as you can stand.

Then you turn on a movie and make grilled cheeses for dinner as requested by the tiny blonde dancer. You sit with Summer, watching the movie as you eat. Then you enlist her help to wash the dishes you used for dinner. You just happen to find ice cream in the freezer and you and Summer dig into that like ravenous wolves.

When your mom and Brittany get back, Summer is already in bed and you're laying on the couch about to pass out. Brittany sets down a few bags and sits down next to you. "Did she wear you out?"

You nod and lean into her.

"I got you something," your mom says which always makes you pay attention. She looks through a boutique bag and extracts a very intricately painted kettle. It's all black and white, but the designs make up for the lack of color.

You take it from her, "It beautiful. Thank you."

She smiles, "I wish Summer was still awake. I got her some things to look at under her microscope." Your mom lifts a bag of assorted colorful and crystallized rocks from a different bag.