The Summer We Let Go

Chapter Nine

Leo

         Carter's sitting on a swing at the park, lost in thought. Her eyes gaze out at the soccer field across from us, her foot swaying her ever so slightly in a soothing rhythm, the chain creaking as if nudged by the wind and not her. I wonder how long she's been here, if she's only a few minutes early or if she's been waiting for me to show up for hours. Her ears perk up as I approach, so I know she knows I'm here, but that's the only acknowledgment she gives me.

          Silently, I set myself in the swing beside her, plant my feet on the dirt underneath me, and stare at my shoes. It's abnormally hot today, but I guess that comes with the July month, so I should have figured it would be. My jeans immediately stick to the backs of my thighs, and I pretend not to notice as I loop my arms around the chains and put my hands in the pockets of my hoodie vest and wait for her to say something.

          It doesn't take long, but she still stares across to the empty field as she states, "One night, when I was twelve, my sister snuck out to go to a party with her boyfriend. She just climbed out of the window and hopped into his truck."

          That is what one would call an opening sentence. Which means she's about to go into a story and isn't looking for any response from me. So I don't say anything, and neither does she for a bit. I just watch her as she grips the chains a little harder, trying to make it so the words can ease out instead of pushing themselves out through a mouth that doesn't want to form them.

          I wait. I didn't ask for this, but I wait anyway, because I know that this is important to her, for some reason. Something she has to get off her chest, and I'm the only person she feels comfortable telling it to. It takes me a second, though, to realize what she said instead of why she said it. I never knew she had a sister, and something tells me it isn't because she's studying abroad in Italy for the semester. My gaze drops to her bare knees because they're easier to look at than her far-away eyes.

          Her voice is bland, no emotion when she talks, as if it's easier to say it if she pretends it doesn't matter. "They got drunk. I mean, it was a party. Why wouldn't they? But he decided he was sober enough to drive her home." This last sentence was spoken at a higher pitch than the others, and I glance up for just enough time to see that she isn't crying, but her eyebrows are knit tight, as if she's concentrating really hard on simply keeping herself from letting any tears fall. "There was another boy that night. It was really late, well after midnight, and he was just out jogging. He was somewhere between my age and hers. And he was just. Outside. Jogging."

          There's a quiet gap as she mulls this over, so I take the opportunity to try to bring her back to here and not in that truck with her sister, or wherever it is her mind is taking her. I figure maybe if she remembers I'm here, she'll remember that she's sitting on a swing beside me, at an empty park. Softly, I ask, "How old was she?"

          "Theresa?" She inquires, knowing well enough that's who I meant. I take that as a sign she's out of the memory enough to not get lost in it. "Seventeen. She just wanted to go out and have fun. But when he saw the jogger out on the road, he panicked. Jerked the wheel. Swerved off the road and into a tree. She wasn't wearing a seatbelt. She died on impact."

           I think back to the time Rachel called me at work, and I didn't answer. What Carter had said. I would have called her back. The pieces that didn't really make sense start clicking together. Why she went off and hung out with my sister at the carnival. It wasn't only because they hit it off, it was because she was appreciating something that I didn't feel inclined to. Why her parents left, because they lost their daughter and needed to get away from that fact. So she moved in with her grandpa.