Sigh, Alaska: a short story novel

Summer Petersen

It had only been two months since she started working at the Northern Lights Hostel, and already Summer Petersen wanted out. Her agreement with the owner, Richard Sutton said that she'd stay until at least May unless circumstances changed, ie, she was fired. It wasn't exactly indentured servitude; it didn't pay much but she got to travel as much as she liked on her days off, and her salary included a private bedroom at the hostel. For a vagabond, it was a pretty sweet deal; except the part where she couldn't leave for six months.

Already Summer was dreaming of where she would go next. South America interested her, but she lacked the funds to purchase a ticket to any of the destinations she wanted to go. Maybe if she picked up a second part time job, she could budget it, but that would mean less time exploring Alaska. It was a tough decision to make, but Summer knew she'd come to a happy balance. Besides, she wasn't afraid of a little hard work.

Exploring Alaska during the winter sometimes seemed like a contradiction in terms. Though winter had barely set in by early November, she noticed that the locals started their own kind of hibernation, trying to wait out the winter instead of making it apart of their adventure. What was the point, she thought, of living in a literal winter wonderland if you weren't going to appreciate it fully? Summer intended to appreciate the wild landscapes of Alaska, even if she had to go on her own. Which, let's be honest, she usually preferred to be on her own anyway.

She too often followed the guys on her days off to the bars downtown, because no one seemed interested in camping once temperatures dropped below freezing. It definitely wasn't her first or even second choice of entertainment, but she liked the guys at the hostel; even if they sometimes delved into questionable behavior. If nothing else, it was a great chance to break away from Daphne and Lacy. Neither one could legally drink yet.

Those girls were too much trouble and drama for Summer to care about. The latest drama concluded when Pete went back home to Hawaii and Lacy tried to forbid anyone from attending his going away party, as if they would do exactly as she said. Pete was one of the few guys at the hostel who seemed to have his head screwed on straight and Lacy single handedly scared him into going back home.

Daphne couldn't seem to stay sober enough to remember the sex she had the night before. It was starting to border on pathological, but Summer had to keep reminding herself that if she wanted to keep her sanity and thus her job, then she needed to remove herself from the situation. To Summer, that mean ignoring them in most cases. Especially when they weren't in the room.

On this particular night Wendy was working so Summer, Ethan, Kevin, Howard, Lee and Alyssa made their way downtown to their favorite hole in the wall bar. Starboard featured dark walls covered in beer paraphernalia, wide wooden planks for the floor and an L shaped bar that hugged along the sidewall. Light was sparse except for where the small platform stood that counted as a stage, opposite of the L bar. There were long tables that seated large parties or many strangers, along with a few booths tucked into corners.

They picked one of the booths that sat all six of them, and listened to the local band massacre a classic rock tune. Summer settled back with her vodka sprite and watched the band play passionately, albeit poorly. One of the guitarists slumped over his instrument, plucking her strings like a bird searching for seeds. The other strummed along softly; so softly you could barely hear his contributions. She thought if she closed her eyes, the tune would come into balance and she'd understand what was being played. The drummer kept a good beat; it just didn't keep time with the rest of his players. It sounded like an off-putting round robin of hey yeahs and wailing. She'd almost forgotten the group of friends she was with until bits of the conversation leaked through the poorly performing band.

"I feel kind of bad for Lacy," said Lee, taking a sip of her hard apple cider. "Clearly she's new at this sort of thing, but I get the feeling she hasn't had a whole lot of good role models in her time."

"Don't feel bad for her, Lee. She is crazy, and after all the drama she's caused I'm surprised Richard hasn't just thrown her out," replied Kevin.

"I dunno, he's let a whole lot worse stick around for a whole lot longer," said Alyssa. After six winters in the hostel, she'd seen quite a few come and go. "Even with the rules there's really no rhyme or reason to how he chooses to kick people out, or let them over stay their welcome. Sometimes I think he secretly thrives on the drama."

"Lacy thrives on drama," retorted Kevin. Howard laughed. "Seriously what is wrong with her?"

"Are we seriously talking about Lacy still?" Summer interjected. "She already monopolizes enough time back at the hostel, and we're still talking about her when we have a free minute away from her?"

"So, Summer. Please, share with us your true feelings about Lacy. Indications point to them being very feisty indeed." Ethan asked with snark.

Summer groaned and dropped her head to rest on the table. "Anything else. Please, any other topic." The tablemates looked amusedly to each other, then to Summer to see who would change the topic.

"Daphne and I had a talk earlier, and we decided to stop fooling around like we have been." Howard offered after clearing his throat a little. He tossed back the rest of his beer, and motioned to the waitress making rounds that he'd like another. "I do have my fiancé to think of. If she ever found out, I'd probably never see my son again. It's too much of a risk and it needed to stop. Daphne seemed somewhat upset by it. She made some noise about never wanting to have sex with me anyway. I dunno. The two of those girls are nuts, that what I know."

Summer rolled her head back up and stared at him with as much malice as she could muster. "Great. Great. I'm going to let you talk that out while I go find an oven to stick my head in. When I come back, I expect the conversation will have moved away from hostel drama in all its forms." Scooting out of the booth, she ignored the pleas that she stay, and that the conversation would change to something more palatable. Summer walked toward the L bar and ordered a whiskey sour.

For a Friday evening at eight-thirty, the bar didn't have many patrons. Other than her group, one of the five long tables had a party and only six or so of the barstools were occupied. Maybe it was the weather keeping everyone in; it did dump a foot of snow during the night before, and had started snowing again. Or maybe the locals were familiar with just how lousy the band was and refused to enter. Summer thought it was probably a mix of both.

She hated feeling like this. It wasn't that she didn't like Lacy or Daphne. They were exactly what they were supposed to be at nineteen years old; irresponsible slutty attention whores. Oh God, that sounded so awful. Summer wasn't that much older than them at twenty-five, and she knew well enough what life was like at nineteen. She had her moments of impropriety and Summer didn't mean to judge them so harshly, but she was so tired of the conversation always going back to what those two idiot girls were doing or who they were doing. They could be talking about travel, family, or any number of otherwise stimulating conversation topics. Anything would be more interesting then hearing about Howard banging Daphne in her sleep again. That was just sad.

She thought about heading back to the table with her half drink, but one look at Howard and she knew they were still talking about Daphne. She imagined he was reliving the last time they went camping.

That camping trip was a disaster, she thought. Summer even felt awful for Daphne because she didn't seem to understand that she'd been taken advantage of. Summer felt even slightly more awful for doing nothing to stop it. She just wanted to see the Northern Lights dancing in the sky, but the clouds had rolled in at the last moment and hid every last star. Snow coated the ground the next morning when she woke up. Ethan and Pete had been good conversationalists until the weed kicked in. She figured she'd probably been decent enough until too much beer sloshed around in her stomach to keep her friendly.

Summer didn't know what to expect, camping with so many friends, if she could really call them that. She was good at traveling on her own, finding temporary friends and moving on when it suited her. Staying in one place for as long as she currently agreed to be was a frustration she just couldn't seem to move beyond.

Really, all Summer wanted to do was plan her next trip. For the last three years she'd been traveling alone but she thought being in a hostel full of vagabonds like herself she might find herself a companion. Thinking back on the current residents she decided not to hold her breath. Whatever these people claimed to be, they were in very different places in their lives and taking any one of them on her next adventure would probably prove to be a gigantic mistake. Summer only had two rules about her vagabonding lifestyle; don't look back and don't regret.

Before Alaska, Summer traveled across the continental United States in an old beater of a Toyota she bought off her older brother who had upgraded to something a little more professional. Thinking of her brother Charles, and his 9-5 job with business dinners and weekend golf meetings made her smile. She could never live a life like that. Too much order, not enough exploring. Summer wanted to see the world, and she intended to visit every continent before she turned thirty. In August, she bought a plane ticket to Hawaii, before making her way up to Alaska. Fifty states in four months. Oh, but she knew her mother was impressed.

Growing up, her dad had been out of the picture and she watched her mother work two or three jobs to keep the roof over their head and food in their belly. Summer's mom always made time to help her children do their homework and tuck them into bed, and at night she would tell fantastic stories from the years she spent abroad in Europe. When Summer was older, she learned that both she and her brother had been conceived abroad, and her mom eventually left their father behind. He had a family of his own and she was in the way.

But the seeds of travel had been planted at an early age, and during college she spent two years studying abroad in four different countries. She had to work really hard to get the scholarships in order, sometimes spending weekends at a time organizing her essays and applications. There were also all of the part time jobs she had waitressing, delivering newspapers when she had a car, and serving coffee in the mornings that went toward her tuition. There were some days when it all seemed impossible, but she did it. Summer thought her greatest accomplishment was being able to manage all of her travels without the financial assistance of her mother.

Looking ahead, Summer saw herself watching the end of the Iditarod in Nome. Once summer finally rolled in, she'd summit as many mountain peaks in Denali National Park as her body, time, and money would allow. Once the long winter started showing its first hints of arrival Summer would be off, heading south to find a farm to plow, plant, and pick from. She wanted to work with her hands, and she wanted to leave when she was ready. Maybe in Costa Rica, or maybe further south in Brazil. She'd figure it out, she'd go alone, and she'd love every minute of it.

Summer ordered another drink and headed back to the table. As she sat down, the conversation slowly died, all eyes shifted away from her. Looking around at her peers who showed a sudden enthusiastic interest in the local band that couldn't seem to hold itself together, she sighed.

"So, how about them Lakers?" She asked, looking around the table. It was about as close to an apology as she was going to get.

"They ain't got nothin' on the Nuggets this year," replied Kevin with a quick smile.

"Oh God, if we're going to start talking sports, I'm going to need another beer." Alyssa sighed and signaled to the server.

Conversation started flowing again, and Summer tried to stay interested in it, commenting when she had something worthwhile to share, but her mind was already calculating how much a ticket would cost to South America for next August, and if it would be better to start learning Spanish or Portuguese first. As she raised a toast to the band's last song, she knew there was a lot of life ahead and she didn't know where it was going to take her. What Summer did know though was, she definitely wouldn't be looking back on her time at the Northern Lights Hostel.