Carolina Summer

The most beautiful smile I have ever seen belongs to my Molly.

Molly and I met eight years ago, the summer following my sophomore year of college. Returning home to North Carolina for twelve weeks was a prospect I felt less than thrilled with. As much as I loved my family, the freedom I had found living hundreds of miles away was not easy to leave behind. In Baltimore, I had the freedom to do whatever I wanted, whenever I wanted, with no obligations to anybody but myself. Being home undoubtedly meant playing the role of taxi driver for my younger sister, Tatum, and her friends while my parents took time away.

Tatum was nothing like I had been when I was fifteen years old. My freshman year of high school consisted of average grades and frequent stints in detention for various offenses, ranging from tardiness to being disruptive during lessons. I never landed myself in too much trouble, but I had always been something of a class clown. Most of my classmates laughed at the stupid things I said and did, but very few of them could be considered friends. Tatum, on the other hand, seemed to be friends with a majority of the student body. She had always been high spirited as a young child and that didn't change as she grew up; people flocked to her because of her cheerful demeanor. Not only did she have a flourishing social life, but she managed to keep a 4.0 GPA and be active in and out of school. Truth be told, I felt envious of how quickly she seemed to have figured life out, which only made the chauffer business more obnoxious.

Come July, my annoyance with Tatum and her social life had not yet died down. Most of my days carried a soundtrack of squealing teenage laughter between the multiple drop-offs and pick-ups. "It's because they think you're cute that they don't ask their parents or siblings to drive as much," Tatum told me after a particularly long day of playing Taxi. Being adored by a gaggle of fifteen-year-old girls did not qualify as a reward in my book, so my irritation persisted.

I had intended on spending the Fourth of July weekend hours away from home, camping with old friends who were also back for the summer. My parents, however, decided they would like to escape to New England for the week. Upon being asked to stay with my sister, my first instinct was to refuse. The desperation in my mother's eyes when she said, "Tanner, I would be so grateful if you could do this for us" wiped away any protest from my mind, and I agreed to bail on my plans to look after Tatum.

On the morning of July third, I awoke to the sound of my sister jabbering on her cell phone. I opened one eye and peeked at the alarm clock on my bedside table and wondered when the last time I had woken up at 7:00 A.M. had been.

After thirty minutes, I gave up on falling back to sleep and left the comfort of my bed. I could see Tatum in her room across the hall wearing an offensively bright yellow robe. I could hear the screeching of wire hangers being moved across the metal bar in her closet as she sifted through her clothes, her phone held to her ear by her shoulder. Mouth still moving.

"Ever hear of sleeping in, Tater?" I leaned against the door frame.

She jumped and struggled to stop her phone from hitting the floor. "Jesus, Tanner. You scared the heck out of me." She mumbled a quiet, "hold on" into the phone.

"And you woke me up three hours early. How long have you been awake? Why are you awake?"

"Sorry, Tan. Early riser, busy bee." She grinned and returned her attention to the person on the other end of the phone. I turned to leave but Tatum held up an index finger. "Cheyenne, let me call you back in a few, okay?"

The smile on my sister's face when she turned to look at me told me I was about to be roped into something. I immediately began to formulate a list of excuses to get out of whatever that something could be. Hadn't it been enough that I agreed to stay home so my paranoid parents wouldn't ship her off to our grandparents for the week?