Frutta e Fiori

Chapter 4: sweet as summer's song

Nana dug her toes in to the warm sand while the fire crackled and the ocean hummed.

The children were carefully tucked in to their respective beds, tired, and maybe a little teary from the first night being away from their parents.

The counsellors sat in a circle around the dying flame. Lena had found a stick and was prodding the coals, watching the clouds of orange gold float away in to the sky.

An old radio lay in the sand, Bad Moon Rising crackling in the speakers, the words floating away with the shimmering dust.

"What's it like in Washington?" Lena asked, turning towards Silas, who'd told them fondly that afternoon to just call him Si.

"Well, not as nice as it is here, that's for sure." he'd laughed.

"But you have snow don't you?" Lena asked, putting down her prodding stick.

She loved Hawaii, but sometimes she wondered if she wasn't missing out on things in other places.

Maybe she should have gone to Juilliard, or at least tried to. She had stellar talent, but what really took your breath away was the emotions she brought forth with her playing. She was still young, but the ever-present choke of fear that you've wasted your life, no matter how young you are, had not made Lena an exception to its suffocation.

She never voiced her worry, instead opting to only let her mind linger in the gloom of insidious thoughts under the wavering palms, on nights where the sea was just as roiling, and only she was there to witness it.

Si thought for a moment.

"That's true. There's nothing quite like the quiet on a morning after its snowed. It's like the world's been put to bed."

Lena had turned back to the fire, murmuring whatever was on the radio.

Nana sat on a rotting log behind her. She knew her sister sometimes wished for more, even if Lena thought she'd hidden that part of her.

It's hard to miss the girl hugging her knees in the sand under your window.

The coals started to breathe their last breath, only flecks of the orange showing whenever Lena stabbed it.

Bay yawned as the radio waned on. "We should probably get back. If I thought kids are hard to deal with on a normal day, I don't want to find out how hard it is when I've only had three hours of sleep."

Everyone moved to get up.

Hyde dusted the sand off himself. "One day down, an eternity to go." Si snorted as he threw sand on the dying embers. "Hasn't anyone ever told you time flies when you're having fun?" he said, stealing a glance at Lena.

-

Nana lay in the creaky cabin, listening to the waves crashing outside.

The girls had opted to sleep at the camp, so all the groups of children had a counsellor to go to in the night, if need be.

There were gentle snores filling the spaces between the waves crashing, and Nana closed her eyes.