The Summer That Melted Everything(73)

Alvernine sat up, but did not stand. She merely continued to reach from her fallen spot, crying out to Dresden, to her baby to just come back to her. Dresden buried her face in Sal’s shoulder.

Having been left behind at the pool, I slowly walked past Alvernine.

“You.” She pointed that perfect nail at me. “I know you. You’re the lawyer’s boy. Your father will hear of this.”

She shook her finger before dropping it back to her trembling lap as I stood over her.

“What?” She sniffled. “What do you want?”

“I just wanna give you a rose, ma’am.”

My hand stung after, but I knew her cheek did even more. I wiped the smears of her mascara and tears from my palm onto my shorts. It felt strange to hit a woman like that, but how can you regret bruising the bully?

I left her there, sobbing into her hands as I ran to catch up to Sal and Dresden, who had stood there watching me slap Alvernine. Sal patted me on the back and said I did a good thing, but as I looked at Dresden, I knew she didn’t think so.

“That was my mother, Fielding.”

“I did it for you. Don’t you know that, Dresden?”

“Yes, I know. But I still wish you hadn’t.”

I think she was about to go to Alvernine, maybe hold her cheek, but she just looked at me and one last time back at her mother, before the three of us ran up the hill.

Together we helped Dresden manage the climb with her leg, and all kept pace until the high land flattened out into a long meadow that we crossed to the dense woods of another hill, which came out on the other side to a fenced pasture belonging to three horses.

There in the pasture, Sal and Dresden removed the last of the roses from each other.

“I like you better without the roses. You know that, don’t you, Sal? That I want you just the way you are.”

He held her cheek, his thumb lightly brushing over her lips as he whispered in her ear, “I’ll be the black boy. You’ll be the white girl. And the world will say no. But we’ll just say yes, and be the only eternity that matters.”





20

Did I request thee, Maker, from my clay

To mould me Man?

—MILTON, PARADISE LOST 10:743–744

WE STAYED IN that pasture with the horses long after sundown, doing what three people in a horse pasture do, think about what brought them there.

Funny enough, I thought of Elohim. I suppose because of the night sky above me, so like the one I had lain with him under the previous summer. We were there on his roof ending the day of work, which had been removing the nests of chimney swifts in his stacks.

All day long, the swifts circled us as we used long poles to scrape out and dismantle their nests of twigs and saliva. Some of the birds swooped down upon us. They were more aggressive than usual, and when we pulled out the last nest, we saw why.

“We could fry ’em.” Elohim held up one of the five small eggs.

“But I thought you were the type of vegetarian that don’t eat eggs.”

He met my eyes for just a moment. “I didn’t mean me specifically. I meant you.”

I looked up at the swifts anxiously circling above. “But … the eggs are their babies.”

He sighed as he looked up too. “I gather you won’t be eatin’ ’em then?” He laid the egg he held back down into the nest with the other four before gently picking the whole nest up. “You’re too sensitive, boy.”

He tossed the nest off the roof, the eggs coming out in the fall to hit the ground before the lighter nest of twigs. They broke on impact, their yolks spilling out like yellow blood.

“Why’d you do that?” I watched the swifts coming down to land on the branches of the tree overlooking the fallen nest.

“You said you weren’t gonna eat ’em. And I couldn’t have, so there was no other choice but to break ’em open. What’d ya think I was gonna do? Give ’em back to ’em?”

He threw his arms up toward the swifts, a few of which had flown down from the branches to inspect the nest and eggs as if there were some sort of saving to be had.

“It would’ve just been more good-for-nothin’ birds, cloggin’ up my chimneys and bein’ a pain in my ass, Fielding. Now, come on, help me finish this up.”

We continued on in silence, fitting metal screens over the top of each of his chimneys to keep the swifts from building any future nests. By the time we finished cleaning and screening, it was evening.

“Take in the stars with me.” He lay down on the roof and patted the shingles beside him. “You’re not still angry about earlier, are you? They were just eggs, Fielding. Like the ones your momma fries come breakfast.”

As I lay down beside him, he grabbed his pack of cigarettes from the toolbox. I didn’t know him to smoke often, but he was on his third cigarette by the time he spoke again.

“You know why I love the sky, Fielding? Because it makes everyone short. There ain’t a man tall enough to ever look down on the sky. The sky makes everyone look up, and in that, it makes everyone me.”

“Do ya ever wish you were taller, Mr. Elohim?” It was one of those things you ask without thinking. I hadn’t meant to be cruel, but when I looked over at him and saw the tear already halfway down his cheek, I knew I had nudged old shadows.