Four Summers (8 page)

Once we get everyone all set up, the big group of about twenty meet in the middle of the field. We’re all decked out in camo clothes and paint gun gear. It’s not completely dark yet and the lights definitely help.

Nathaniel hasn’t tried to talk to me the whole time and I haven’t tried either. It makes me sad, but it’s for the best. I know it. I just have to keep reminding myself of it.

Everyone’s arguing about team captains, but I don’t pay much attention. It’s not until I hear them announce that the two captains are Alec and Nathaniel that I perk up. I’m suddenly disappointed I won’t get to be on Nathaniel’s team.

Alec wins the coin flip, meaning he gets to choose first. The rest of us stand in a group with him and Nathaniel in front of us. I try not to look at him, but my eyes keep darting his way.

“Come on, Andrews! Choose!” someone yells at Alec.

I’m about to step forward to walk to his side when I hear Alec say, “Brandon.”

My heart stops. Everyone suddenly gets quiet like they can’t believe what happened. Alec has never, ever not picked me first for something. My cheeks get hot, but I try to stamp down the embarrassment.

Brandon walks over to Alec and they do this stupid boy, shake-hand, high-five thing and I’m about to leave. Screw Last Man Standing. Screw Alec and Brandon and even Nathaniel, too. Alec knew I didn't want to come here tonight; the least he could do is not throw me for a loop by embarrassing me.

“Charlotte.”

My eyes shoot over to Nathaniel and he’s staring at me, hard. My heart is running a race in my chest and I hear Alec in the background saying, “What? Charlie’s always on my team!”

“Then you should have picked her,” Nathaniel tosses back, still looking at me.

“Everyone knew I would!”

But he didn’t. He always does, but this time Alec didn’t pick me.

“Then I guess you should have picked her
first
.” Nathaniel nods his head, like he’s calling me over, and I walk right over and stand next to him. My feelings are hurt that Alec didn’t pick me first and my heart is soaring that Nathaniel did, but I’m also trying to ground the freaking flight because I am not supposed to be feeling this way about him.

“Charlie?” Alec says and there’s a little bit of shock and regret in his voice, but I feel the same thing. It’s just a game and he didn’t pick me.

“It’s cool. We got this,” Brandon tells him. I glance at Alec and he looks at me, something strange in his eyes that I don’t understand. There's never been a time I couldn't understand Alec, but right now I don’t.

And then, we break eye contact. He looks at the group of people and picks someone else. Nathaniel asks me who he should pick and I tell him who the best is. Back and forth we trade picks until everyone is in a group, and we have our two man teams decided. The goal is for one team to work together to try and take out the other, then it goes all Lord of the Flies and we go after each other.

Once there are only two, two-man teams left, we go for the conch with the flag. Whichever group gets it, wins.

Nathaniel looks at me, competitiveness that matches my own glimmering in his eyes. We’re going to win. There’s no question about it.

All hell has broken loose. This is unlike any game of Last Man Standing we’ve ever played. People are brutal and it’s getting darker and darker but we still don’t have a winner. There’s one group left on the other team, Alec and Brandon, and then me and Nathaniel on ours.

The flag is in the middle of the field, waiting for us, as Nathaniel and I hide behind one of the forts on one side of the field. We have no idea where Brandon and Alec are.

“How good a shot is your brother?” I ask. Everything else is put behind us out here. It’s like life or death and even though I can tell he wants to ask me why I’ve been ignoring him and I have the urge to either run and hide or just grab him and steal my very first kiss, he doesn’t ask and I try to ignore my instincts.

Out here, the only instinct I can let grab me is the one telling me to win.

“He’s all right. Not horrible but not great.”

“You better than him?”

“Absolutely. What about Alec?”

I shake my head. “Not better or worse, either. We’re pretty evenly matched, but he’s good. Really good.”

“So that’s your way of saying you’re good?” Nathaniel smiles.

I shrug. “I guess.” We pause for a few minutes and then I ask, “What’s the plan?”

Just then, Nathaniel grabs my arm. My first thought is they snuck up on us, but he points to the sky and I see the tail end of a shooting star. I love shooting stars.

I can’t help but smile. He saw one and knew I would like it.

“I think that’s our sign. I say we go for it. They’re probably sitting somewhere waiting to snipe us, but let’s let them be the passive ones who sit back and wait. We’ll run out there, get it, and win.”

“It’s a risk.”

“Not if you run fast,” he laughs.

He’s right. We can sit here forever waiting for them to find us or we can go out there and take our win. I’m determined to grab it with both hands and own it. But we can’t let them shoot us either. If we do, it doesn’t matter if we get the flag or not.

“Let’s do it.”

Nathaniel grabs my hand. “Run like hell. Don’t look back. Leave your gun—”

“What? I can’t leave my gun. How will I shoot them?”

“You won’t need to. I’ll have your back. I’ll be right there and I’ll take out anyone who gets you in their sights. You get the flag and we got this, Charlotte.”

This is not usually how Alec and I do it, but I will be able to run faster without my gun. And…maybe it’s not something I should be thinking, but it feels good to think of him having my back.

“Let’s do it.”

He squeezes my hand tighter. I forgot he even had it. “If we win, you have to meet me tonight.”

My brain tells me to say no, but my heart is beating to say yes. The word is pumping through every part of me. There’s no other option. “Okay.”

Nathaniel smiles and I think it might be the best smile in the whole wide world. I bet his girlfriend loves that smile, too.

“Ready?” he asks. “On the count of three.”

I set my paintball gun down.

“One,” he says. Pauses. “You can do this. Run fast. I’ll be right behind you.”

I nod again. Who knows if he can see me but once we step into that field, everyone will be able to. The lights are that bright.

“Two.”

Another pause.

“Three.”

As soon as the word leaves his mouth, I run. Run with everything I have. My chest hurts. My legs hurt. Nathaniel is right behind me.

“Keep going. Shooting on your right,” he yells. I hear the
pop, pop, pop
of his paintball gun. I keep running. Brandon curses. Alec and Nathaniel are shooting at each other. I don’t pay attention. Just keep moving. As soon as I get there, I grab the flag and Nathaniel grabs me and jerks me into his arms. He lifts me up and we laugh, not a drop of paint on either of us.

I sit in the dark, waiting for it to be time to meet Nathaniel. It’s like there’s electricity inside me. A live wire that’s flipping all around because I’m anxious to have another of our nights together and because it seemed so important to him that I meet him. I know it makes me sound bratty, but when he didn’t push for it sooner, it made me feel like it didn’t matter. I think maybe I wanted him to…maybe not
fight
for me to meet, but to pull for it. To show me he wanted it and he did and that means more to me than the knowledge that this will make it hurt more when he leaves. He’s here now and I don’t have anything else I look forward to.

I’m taking this.

Quietly, I push my widow open and crawl out. The “pillow me” is under the blankets. Not like anyone will check on me, anyway. As soon as my feet hit the ground, I hear Mom’s voice surfing on the wind as it drifts from her and Dad’s partially open window.

“I’m so tired of this place! I tried to make it work, but I don’t want this life, Richard!”

“We’ve been okay,” Dad replies. “Things have been better. We’ll close for a week or so and take a trip this fall. Get out of here for a while. This is our life, Tabitha.”

“A life only you want! You and Charlie Rae love it here. This place fits you. I just…I want to take Sadie and go. You can go, too. We can sell and—”

“No! I’m not selling. This is our past and our future. How can you just want to throw it away? And what about Charlie? You’re going to leave her?”

“She can go if she wants.”

I grab my chest. Fight to breathe. Tears fill my eyes and I turn to run. I stumble and fall, but get right back up again. They’re leaving? She wants to take Sadie and leave? Leave
me?
I stop when hope fizzles in my veins. I could get out of here. How could I want to leave Dad? I don’t. I love him. And it’s not that she really cares if I go or not.

Her words hit me again and I dry heave. I fall to the ground again and cry. They’re going to leave and I’ll be stuck here. Then the guilt mixes in, making me nauseous. Is here really that bad? I don’t like it, but I would never just bail.

“Charlotte?” Nathaniel’s voice comes from behind me. “What’s wrong?”

I scramble to my feet, embarrassed that I’m on the ground crying. All I can think about is the fact that they’ll get out of The Village to find a new life, and then I hate myself for wishing for the same thing.

Nathaniel steps toward me. I try to turn my head away, but he ducks and follows, tilting my chin toward him. “What’s wrong, Star Girl?”

I watch him in the moonlight. His eyes look like they belong in the sky and I want to talk to him. I want to tell him things because I need to get the words out. Nathaniel has the key that can set them free before they eat me alive.

I can’t talk to Dad, Mom, Sadie, or even Alec. Not about this, but more than anything I want to tell him. “I hate my life.” If there was a way to snatch back those words, I would. They sound so end of the world and I’m not like that. I’m a realist. I know how things work and I usually don’t run so high on emotions, but…I think he might get what I mean. I hope he will.

“Wow…that’s pretty brutal.” There’s a laugh in his voice and it’s just what I need. It makes me smile when two seconds ago it felt like I’d never smile again. In this second, I’ll do anything to forget what I just heard. The thoughts are still there. They can’t disappear that easily, but they aren’t what I want to focus on right now.

“I want to show you something,” I tell him.

Nathaniel nods and I head down path that will lead us where I want to go. When I get there, I disappear into the trees. Nathaniel steps up beside me and grabs my hand. It’s not the way Alec and I have held hands before. Our fingers are weaved together and I like how his hand is a little bit bigger than mine.

We don’t talk as we follow the trail into the night, each of us carrying a flashlight in our free hand. It doesn’t take long to get to the fort my dad made us when we were kids. It’s a decent size. Alec and I used to have secret meetings out here with our friends so it’s big enough for a small group of kids to stand inside.

The little plastic table we used to keep out here is long gone, and the place is empty, but I like to come out here now and again. Alec and I used to play in the creek running behind the fort.

“What is this place?” Nathaniel asks.

“It used to be my hideout.” I shine the light inside. There’s no door or anything like that. “It’s not much, but when I was younger I used to think it was the most amazing thing in the whole world. I helped my dad build it.” That was back when I thought The Village would always be the place for me.

“That’s cool. None of my friends back home have stuff like this. And my dad was always too busy to help us make one.”

I nod at him. “Let’s go out back.”

If I’m being honest, I’ll admit it’s a little scary out here at night, but I grew up stomping through this place. Kids party on the mountains in Lakeland Village. It’s just a part of our lives.

When we get behind the fort, Nathaniel asks, “Why were you crying?”

I sit down and he follows right behind me. “I thought you were so different that first day. I thought you would be scared to get dirty or something.”