The Summer We Came to Life

That must be the caretaker, I thought, and waved out my window. Ana Maria had told me about a watchman who lived in a cement house nearby and maintained the vacation home while her family was away. Which, I only now realized after the car accident, must be because the area was unsafe. The beach house was surrounded by the local Garifuna population, whom I was excited to photograph. Their culture blended Indian blood with that of shipwrecked slaves and had grown to inhabit the coastline of Central America. They were supposedly an easygoing and self-sufficient people, but modern world poverty allows few exemptions from discontent and rebellion.

The watchman was lanky and tall, ancient-looking yet nimble. His skin was like shiny wet pebbles in the headlights of the cars. He had his hands in his jeans pockets and stood perfectly still, watching and waiting.

I got out and went to him with my hand outstretched. “Soy Samantha. Mucho gusto,” I said, it dawning on me as I did that he might only speak the local Garifuna language.

The man hesitated then smiled a perfunctory smile of yellowed ivory teeth. He held out his hand. It was smooth and warm.

“Ahari.”

Ahari walked toward the Ford. Arshan got out of the driver’s seat. He looked at me for assurance. I had never mentioned a caretaker.

“You guys, this is Ahari. He’s the watchman.”

Arshan popped the trunk in response.

Ahari grabbed two armfuls of groceries and started for the house.

The vacation club piled in on his heels. It looked like any typical beach house, sandy and worn, with mismatched chairs and tables and paperback books and board games piled along the walls. Truthfully, I had expected something far more luxurious based on Ana Maria’s stories from college. I hoped nobody would feel let down.

“Sammy, I love it!” came Jesse’s voice, as if in answer. “It’s fabulous!”

Everybody went off to choose rooms and unpack, while Lynette threw together a salad with liberal mounds of the unidentified veggies we had bought.

The house was shaped like a horseshoe, with two private bungalows on either end, and palm trees strung with hammocks in between.

Jesse and Arshan headed straight to the opposing bungalows with doors to the outside, and Cornell and Isabel took their bags to the inside rooms. I followed Isabel.

Isabel had said barely a word since the accident. When I entered the room behind her, she spun around. Her scared eyes looked searchingly into mine.

“You okay?” I asked warily. Isabel had truly not been herself these past two days.

“I want you to promise me something.” Not a hint of joking in her turquoise eyes.

I nodded, waiting.

“I just almost watched everyone I love die in a car accident.”

Of course Isabel wouldn’t consider that she had almost died, too.

“You have to promise me that you won’t die before me.”

Isabel’s emotion singed my skin. “Promise.”

I didn’t know how to reply but she read my heart, breaking at her fear, and seemed satisfied. Isabel sank down on one of the twin beds and unzipped her backpack. She took out a book and lay down with her back to me. It took me a second to realize she was reading Mina’s journal.

“Read me something.”

Isabel didn’t answer.

“I’ll let you read mine. I don’t think Mina would mind. She probably expected us to.”

I could see Isabel’s back moving with her breath.

“You know what I do? I ask a question and then a flip to a page for the answer. It makes me feel like I’m talking to her.”

Still no answer. Oh shit, I made her feel worse. I started to apologize, but then I heard her flip to a page and take a deep breath.

“‘December 15. All three of you were here today. I love you, Isabel, for pretending that you and Kendra came home early for Christmas and not because you know I’m going to die soon. I look terrible, right? But when you read this, I want you to know that I’m okay. Or that I was okay, I guess. There’s a kind of peace that comes the closer I get to the end.

“‘The maple tree dropped its last leaves today. Oh, they were long since shriveled and brown. But I know what it means. That tree has taught me things, Isabel. We’re all so much more connected than we know. The tree speaks to me and I don’t even mean it allegorically. It’s probably the cancer, or the pain meds, but what that tree whispers at night makes so much sense that I don’t care where it comes from. It tells me that I’m doing fine, that death isn’t the end we think it is.

“‘I know the tree watches you come to visit me every day. It says that love lives. That love is really all there is and everything else is just different manifestations in different dimensions. Ask Samantha!

“‘I think that means that you’ll be able to feel how much I love you guys even after I’m gone. And that’s good. That makes me feel so much better. Because I love you three so much I just couldn’t imagine how it would disappear. And maybe if my love lingers then it can help you somehow, when you need it.

“‘Love you, Belly. A penny for your precious thoughts.’”

I looked closer to see what Isabel was doing. She was stroking a shiny penny taped at the bottom of the entry.

Isabel closed the journal and lay back on the bed. She looked at me with wide eyes, a technique that dries out watering tear ducts. Thought I’d invented that technique.

I must’ve looked like a dead bug, still stuck in the web of Mina’s words, with no reply coming to rescue me. When I finally wriggled free, I found myself still holding two very heavy bags. I dumped them on the other bed, while Isabel stared at the ceiling. She was crossing and uncrossing her toes.

“You remember Mina with those baby rabbits?”

I shuddered in the humid room. “You really wanna talk about that now?” I whispered like someone might hear us. Who?

“Mina never got over it, Sam. She told me whenever she looked at that maple tree, she thought about the bunnies.”

Mina’s backyard, Springfield, VA, 1993

Mina’s father loved yard work. In Virginia, there’s plenty of it year-round. He left Mina and me to cook ramen noodles with frozen peas so he could rake leaves. He couldn’t watch our homespun dance recitals because there was grass to cut. And there was no time for algebra help as long as mulch needed to be spread around.

Sometime when we were freshmen in high school, Mina worked up the courage to ask her dad if yard work was more important than her. He only frowned in response, but he let a whole week go by without even entering the yard.

The following week, as if Mina had angels at her beck and call, a neighborhood kid knocked on the door to ask if her dad needed help with the yard.

Not just any kid. Brandon Bateman. The hottest kid in school. A junior. He had thick dark hair like Tom Cruise and tan muscles from playing football. Mina and I had a new pastime. We drank Cherry Cokes at the kitchen table and watched Brandon go back and forth with the lawnmower or dig up weeds or prune trees. With military efficiency, we took turns offering him more water or clean towels. He knew we were watching and giggling. One day he strategically took his shirt off and poured his glass of water down his muscled chest. The next Saturday, Isabel and Kendra joined us.