A Summer Remade
By
Nicole Deese
This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are the product of the authors’ imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons, living or dead, is coincidental.
A Summer Remade—©2015 by Nicole Deese
Kindle Edition
Cover Design by Humble Nations Covers © 2015
All rights reserved. Except as permitted under the U.S. Copyright Act of 1976, no part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, or stored in a database or retrieval system, without the prior permission of the authors.
To my readers.
The only people crazy enough to spend as much time with my imaginary friends as I do.
I appreciate you all.
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Letting Go series:
All For Anna
All She Wanted
All Who Dream
Love in Lenox series:
A Cliche Christmas
A Season To Love
‡
O
ne hour.
I’ve been on the phone with my mother for sixty straight minutes, and I’ve said approximately six words. Most of which are one syllable; half of which could be replaced by a
hmm
or even a caveman-like grunt.
The signal to my phone has dipped in and out, but no worries because no matter how long the gap of silence lasts, she’s still there.
Still talking.
The Bluetooth in my car is both a blessing and a curse.
I jam the clutch into the floorboard of my faithful Corolla and shift into fourth. The last ferry to the San Juan Islands leaves in just twenty-three minutes, but thanks to the pokey
Golden Years
tour bus, I might not make it aboard the punctual sea vessel. My only hope to salvage the worst summer of my life.
“…Your dad and I have also agreed on the holidays. We want to make this as easy as possible on everyone. We’re thinking you can spend Thanksgiving break with your dad since Grandma Sanders would be heartbroken if you didn’t show up for her big hoopla…and well, you know, she’s only going to be around for so long. And then you’ll be with me for Christmas.”
If I don’t speak now, I may actually vomit. “With you where, mom?”
“The condo.”
The condo. Two words that shouldn’t elicit a visceral reaction. Yet they do.
I need air. Right this second.
I crack open the window and a rush of salty air calms my restless gut.
“I thought you liked it,” she continues in a tone that borders on hurt.
“I don’t really remember it.” That’s not exactly true. I remember one wall, painted to match the ominous clouds of a coming storm. The backdrop to my nightmare come true.
I’d hoped the request to meet them at the model high-rise condo in Seattle would be the announcement of a fresh start, a new beginning, a decision based on the advice of their long-time marriage therapist.
But only one of my parents is moving to Seattle.
“Joss, you just saw it last week. Of course, I can add my own touches to it, make it homey.”
But nothing about that place would ever be home to me. It was as cold and sterile as the stainless steel appliances crowding the pocket-sized kitchen.
“And the den can double as a guest room, for when you stay with me.”
Taking a deep breath, a familiar mix of ocean, rust, and seaweed fills my lungs. I roll my neck and visualize the promise that awaits ahead.
A foghorn blasts in the distance.
“Joss? Where are you?” My mom’s voice has morphed into the robotic staccato of a dying phone signal. I couldn’t have prayed for better timing. The call cuts short. The second I’m stopped, I shoot her a quick text and then power down my phone.
Parking on the lower level of the ferry, I take my keys from the ignition, climb the nine white steps marked with faded caution tape, and push against the heavy metal door to the open deck.
And just like that, I’m free and going home. Not to the house I grew up in, but to the cabin that holds every treasured memory from my childhood. The same cabin I’ve visited every summer with my three closest friends.
Except for this one.
Sydney’s playing bridesmaid for her mother’s wedding—again. Darby has a once-in-a-lifetime audition in L.A., and Avery’s about to leave for a summer-long culinary internship.
But no matter how legit their reasons, this summer is one broken promise after another.
Thus the theme of my life as of late.
The ferryboat shudders to life and I grip the railing, a rumbly vibration under my feet. Dark water churns below, pushing and pulsing against the walls of the massive ship. I exhale, my breath lost to the cutting wind, and lift my eyes to the horizon.
This is the one view on earth that has the power to right wrongs, rewind time, and glue all the broken pieces back together again.
The white-capped Olympic Mountains that surround the San Juan Islands off the coast of Washington State are but a faint backdrop against today’s overcast sky. But their presence, their fortress-like protection which encompasses the Puget Sound and beyond, offer a breathtaking invitation to come closer. An invitation I accept.
The islands are a combination of rolling hills and fertile valleys, luscious green forests dominated by evergreen and pine, and patches of sandy beaches that border a rocky coastline.
And it’s this beauty, this mesmerizing wonder of my childhood summer home on Lopez Island—the heart of the San Juans—that stirs a belief in me that I can go back in time.
To a life before.
Before the fighting, and the packing, and the leaving.
A life before change.
Because the only chance to escape my future is to find comfort from my past.
*
“Holy Moses.” An
odor so foul it could double as a torture device, rocks me back on my heels as I unlock the front door.
I yank my hoodie up over my nose and take a cautious step inside the cabin.
Rubbing my palm along the bumpy wall, I feel for the switch that will kill the darkness and shed some light on the cause of this rancid smell.
Click
.
Nothing.
I flick the switch again. And again.
No. Way.
My hand fumbles for my phone in my back jean’s pocket, as if this tiny piece of technology holds the same protection as a military-grade arsenal. I bring up the flashlight app and aim. Instantly, the kitchen to my left is basked in a florescent glow.
Clutching my phone like a shield, I walk toward the fridge, its door slightly ajar. A box of old pizza, a tub of sour cream without a lid, and a shelf oozing with greenish-brown slime—
“No!”
My foot slips and my phone smacks against the floor, skittering across the linoleum.
Along with my body.
I’m flat on my back, fridge door banging against the top of my head and sloshing yet another dose of nastiness into my hair. Peeling myself from the floor, I grip the counter and curse the liquid green vegetation leaking from the bottom of the kitchen’s largest appliance. Obviously my parents had just cause for firing their property management company. If I were a random vacationer and not their only daughter, I’d sue.
Ignoring the ache in my lower back, the throb in my right elbow, and the squish in my shoes, I zombie-walk toward my phone.
I freeze.
Eyes—reflective, beady little eyes that guarantee certain death—stare back at me.
A guttural war-cry wrenches from my throat.
And then I run.
Down the hall, past the kitchen, and onto the front porch.
Slamming the door closed behind me, my chest heaves in unison with my pounding heart. “This isn’t happening, this
can’t
be happening.”
A frantic glance around the heavily wooded darkness might cause a lesser person vertigo, yet my fear doesn’t make time for that. Ages ago I used to pretend this place was Snow White’s cabin, and right now, I’d give anything to have the Seven Dwarfs stumble out of the trees and tell me what to do.
The back of my wet shirt has suctioned itself to my bra, but I won’t let myself think of the toxic waste seeping into my pores. Instead, I close my eyes and will my mind to focus. Because if I don’t, I’ll crumple into a pathetic heap right here in these less-than-fairytale-like woods and never get up again.
And then I see it. The storage shed, the one that houses my bike. The same bike I used to ride to the Culver’s house as a young girl.
The Culvers.
Pat and Shirley Culver will help me. They live on this island year-round. And they are two of the most generously hospitable people I know.
I sprint to the shed, tear open the metal doors and find that my pink Huffy bike—equipped with rainbow tassels and boy band stickers—is still here. Right where I left it.
Finally, something is how it should be.
I’m huffing, peddling down the path toward the yellow Victorian house. I know this path well. Even in the dark.
Several branches whip across my cheek, snag my hair. But I don’t stop peddling.
An old tire, suspended like a pot-bellied ghost in the moonlight, is tethered to the Culver’s large oak tree out front. Yet my eyes focus on the house behind it.
The very dark house.
Four feet from their driveway, I squeeze the hand breaks, slide off the seat, and allow my Huffy to fall to the ground. Along with my hope.
I kick the bike. Hard.
“Stupid! Stupid! Stupid!”
The magenta hunk of metal from my youth doesn’t deserve this kind of abuse, but I know the second I stop kicking, the second I stop fighting, the second I stop running, I’ll hear their words again.
“We’re getting a divorce.”
Only the deeply male voice I hear next belongs to neither of my parents.
“Can I help you?”
I whirl around, lungs seizing from my bike-killing exertion.
A half-naked man who looks like he could grace the cover of
Surfer
Magazine, stands in front of me.