Sixteenth Summer (15 page)

E
very year my parents throw a big Fourth of July barbecue. I mean
big
. Every bar, restaurant, and sno-cone stand on Dune Island is run by skeleton crews that night because everybody
else
is in my backyard.

The day starts at sunrise, when a bunch of other dads show up in their grubbiest clothes and help my dad dig a pit somewhere between the vegetable garden and Benjie’s sandbox. They fill it with smoldering hickory wood and—a pig. Snout and all. Twelve hours later, he or she is the main course. (I try to avoid learning whether the pig
is
a he or she, and my siblings and I definitely don’t name the pig, ever since our great Wilbur boycott of a few years ago.)

Also on the menu are bourbon-boiled peanuts, ambrosia salad, cheese straws, dog head biscuits, boiled shrimp, pickled okra, and basically every other super-Southern morsel that my Midwestern parents find fascinating. If you could put grits on a stick, they’d serve that, too.

The one thing they don’t serve is ice cream. Oh, it’s there of
course. We roll an entire eight-tub freezer out of The Scoop and transplant it onto the screened porch. My mom always makes up a special one-day-only flavor for the party. But it’s a rule that nobody in our family is allowed to scoop. It’s our holiday. The guests make a big deal of putting on aprons and paper soda-jerk hats. Then they take turns dipping gargantuan scoops and making lopsided cones and sundaes that shed gobs of marshmallow and fudge across the grass.

When everybody’s good and full and sticky, we all head to the field out back. It’s a big, shaggy mess of wildflowers and scratchy grass that’s separated from our (slightly) more groomed yard by a thicket of blueberry bushes. The field is tree free, which makes it the perfect viewing spot for the Beach Club fireworks, about half a mile due east.

Inevitably, when the fireworks finish, someone starts singing patriotic songs and somebody
else
tells them to shut up. Then the parents make more spiked Arnold Palmers, the kids twirl with sparklers and gobble fizzy candy, and everybody stays up way past midnight.

I hadn’t thought twice about inviting Will to the barbecue. I’d even told him to bring his mom and Owen. (I mean, our
mailman
comes to the Fourth of July barbecue.)

It was only after the three of them arrived that night at seven o’clock—and stopped cold in our red dirt driveway to gape at Figgy Pudding—that I saw the party from an outsider’s eyes.

Oh yeah
, I realized,
this must look kind of weird
.

My family (and the rest of Dune Island, for that matter) are so used to our Fourth of July tree, otherwise known as Figgy
Pudding, that even Sophie isn’t embarrassed by it. It’s just part of our summer landscape, along with sea turtle nests, sunburned tourists, and the constant
slap-slap-slap
of flip-flops.

Figgy Pudding became Dune Island’s tackiest icon when I was still a baby. One of my parents decided that since the Fourth of July in a beach town is like Christmas everywhere else, it required a tree. But not some tasteful fir swagged with garlands and earnest ornaments. They chose the sprawling fig in the center of our front yard.

From then on, instead of bringing covered dishes to the barbecue, guests have brought strange things to drape on Figgy’s branches. The ornaments are different every year, but platform shoes and feather boas are always popular, as are stuffed animals and Slinkys. People make scary fairies out of twigs and feathers. They also hang kooky cooking utensils and, of course, ice cream scoops.

After everyone has looped their decorations around the tree’s branches—plucking handfuls of sticky, purple figs while they’re at it—the poor tree looks like a huge, bedraggled drag queen on the morning after Mardi Gras. Enterprising tourists have even been known to come out and snap pictures of it.

We keep Figgy in her finery until the first rain turns everything to muck. Then Sophie and I climb the branches and throw down the decapitated fairies, sogged-up feather boas, and musty shoes, returning the tree to her natural state.

Benjie always cries about the dismantling of poor Figgy Pudding, but I’ve never thought much about it. I’ve always known she’d be back the following year.

And now Will and his family were meeting Figgy for the first time. Even though she was only halfway to her full gaudy glory when they arrived, she was still kind of a shock to the system.

As usual the decorations were pink, white, and blue (but heavy on the pink). Figgy was bedecked with lawn flamingos, pinwheels, and even a pink bicycle, its wheels straddling the point where the trunk split into two thick branches. There were many shoes and feather boas, of course, somebody’s collection of troll dolls, and a shocking pink stuffed boa constrictor twining around the trunk. The Garden of Eden gone wild—that was my front yard.

Once they got past Figgy Pudding, I realized, Will and his family were going to see the pig, the tipsy adults making
jokes
about the pig, the not-completely-ironic pastel mini-marshmallows in the ambrosia salad, and half a dozen other possibly mortifying things.

For a moment I considered saving face by shrugging off the party as an obligation I didn’t really like; a parental eccentricity.

But then I looked at Will—who was grinning like mad at the tree, while his mom shook her head in amazement—and reconsidered.

Will liked my (allegedly) Southern accent. He fed my gummy habit without judgment. He didn’t think it was weird that sometimes I’d rather spend my time alone with an ice cream churn than with my friends on the South Shore.

And unless I’d been very misguided, he’d like our wacky barbecue, too.

Even though I’d never really stopped to think about it,
I
loved our Fourth of July party. It was one of my favorite nights of the year. On the Fourth of July, I felt like we were one big, crazy, happy family—me and the Dune Islanders.

And I wanted Will to be a part of it too.

So I swallowed my self-consciousness and smiled at Will’s mom. She was pretty in a mom-ish kind of way—thin, with an upturned nose and freckles. She wore her hair in a slightly frizzy blond bob, and she had the same pointy chin as Will and Owen.

“Ms. Dempsey?” I asked. (Will had told me she’d gone back to her maiden name after the divorce.) “Can I get you an Arnold Palmer?”

W
ill didn’t like the party.

He loved it.

He loved the fact that Ellie Dunlap, Dune Island’s mayor, was singing old standards with a karaoke machine on the back porch.

He loved that there were kids (and grown-ups, too) swooping on our swing, which hangs from a high branch in an ancient water oak.

He was nuts about the food, especially, as a matter of fact, the boiled peanuts.

He loved it all so much that I worried (just a little bit) that
I
was being overshadowed. I mean, how could I—even in the cute navy-and-white-striped halter dress I’d fished out of Sophie’s closet—compete with the
feeling
of this party? With food that
made your mouth sing, in a yard strung with so many white lights that the stars were superfluous, while on the porch a town leader in white braids and overalls sang, “
If you don’t like them peaches, don’t shake my tree …”

But then Mayor Dunlap started a new tune. The song was clearly very old. It made me think of women wearing silk stockings with seams up the backs. Mayor Dunlap’s clear, pretty soprano was both lilting and melancholy, making the couples dancing on the patio sink into one another and sway more slowly. As for me, I recognized the sweet yearning—and reward—in the lyrics.

“I wished on the moon, for something I never knew,”
Mayor Dunlap sang.

And Will asked me to dance.

“Seriously?”
I asked. I was sprawled on the porch steps, one arm propped on the banister, the other dunked into a bowl of butter mints. I did
not
look, I was sure, like the kind of girl you asked for a waltz.

“Anna,” Will said, standing over me with one hand extended. “Don’t make me lose my nerve.”

I laughed with a whoosh of relief.

“Okay, so this
isn’t
something you routinely do in New York?” I said.

“Trust me,” Will said, looking at the other dancing couples. Most of them were senior citizens. “I
never
do this.”

“So it’s okay if I step on your toes?”

“Considering you’re barefoot?” Will said with a grin. “Not a problem. In fact …”

Will kicked off his own flip-flops, stashing them next to the stairs.

“Now we’re even,” he said.

“I
do
wear shoes, you know …,” I said as I took his hand and got up.

“Oh, I saw them,” Will said with a nod and a sly smile. “You had ’em on for about five minutes before you ditched them.”

He was right. As we walked to the patio, I tried to remember where those cream-colored espadrilles even
were
. But then Will put his arms around my waist and began to sway me in a gentle circle to the music. And suddenly I could barely remember my middle name.

My hands were on Will’s shoulders. And I wasn’t stepping on his feet, because he was leading me, with a soft, gentle pressure, in a loop around the patio.

I felt like I should say something. Something that poked fun at the two of us; that made this dance a lark instead of a love song.

But swaying in Will’s arms didn’t feel jokey. It felt serious in the most wonderful way. Will pulled back a little bit and looked down at me. Our eyes met for a long moment, much longer than would have been comfortable with anyone else.

I knew he wanted to kiss me as much as I wanted to kiss him. That if we weren’t out here in front of our parents, the mayor, and the mailman, we’d be kissing.

Instead, I lightly laid my cheek against Will’s shoulder. His arms tightened around me, and I closed my eyes as we danced on.

The lyrics in Mayor Dunlap’s antique song might have been corny, but suddenly they made perfect sense to me.

“I looked for every loveliness. It all came true. I wished on the moon … for you.”

Mayor Dunlap’s pretty voice trailed off. The crowd clapped and cheered while she pulled at the seams of her overall legs and did a mock curtsy.

I didn’t really want to let go of Will, but I had to, especially when the mayor announced, “That’s it for me, folks. I’ve got to get over to the pit before that pig is completely gone. But stick around for a couple minutes and we’ll have something
completely
different for y’all.”

During the lull between acts, Will and I wandered over to the drinks table. The lingering swooniness of our dance made me want something special, so I made a spritzer of limeade, sparkling water, and a handful of raspberries. Will was reaching for the iced tea pitcher when his mother walked over arm in arm with our neighbor Mrs. Sumner. Mr. Sumner trailed behind them, looking bemused.

“Will!” Ms. Dempsey gushed. “I want you to meet Marlene Tifton and Bobby Sumner! Well, she’s Marlene Sumner now. I knew the two of them when I was fourteen years old, if you can believe it.”

“Well,
I
can’t believe Sissy’s back for the summer!” Mrs. Sumner gushed, giving Ms. Dempsey a squeeze.

“
Sissy?”
Will said to his mother.

“Oh, you know your uncle Roy was always the star when we were down here,” she explained. “So for a while I was just known as his little sister.”

“Sissy means sister,” I said, translating Southernese for Will.
“Good thing she wasn’t a little brother. Then she would have been Bubba.”

“Bubba means
brother
?” Will gaped.

“What else would it mean, son?” Mr. Sumner said in his loud, booming voice.

“I think this is why I teach so much Faulkner in my lit classes,” Ms. Dempsey said with a laugh.

“Oh, I know I sound like a redneck,” Mrs. Sumner said with a shrug. “But, Sissy, I just can’t call you by your real name.
Lizzy
. It sounds so
formal
.”

The three of them guffawed like teenagers, then drifted toward the barbecue pit.

“Your mom seems happy,” I said to Will with a grin.

“Yeah,” he agreed, gazing after her with raised eyebrows. “Huh!”

Before he could say anything else, a twangy crash rang out from the back porch. I grinned. I’d almost forgotten about the next act. They were shuffling onto the porch, lugging their instruments and equipment with them. I led Will back to the patio.

“I think you’ll like this band,” I told him. “They’re called Undertoad.”

“Cool name,” Will said.

As Undertoad’s four guys set up their stuff, every Dune Island High kid at the barbecue (especially Sophie and her posse of girlfriends) crowded around the steps and cheered. I saw Owen in the crowd too, slurping lemonade and chatting with some kids as if they’d known one another forever.

I nudged Will and pointed at the lead singer.

“See anyone you know?” I asked.

His eyes went wide.

“You didn’t tell me Sam was in a band,” Will said.

“Don’t worry,” I said with an elbow in his ribs. “You don’t have to pretend to like them. They’re actually good.”

“How did you know what I was thinking?” Will said, shaking his head at me.

I shrugged and laughed. The fact that I’d successfully read Will’s mind exhilarated me like a shot of espresso.

Apparently, the feeling was mutual. Will and I grinned at each other so hard you could probably see little cartoon birdies tweeting around our heads. Our own personal Disney movie was mercifully interrupted when Sam cleared his throat into the mic.

“Uh, hi, y’all,” he said. “We’ll be right with you. Just give us a chance to plug in.”

As the guys started messing around with their equipment, Caroline came up, sipping peach cider from a mason jar.

“The pig’s so cute this year,” she said with a shudder. “I can’t stand it.”

“Cute … and tasty!” Will said, his grin turning devilish.

“So you’re a carnivore just like Sam, huh?” Caroline asked.

“I think it kind of comes with the gender,” I said sympathetically.