The Different Rules Of Summer 12

THERE WAS NOTHING WRONG WITH ME. THAT’S WHAT the doctor said. Just recovering normally from a severe flu. An afternoon wasted. Except I’d seen rage appear on my mother’s face for an instant. That was something I would have to think about.

Just when she was becoming less of a mystery, she became more of one.

I finally got to leave the house.

I met Dante at the swimming pool, but I got winded easily. Mostly, I watched Dante swim.

It looked like it was going to rain. They always came this time of year, the rains. I heard the distant thunder. As we were walking toward Dante’s house, it began to rain. And then it began to pour.

I looked at Dante. “I won’t run if you don’t.”

“I won’t run.”

So we walked in the rain. I wanted to walk faster, but instead I slowed down. I looked at Dante. “Can you take it?”

He smiled.

Slowly, we made our way to his house. In the rain. Soaked.

Dante’s father made us change into dry clothing when we got to his house, and gave us a lecture. “I already know that Dante doesn’t have an ounce of common sense. But, Ari, I thought you were a little more responsible.”

Dante couldn’t help but interrupt. “Fat chance, Dad.”

“He just got over a flu, Dante.”

“I’m okay now,” I said. “I like the rain.” I looked down at the floor. “I’m sorry.”

He put his hand on my chin and lifted it up. He looked at me. “Summer boys,” he said.

I liked the way he looked at me. I thought he was the kindest man in the world. Maybe everybody was kind. Maybe even my father. But Mr. Quintana was brave. He didn’t care if the whole world knew he was kind. Dante was just like him.

I asked Dante if his father ever got mad.

“He doesn’t get mad very often. Hardly at all. But when he does get mad, I try to stay out of his way.”

“What does he get mad at?’

“I threw out all his papers once.”

“You did that?”

“He wasn’t paying any attention to me.”

“How old were you?”

“Twelve.”

“So you made him mad on purpose.”

“Something like that.”

Out of nowhere I started coughing. We gave each other a panicked look. “Hot tea,” Dante said.

I nodded. Good idea.

We sat, drinking our tea and watching the rain fall on his front porch. The sky was almost black and then it started hailing. It was so beautiful and scary, I wondered about the science of storms and how sometimes it seemed that a storm wanted to break the world and how the world refused to break.

I was staring at the hail when Dante tapped me on the shoulder. “We need to have a conversation.”

“A conversation?”

“A talk.”

“We talk every day.”

“Yeah, but. I mean a talk.”

“About what?”

“About, you know, what we’re like. Our parents. Stuff like that.”

“Did anybody ever tell you that you weren’t normal?”

“Is that something I should aspire to?”

“You’re not. You’re not normal.” I shook my head. “Where did you come from?”

“My parents had sex one night.”

I could almost imagine his parents having sex—which was a little weird. “How do you know it was night?”

“Good point.”

We busted out laughing.

“Okay,” he said. “This is serious.”

“Is this like a game?”

“Yes.”

“I’ll play.”

“What’s your favorite color?”

“Blue.”

“Red. Favorite car?”

“Don’t like cars.”

“Me neither. Favorite song?”

“Don’t have one. Yours?”

“‘The Long and Winding Road.’”

“‘The Long and Winding Road’?”

“The Beatles, Ari.”

“Don’t know it.”

“Great song, Ari.”

“Boring game, Dante. Are we interviewing each other?”

“Something like that.”

“What position am I applying for?”

“Best friend.”

“I thought I already had the job.”

“Don’t be so sure, you arrogant son of a bitch.” He reached over and punched me. Not hard. But not soft either.

That made me laugh. “Nice mouth.”

“Sometimes don’t you just want to stand up and yell out all the cuss words you’ve learned?”

“Every day.”

“Every day? You’re worse than me.” He looked at the hail. “It’s like pissed off snow,” he said.

That made me laugh.

Dante shook his head. “We’re too nice, you know that?”

“What do you mean?”

“Our parents turned us into nice boys. I hate that.”

“I don’t think I’m so nice.”

“Are you in a gang?”

“No.”

“Do you do drugs?”

“No.”

“Do you drink?”

“I’d like to.”

“Me too. But that wasn’t the question.”

“No, I don’t drink.”

“Do you have sex?”

“Sex?”

“Sex, Ari.”

“No, never had sex, Dante. But I’d like to.”

“Me too. See what I mean? We’re nice.”

“Nice,” I said. “Shit.”

“Shit,” he said.

And then we busted out laughing.

All afternoon, Dante shot questions at me. I answered them. When it stopped hailing and raining, the hot day had suddenly turned cool. The whole world seemed to be quiet and calm and I wanted to be the world and feel like that.

Dante got up from the step of the porch and stood on the sidewalk. He held up his arms toward the heavens. “It’s all so damned beautiful,” he said. He turned around. “Let’s go for a walk.”

“Our tennis shoes,” I said.

“Dad put them in the dryer. Who cares?”

“Yeah, who cares?”

I knew I had done that before, walked barefoot on a wet sidewalk, knew I had felt the breeze against my face. But it didn’t feel like I’d ever done that. It felt like this was happening for the first time.

Dante was saying something but I wasn’t really listening. I was staring at the sky, the dark clouds, listening to the distant thunder.

I looked at Dante, the breeze alive in his long, dark hair.

“We’re leaving for a year,” he said.

I was suddenly sad. No, not exactly sad. It felt like someone had punched me. “Leaving?”

“Yeah.”

“Why? I mean, when?”

“My dad’s going to be a visiting professor for a year at the University of Chicago. I think they’re interested in hiring him.”

“That’s great,” I said.

“Yeah,” he said.

I’d been happy, and then, just like that, I was sad. I couldn’t stand it, how sad I was. I didn’t look at him. I just looked up at the sky. “That’s really great. So when are you leaving?”

“At the end of August.”

Six weeks. I smiled. “That’s great.”

“You keep saying ‘that’s great.’”

“Well, it is.”

“Yeah, it is.”

“Aren’t you sad, that I’m leaving?”

“Why would I be sad?”

He smiled and then, I don’t know, there was this look on his face and it was so hard to tell what he was thinking or feeling, which was strange because Dante’s face was a book that the whole world could read.

“Look,” he said. He pointed at a bird in the middle of the street that was trying to fly. I could tell that one of his wings was broken.

“He’s going to die,” I whispered.

“We can save it.”

Dante walked into the middle of the street and tried to pick up the bird. I watched him as he picked up the frightened bird. That’s the last thing I remember before the car swerved around the corner. Dante! Dante! I knew the screams were coming from inside me. Dante!

I remember thinking that it was all a dream. All of it. It was just another bad dream. I kept thinking that the world was ending. I thought about the sparrows falling from the sky.

Dante!

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