The start of summer

It’s dark and cold but I feel at ease. What is it? Where am I?

All I recall was the beginning of summer; it was hot, humid, and moist. My skin was so wet that it started to soak my clothes. I live in a small town with my dad and three older siblings. I have two older sisters Darlene (19)and Abigail (21) and one older brother Jesse (17). My sisters would always make fun of me because I always looked different from them. They had golden hair and hazel eyes with beautiful fair soft skin. They were so beautiful they looked like my mom, but my brother had green eyes just like my dad with dark brown shaggy hair. I guess you could say he was a spitting image of my dad. I looked nothing like my siblings; I had dark brown hair, light brown eyes, and freckles. I didn’t look as good as my siblings and didn’t have anybody to hang out with, my father always said “honey you are just as beautiful as the springtime bees. heck! With the amount of goodness in your heart I bet you could feed an entire village”. I was always flustered by the things he said but he did always know how to make me feel beautiful. As the summer went on Abigail and Darlene would be off in the city figuring out their lives and Jesse had enlisted in the military. My mom left us when I was 12, I’m now 16, guess she got tired of having to take care of my siblings and me since my dad worked overtime a lot. She was more of a city gal. She loved to party, get dolled up, and shopping. She had such beautiful light brown eyes and her golden wavy hair always smelled like sweet peas and daisies. I don’t hate my mom, she gave birth to me; although sometimes I do wonder why she brought us into this world if she was just going to leave us. My mom and dad always liked to sing songs and dance in the living room. Although that was rare since my dad was mostly out of the house my mom had a drinking addiction. She’s either be passed out on the kitchen table, or living room couch, or she’d just leave the hose till late. She started bringing men to the house and always threatened us to keep quiet or she’d do something really bad. It wasn’t long until one night everything changed when my dad caught her in bed with another man when he had unexpectedly arrived home early. They fought and fought to yell for what seemed like an eternity. He was devastated since he loved her so much and felt such betrayal but she said that this was never the life she wanted. By the next morning, she had left with all her belongings without even a single goodbye. I had always hoped to find someone as kind as my dad, He’s a hard-working man who would always find a way to keep us fed with a roof over our heads. He always knew how to make us laugh. This summer was the first time the house felt empty and quiet especially since it was just me and my dad but I was alone most of the time. My dad had just gone to work in the early morning and I was off to the ice cream shop since it was such a hot day. On my way, I would always pass by a beehive hanging from a tree. You would usually see them working very hard working on their beehive. I was walking down the road when I saw something shining in my eyes, my god I almost thought I was blind. I looked around to see what was making the shine and then I saw it was coming from behind some trees. I chased after the light and then I looked behind a small tree and I see him. A very beautiful boy, he looked so kind and gentle with soft brown hair and long eyelashes. He was asleep against the tree holding a shiny pocket watch in his hands. He looked very tired he had dark circles around his eyes. I went to get a closer look at his face and as soon as I approached his face he opened his eyes. I jumped!! And so did he. I saw someone get up so fast. He asked, “who are you? And what were you trying to do to me?”. I felt embarrassed and said, “I wasn’t going to do anything to you, I was just going to check if you were dead”. My, he looked so furious “ dead!! Why would you think I’m dead?!”. To which I said, “ have you seen yourself?!?, you look like a corpse!”. I think I made him madder, “ who looks like a corpse?!, definitely not me!”. I felt bad and said, “Okay, I’m sorry I didn’t mean to offend you or anything I just wanted to make sure you weren’t hurt or anything”. I’m sure he’d calmed down. “ it’s fine, it’s fine, I didn’t mean to get so mad I was just caught off guard”. Then I sure felt bad and I offered to buy him some ice cream as an apology to which he hesitantly agreed. We walked to the ice cream shop and bought two popsicles.

We went to a small cliff side where I would always go to see the sun go down. We started to talk and I asked him for his name and he said it was Wilbert. He asked me for my name to which I replied Ivory. I thought to myself what a peculiar name he had. I asked about the pocket watch, at first He seemed hesitant to answer but he said it belonged to his father and mother. He looked mournful. I asked what he was doing in our small town and he said he was staying with his grandparents for a while. I was kinda glad it meant he was going to be here for a while. I must have lost track of time because it was already getting dark and I hadn’t made dinner for my father and me, I rushed up and told Wilbert that I had to go home quickly. I explained the situation quickly and offered to join us for dinner but he refused to say that he had to be back at his grandparent's home by seven. I asked him if we could hang out again and he agreed to the idea. I got home and I guess my father beat me to it because he was waiting for me on the front porch. I ran into his arms and he asked where I was all evening and why I looked so happy. I told him I had possibly made a new friend. He laughed and said, “well I hope to meet this new friend of yours, now go on inside I brought some food from a restaurant near my job”. We went on inside. Throughout dinner, we talked about my acquaintance with Wilbert and what we had talked about. My father looked too pleased to hear that I had made a new friend.

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