The Summer I Destroyed You, page 5
I’m pretty sure it’s not the anesthesia.
My mother carps about the snacks while the nurse pulls together the discharge papers, and then carps audibly about the nurse’s slowness. She snaps at the orderly who pushes her wheelchair to the hospital’s exit. “Your job is too easy for you to be so bad at it,” she tells him.
It’s rather pleasant, not being the subject of her ire, but all good things must come to an end.
“Since you’re so smart,” my mother says as we hit the highway, “I suppose you’ve figured out how to get me up the porch stairs?”
Shit.
“Didn’t they show you how to do it at physical therapy? Can’t you just, I don’t know, scoot up on your butt?”
“Of course not,” says my mother. “I can’t believe you didn’t realize this would be a problem.”
“What was I supposed to do, Mom? Build you a handicap ramp? Look, I can call Jeff—”
“Jeff lives a half hour away, for God’s sake, and he’s out of town anyway. That’s the whole reason I had to have you come.”
I don’t actually believe that for a minute. I believe Jeff claimed to be out of town so he wouldn’t have to be around for the surgery, but it’s not like he’s going to admit he lied if I call asking for help.
My mother sighs. “You’ll need to ask one of those boys working in the back to help you.”
No. “That’s not their job. And—”
“Do you have a better solution?” she demands.
Alas, I don’t.
I rack my brain for the remainder of the drive, and when we arrive, I admit I’m going to have to do the unthinkable: ask Liam or his guys for help. Mac and JP are both nice. As long as it’s one of them I’m asking for a favor, I’ll survive.
I turn off the car, go to the backyard, and it’s Liam I encounter first, hammering a two-by-four, his lovely biceps on display.
I’ve got the worst luck.
“Need something?” he asks.
Ugh.
“My mother just had surgery. She needs some help getting up the stairs.”
His grin is unbearably smug. “So you need some help getting your mother inside?”
“I don’t need help,” I snap. “My mother needs help.”
“Sure.” He smirks, wiping his hands on his jeans. “I’d be happy to help you.” He follows me to the front yard.
“If you can get her out,” I grumble, “I’ll lift on the other side.”
He scoops my mother up as if she’s made of air. “I’ve got her. Just unlock the front door.”
“Thank you for doing this,” she tells Liam. “Emerson should have made plans but she’s never thought of anyone but herself in her entire life.”
Liam’s shoulders stiffen. He probably agrees with her but says nothing.
I open the door. My mother could walk the rest of the way and is supposed to be doing some walking, but I don’t want to get into it with her in front of him. “Just down the hall and into the living room,” I tell him.
“Before you go out back talking about how heavy I am,” my mother says after he’s set her on the couch, “just know how much worse it could have been. You wouldn’t have been able to carry Emerson a foot when she was in high school, much less all the way from the car.”
“Mom,” I hiss, wincing. It’s par for the course with her, but it hits a lot harder with an audience.
He glances between us. I brace for a smirk from him, a mean little laugh, but there’s none.
“I would never talk about how heavy anyone is or was,” he says, turning for the back door. “Especially not if she was my kid.”
He walks out. It takes me several seconds to realize that he just put my mother in her place—on my behalf.
He sure doesn’t sound like the kind of guy who’d have tormented me back in the day. Is it possible for people to change? Can you forgive them if they have?
I pick up my phone. I consider thanking him. It seems like an awkward thing to do, but if I coupled it with a complaint about his progress at the theater, it might be okay.
In the end, I do nothing.
But a part of me wishes I had.
For the next few days, aside from running Snowflake to the groomer, I’m stuck at home with my mom. When I’m downstairs, I find myself watching for Liam in the backyard. When I let Snowflake out, I’m both cringing at the memory of what my mother said and hoping he strikes up a conversation—but he’s usually not there and he ignores me if he is.
I practice my speech for the hearing on Lucas Hall, though I’ve got every base covered, and make my mother food she complains about, while she otherwise ignores me. She’s too busy calling everyone she knows to discuss her surgery anyway and seems to be going out of her way to make it sound like she and Dr. Sossaman, her surgeon, are friends…or more than friends.
“Harold said I’d be up and about any day now.”
“Harold said I’m still young enough that I’ll heal fast.”
“Harold said if I wasn’t so thin, this would have been much worse.”
I go to my room and look through Liam’s old texts.
Liam
I can’t believe you wanted me to work on the weekend. You’re like the villain in a Hallmark movie.
*I’m* working. Why shouldn’t I expect it of you?
Now you sound like the heroine of a Hallmark movie, the one who will realize the error of her ways.
And you sound like a guy who watches a lot of Hallmark movies. Only one of us should be ashamed right now. Hint: it’s not me.
Look at you bantering with me about Hallmark movies. I knew you had a soft side.
I didn’t think I was lonely before. I threw myself into work and told myself I was too busy for more, but once I started hearing from him all the time—at night, on the weekend—I felt myself opening, a flower finally exposed to light, and I miss that feeling now.
It makes me wish I’d never come here in the first place so I didn’t have to ruin things.
11
LIAM
One of my earliest memories is of walking down the street with my grandmother on the way to Lucas Hall. Every time she bought me an ice cream cone, she’d tell me the story of meeting my grandfather there during the Vietnam War. Her parents got married there during World War II. The days she described didn’t seem so far away to me, perhaps because the town itself had remained unchanged.
I feel the town’s history every time I arrive on Main Street. Generations of Dohertys graduated in Lucas Hall’s grand ballroom. My “Athlete of the Year” trophy still sits in its awards room, gathering dust. When the world feels especially crazy, I can stand here and feel as if things are still going to be okay—that even if the world changes, it will never be a place I no longer recognize.
But now they’re trying to take that away too.
The meeting about Lucas Hall is held inside Lucas Hall, which is sort of like enjoying a delicious glass of your cow’s milk while you decide whether or not to slaughter that same cow—and there are plenty of people here who want to slaughter her.
Locals haven’t seen the writing on the wall. They really think a bunch of rich tourists are going to put Knits R Us or Smiths Insect Control on the map when it should be clear to them that this is not going to happen. Tiny, home-grown businesses don’t thrive when tourists come to town—they get run out by the conglomerates who’ve finally seen dollar signs. How long is Mountain Brew Coffee going to survive when some coffee chain moves in across the street with the power of a multimillion-dollar ad campaign behind them? Not long.
I’ve done my best to explain this at previous council discussions, but no one’s listening. I’d thought I could restore Lucas Hall myself, turn her into a hotel to satisfy the locals while preserving our history, but the bank has shot that plan to hell. All I can do now is appeal to people’s common sense, so I’ve lost before I’ve even begun.
The meeting’s being called to order when Emerson Hughes swans in, wearing a tiny suit and sky-high heels, shooting a megawatt smile at the mayor as if she’s his most honored guest.
What’s even more annoying is that he smiles back. I’m not sure what our octogenarian mayor thinks Emerson’s offering—money, prestige, blow jobs?—but it’s pretty fucking clear he’s saying yes to it.
“Miss Hughes,” he says, rising. “Welcome. I believe you wanted to do a little presentation?”
She blushes like a hopeful beauty pageant contestant, smiling shyly at its most important judge. “Really?” she asks. “It’s okay?”
“Of course, of course,” he says, beckoning her to the smart board. “Hook up your whatsit to the whosit here. I have no idea how these things work.”
“There’s an agenda,” I bark, and Emerson slowly turns to me. Her smile holds. In fact, she looks pleased by my outburst.
“I’m sorry,” she says, ever so sweetly. “It’s…Mr. Doherty, yes? If you’d like to go first, that’s just fine. I’m in no rush.”
Everyone in the room is looking at me like I’m Scrooge. As if Emerson fucking Hughes just wants to give the town everything inside her generous little heart, and I’m the mean old crank who doesn’t know how to love.
“I’m in no rush either,” I reply between my teeth. “I’m just pointing out that there’s an agenda, and presentations are at the end.”
“I’m sorry.” She offers the mayor a deeply apologetic smile. “I definitely wasn’t trying to jump ahead.”
The mayor frowns at me. This lovely young girl is so wonderful that she’s apologizing for my mistake, that frown says. A mistake pointed out by that jackass near the front. What’s his name again?
“I’ll just take a seat next to Mr. Doherty,” she says, repeating my name in case he missed it, “and wait until everyone’s ready.”
“Pleased with yourself?” I grunt as she slides in beside me. Smug pleasure radiates from her pores.
“Exceedingly,” she replies under her breath. As she sits, her skirt rides up, perilously close to her panties. I force my gaze elsewhere.
The secretary reads the minutes from the last meeting, where it seems almost nothing of import occurred. When she’s done, the mayor glances my way. “Hopefully that was sufficient, Mr. Doherty?” he asks, before summarizing the purpose of the day’s meeting, reminding everyone about the mysterious state inspection of Lucas Hall last winter that revealed some serious safety issues—flaws the town cannot afford to repair.
Interesting, the way the building was randomly inspected this past winter, when it wasn’t due for inspection. Just, you know, a random goddamn inspection of a building barely anyone knows exists.
“As we cannot afford the repairs, we’re now opening the floor to other proposals for the land. I assume you’d like to begin, Mr. Doherty?”
Jesus fucking Christ. I’m here to save the town, Emerson’s undoubtedly here to destroy it, yet somehow, I’m already the bad guy.
“Ladies first,” I snap.
Emerson rises and walks to the front of the room, smiling at the mayor and town council before she turns to offer that same demure smile to the rest of us. She is the epitome of earnest, good intention. Her laptop connects instantly, and an image of the town, circa 1910, flashes on the screen. I suspect she was in the building for hours getting set up and that last-minute entrance was simply for added drama—so that every man she passed got a good look at her ass and every woman could admire her expensive suit and glossy hair.
“Hi. I’m Emerson Hughes with Inspired Building. I see some new faces today, and several familiar ones as well.” She stops here to grin at the mayor as if he’s her father. Or boyfriend. “I was actually born and raised right here, so I want to make something clear before I begin: Inspired Building does not want to change all the things that make Elliott Springs so magical. Our town has a long, proud history. It has the warmth of a tight-knit community. The small-town values everyone in this room cherishes. These things matter to us too. That’s why we’ve been working quietly in the background to preserve Elliott Springs’ past while we bring it into a new century.”
They’re turning a hardware store that’s been around since the 1800s into a spin studio. How exactly is that preserving the past?
“Our new grocery store,” she says as if I’ve asked the question aloud, “is going to bring the modern conveniences of an upscale grocer to Elliott Springs while never forgetting where it began.” The pictures that flash past show smiling cashiers in old-timey aprons, hand-drawn placards announcing fish of the day and fresh-baked pies, a woman biking with a wicker basket full of flowers.
I’d like to see someone attempt to bike down our cobblestone streets.
“Our new bookstore and theater open this summer to become the heart of a thriving intellectual community while offering visitors and residents alike a taste of the town’s past.” The images on the screen go to a suffragette protest, a woman being helped out of a Model T. I’ve got no fucking clue what that has to do with a bookstore or a theater, but I appear to be the only one in the room questioning it. These fucking idiots are ready to give her a standing ovation.
“But these businesses can’t exist in a vacuum. In order to support the sort of shops and restaurants and experiences that Elliott Springs residents deserve, there needs to be the customer base. That’s where the Homes of Lucas Hall comes in.”
A new picture appears on screen—an architectural rendering of a massive apartment complex, with a little kid on a tricycle and a smiling couple in front.
It’s framed by mountains, on the sunniest day God ever created, and it takes me a second to realize it’s set in the same goddamn place where we currently sit.
She wants to tear Lucas Hall down and turn it into a fucking apartment complex.
“Two hundred and fifty luxury apartments in a building featuring a gym, rooftop terrace, twenty-four-hour concierge, and ample underground parking for both the residents and town visitors.”
A building like that would ruin the town. It would change everything. The roads would be clogged, the schools overcrowded. It would turn Elliott Springs into the same fucking big-city mess that drove people here in the first place.
She smiles at the crowd. “So what does that mean for all of us, the people who are already here?” she asks.
You live in New York City, Emerson. There’s no ‘us.’
“It means an average of five hundred new residents—residents who will support a bookstore, an upscale grocery store. Residents who’ll need haircuts and baked goods and insect control,” she says with a nod toward Dave Smith. “And when we prove to the world that Elliott Springs is thriving, it will bring other businesses here, which means access to the same stores, the same restaurants, the same upscale gyms that you see in San Jose and Santa Cruz.”
A hand shoots up. I wasn’t aware it was a question-and-answer, but she smiles and points to him like she’s the White House Press Secretary and he’s her favorite reporter.
“I’m just wondering what it’ll do to home values in the area,” says this guy I’ve never laid eyes on before.
She nods. “I’m so glad you asked. The nice thing about bringing in five hundred new residents is that it means we’re bringing in hundreds of potential homeowners. Young singles who’ll be getting married and starting families and looking for more space. Meaning home values will skyrocket.”
Beverly Grimm, who owns the grocery store across from the one Emerson’s putting in, raises her hand next. Emerson’s smile tightens, as if she’s fastening it in place by force.
“These businesses you’re talking about are going to take customers away from the rest of us,” Beverly says. “Your grocery store is competition for me. It’s also competition for Lori’s bakery and even the drug store.”
Emerson’s still smiling, but there’s a hard glint in her eye. “I know change is unsettling.” Her voice is saccharine-sweet. “But with an enlarged consumer base, there’s room enough for everyone. I assure you, thriving towns can support two grocery stores. They can support a bakery. But Elliott Springs does need to grow for that to happen.”
If I hadn’t already pissed off the mayor, I’d point out that no one’s going to go to Bev’s shitty little grocery store if there’s a better option and that yuppies want macarons and designer cupcakes, not the day-old gingerbread men sold at Lori’s bakery. That we are settling for what the town offers because there aren’t other options, but once they’re there, no one’s going back.
“I’ll set my business cards here on the table for anyone who wants to give me a call,” Emerson concludes, “and I’ve got a little office in the back of the grocery store if you want to chat in person. But I really hope we can work together. Let’s turn Elliott Springs into the town it was meant to be: a place you’re proud to call home.”
The applause is thunderous. She smiles her beauty pageant smile as she returns to her seat.
“Knock ’em dead, little hammer,” she whispers as I rise.
By the time I’ve reached the podium, the crowd’s rapt interest has vanished entirely. I guess I should have made a fucking presentation. It honestly never occurred to me that anyone would be as persuasive as Emerson just was. I also never thought the majority of the town would be dumb enough to believe her.
I’m the good guy here, but I’ve got nothing to sell these greedy idiots who simply want a payday.
“Lucas Hall has played a vital role in our town’s history,” I begin. “My grandfather received the Purple Heart in this very room when he returned from his first tour of Vietnam, and he met my grandmother at the ceremony.” If Emerson was presenting this, she’d have had a photo of this moment, no doubt. She’d have created holograms of my deceased grandparents, beaming down on us all as they listened in. “I attended Boy Scout meetings here. My prom and my graduation were held here, and I’m sure that’s true for many of the people in this room. So this place matters to me. I’ll bet it matters to you. What I’m hoping is that it matters enough to all of us to preserve it in a way that will leave its character unchanged.”
