Summer's Desire Vol. 1 (Complete)

Part 1: Chapter 3

Chapter 3

It was the beginning of spring in the sixth year since Summer had joined the Lewis household. Seth was thirteen years old, Summer eleven. It was a cold day in March, the frost having returned overnight.

Summer had spent the last week battling a nasty case of the flu. And even though she had been feeling better the last couple of days and was heartily sick of being cooped up indoors, Seth wouldn't even hear of her going for a walk outside. Allegedly, he didn't want her to turn into an icicle and have to deal with a return of her flu.

Still, if she had to spend another afternoon under house arrest, keeping warm, at least her best friend (and current jailer) was sharing her imprisonment. (Although, most annoyingly, he didn't seem the slightest put out because of it.)

The two of them were horsing around on the living room floor, with the door to the kitchen, where Grandma was cooking dinner, left open. Suddenly they heard a plate breaking, followed by a mighty crash. They both rose to their feet, Seth in a graceful leap and Summer in a stumble, and ran to the kitchen. Grandma was lying on the floor, unmoving. Seth immediately crouched down to check her pulse and yelled at Summer to call 911.

All too late. Massive heart attack, Seth would later read in the coroner's report. Grandma was dead before she hit the floor.

In the moment after the EMT pronounced Grandma dead, when Seth's stricken gaze flew to a devastated Summer, his first horrified thought was, What will happen with Sunny now? They can't take her away from me.

But take her they did.

Someone from social services—but not Ms. Owens—was there the next day. In spite of Summer's crying and pleading to stay with Seth, and Seth's railing and threats, Summer was swiftly packed, bundled and dragged away. There wasn't even enough time for him to go out and get her a cell phone, and in his mind he used the foulest swearwords imaginable to curse Grandma's intransigent stance against modern gadgets—there had been none allowed under her roof.

Seth and Summer had moments only, for a brief farewell.

"We don't know where they'll send you," he said, "so you'll have to call and tell me immediately when you find out." He was holding her shoulders in a possessive grip and looking into her water-logged eyes with a burning gaze. He took her left hand and placed in it a thin stack of low-denomination banknotes (the entire small amount that his Grams had kept in the house, spread among her various purses). "Use this money to buy a cell phone as soon as you can and call me at the house. I'll get a cell too, and once we have each other's numbers, we'll talk and figure things out."

"But Seth... What if I can't call you? Or you can't answer? Or..."

"Shh, Sunny, it'll be okay. Besides calling, you should also write—a letter each day until you hear back from me. I'll write back or I'll call back, and somehow we'll fix this. We'll find a way to be together again. You hear me, Sunny?"

"I hear you," she whispered.

"Promise to do like I said?"

"I promise, Seth. On my life. But you promise me too... that we'll find a way back together."

"I promise." His voice rang with soul-deep resolve. "I promise you on my life."

And then he drew her in his arms and she burrowed into him one last time.

* * *

Five days later, Summer awoke in a hospital bed, disoriented. Her lips felt dry and her chest tight. But the previous stabbing chest pain was gone, finally, and so were those awful chills.