Summer Turned Dark

It was one of those days where you felt that nothing else could be more perfect. It was a warm summer day- with the cloud cover just right, a light breeze, and the warm sun hitting our backs. Jason and I were at my house, sitting in the sun and reminiscing memories. The world couldn’t have been better. 

“Lara, remember when we were like, seven, and you were too scared to dive into the pool and I pushed you in? I was scared of you for a week after that,” Jason grins in a way that makes me want to slap the smile off his face. 

“Haha, very funny, dude. No way. It was a month for sure,” I get up to go inside the house. “You comin’?” Jason loves my mom’s cooking. If he could, he’d stay at my house every night for dinner, but my mom insists that he eat at home sometimes. 

“Yeah, just a sec. Andrew just texted. He’s at your porch, asked me to meet him up there.”

“I’m coming too!” I roll my eyes and follow him. Andrew is so clingy. He’s practically Jason’s brother, a brother who can’t stay a minute without him. 

“Yo, Andrew!” without looking up, Jason walked up the side of my house as he glanced at his phone. Turns out, it wasn’t Andrew. 

“Hey, Peters! Hanging out with your girlfriend again?” the big guy says in a mocking tone. Jason turned his head and moved directly in front of me. 

“First of all, she’s not my girlfriend. Second of all, why are y’all here? I thought you liked to mess around with people worse than you,” compared to the guys on my lawn, Jason is pretty small. Gangly, with light muscle in his arms and shoulders from helping his dad in the garage. 

“Calm down, dude. Lara, is it? You wanna hang with us at Chico’s tonight?” Chico’s is this fro-yo place downtown. I’ve never been there alone. I think Jason didn’t feel too good about this arrangement either. 

“If she comes, I come too,” and he stood his ground. Sometimes I wonder what I did to get a best friend like him. Must’ve been all that ice cream. Ice cream is the solution to everything. The boys stared him down and left. They infuriated Jason enough that he got on his bike and rode away without a word. I don’t follow him. When Jason is angry, no one dares to talk to him. 

That night, Jason FaceTimes me and says he’s sorry for leaving without notice. I don’t press the issue. 

The next day is Monday, and it marks one week until the start of high school. I am naturally stressed, worried, and all the other emotions about practically nothing. Jason, on the other hand, is chill. Polar opposites. I worry enough for both of us, and he’s chill enough for both of us. It all works out. 

That evening, when Jason and I are getting ready to go for a bike ride, the boys from yesterday show up again. This time, though, Jason doesn’t even go outside. We go straight back into my house and listen to them from my couch after we draw the curtains closed. 

“He’s always hanging out with her, isn’t he? Probably cause no one else wants to talk to him after what happened last weekend,” one of them says. I’m not sure what happened last week- Jason never said anything. Usually, he’s quick to tell me anything that’s going on. 

“Dude. What’s he talking about? What happened last week? And if those stupid guys know about it, then how come I don’t?” I shake Jason’s shoulders because he was tuning me out. 

“Can we talk about this upstairs please?” he asks, and silently, Jason begins to walk up the stairs. I have no choice but to follow him. 

When I get to my room, Jason is sitting in my desk chair, fiddling with a pen. I pull the bean bag into my room from the hallway and plop down on it, facing him. “What’s up?”

“Lara, I- I didn’t get a chance to talk to you about this. But they made me-” at this point, he can’t face me anymore. When I see his face again, a minute later almost, there are tears in his eyes. I am not the one to press at someone’s thoughts, but Jason never cries. If he’s crying, then something is going on, and it’s not good. Usually, he’s very “bravado,” I guess? This was a whole new side of him to me. I didn’t know what to say or do. Whatever happened wasn’t on social media, and since it was the summer, there was no gossip or rumors. Whatever happened couldn’t have been that bad. 

A couple of minutes later, Jason scooches onto my beanbag and engulfs me in a comforting hug- one that feels amazing, not just great. Then he keeps saying that he’s sorry and starts crying. I just hold onto him the whole time. Whatever he was going through wasn’t easy, and he needed my support. He would get more. I smile at him, and we just sit there. At this point, I don’t ask questions, I don’t talk to him, and he doesn’t talk to me. We have a mutual understanding that the situation must not be spoken of. We sit silently, staring at my patterned wall. After it gets dark outside, Jason stands up to leave, gives me a quick hug, and goes downstairs. I’m still contemplating what just happened and what could leave him in such a mess. 

That night, we don’t have a Netflix and Chill session. No FaceTime. I go to bed while reading a book and thinking about what went down that evening. 

The next morning, I decide to bike down to Jason’s house because I want to talk to him about what happened last night. When I get there, his parents open the door. 

“Hey, Lara! Is Jason with you? He texted and said he spent the night,” his dad peeks behind me. 

“No, Mr.Navarro. Jason left my house around 8:00 pm last night. He didn’t come home?” I ask with worry. First, he cried his brain out, and then he didn’t go home last night? Something was up. “One second. Let me call him,” I step off the front porch and see a single text message from Jason: “Goodbye, Lara. ILY <3.” I showed his dad the text, and he shut the door. 

My life has ended. Without Jason, who am I? What am I meant for? And what happens when he needs me? If I need him? Maybe we only have each other in our hearts now.