The Summer We Got Free Read Online Free PDF Page A

is long, aint she?" George asked, taking a seat at the table.
    Regina paused to glare at him a moment, not for any
particular reason, just on general principle, before she pulled a pack of
cigarettes, along with a book of matches, from her housecoat pocket.
    "You want
coffee, Daddy?” Sarah asked.
    "Yes, thank
you," George said. Then, "I didn't even know Paul had a sister. Did
you know he had a sister, Ava?"
    "Yes.”
    "Well, she don't look nothing like him. I aint never seen anybody so
black in my life. Y'all ever seen anybody so black?"
    They all shook
their heads. None of them had ever seen anybody so black.

 
    When Helena wasn’t in the room, Ava felt a little better.
Steadier. More like herself again. The strange
emotions that had risen to her surface unswelled . For a few minutes. When Helena came back, the moment Ava
turned to put the butter on the table and saw her coming through the kitchen
door, she felt a trembling, and the butter dish shook in her hand.
    When breakfast was ready, they all sat down to eat,
and Ava sat on the other side of the table from Helena, at the other end,
putting as much space between herself and their guest as she could.
    Sarah was grinning around at all of them.
    “What you so happy about?” George asked.
    She shrugged. “This is nice. We don’t
hardly never eat together like this, sitting at the table together like
a real family, the way we used to. Usually everybody take a plate and go their
separate way.”
    "This is a
nice house," Helena said.
    Regina laughed. “Child, this house look like something out of a goddamn horror
movie. But it’s nice of you to say so.”
    "How come
the hedges aint been cut yet?" George asked. "That front yard’s starting
to look as bad as the back. Paul was supposed to do that yesterday.”
    "That boy
been working non-stop," Regina said. "He tired. Them hedges can
wait."
    George frowned.
"They high as my collar already. Tomorrow's Sunday. I don't want people walking by on they way to church seeing it like that."
    Regina put down
her fork. “Why you give a damn what them people think about the hedges?”
    Ava saw Helena
looking from George to Regina and back.
    "Paul aint
had a day off in what?" Regina looked at Ava. "Two weeks?” She waved
a dismissive hand at George. “Them hedges’ll be fine
for another couple days. If you don’t like it, go cut ‘ em your damn self."
    George glared at
her. "Why you always—"
    "So, what's in New York?" Sarah asked
Helena, loudly.
    George frowned and stabbed his fork into is eggs.
    "Work," Helena replied. “A friend of mine
got me an interview in a couple of weeks at a school in Harlem,” Helena said.
“Teaching art.”
    "You an
artist?" Regina asked.
    “I’m not that
much of one. But I know enough to teach children.”
    "I love art," Sarah said. She was sitting so
far out on the edge of her chair, she looked ready to
tip over.
    "Since
when?” George asked.
    "I always
have."
    "Ava the
one used to paint," Regina said.
    Sarah frowned. "That
was years ago.”
    Helena looked at
Ava. “You paint?”
    Ava shook her
head. "I just did it a little when I was a child, I guess.”
    Sarah raised her
voice just a notch higher than Ava’s. "Was you and Paul close growing
up?"
    Helena nodded. “We
were best friends.”
    "Like Ava
and Geo," Regina said.
    Helena looked at
Ava again.
    "My
brother," Ava explained.
    Sarah folded her
arms across her chest. "He was my brother, too.”
    George got up
from the table, taking his only-half-empty orange juice glass with him to the
refrigerator, where he got out the jug and very slowly poured himself some
more. Watching the dark yellow liquid as it streamed heavily into the glass, he
wondered how long Paul’s sister would be visiting and hoped it would not be
long. He didn’t like the disruption, the uncomfortable conversation, or the
curiosity in that woman’s eyes.
    "Does your
brother live here, too?" Helena asked Sarah.
    “Yeah, he do,” Regina said. She looked from