In Time For Lemonade

Thinking back on that summer, nothing comes to him fully formed.

Trips to the beach.

Visits to galleries.

The heat seeping into every single movement.

Coral-coloured nail varnish. His sister holding her fan like a fragment of sky.

It was the summer before that famous journalist was killed, very far away from mint and rum and crushed ice.

They didn’t talk about much, but they walked a lot.

Their mother had spent most of the school holidays in the hospital. She made a big fuss about wearing what she called good shoes, even in there, and good tights. Whenever she got out of bed, anyway.

When she did, the three of them would walk down to the water’s edge. Greet the waves, then turn back. In time for lemonade. They put too much sugar in it, there. Which didn’t feel very healthy.

As the summer waned, his sister took a pair of their mother’s heels away in her rucksack. Staggered away from him down cobblestones.