Page 10 of Don’t Be A Stranger

He heads toward the door but I call out to him. “River?”

“Yeah?”

“Love you lots.”

His shoulders fall like there’s nothing better I could’ve said right now. As if just like me, he needed a reminder that we’re still friends. The only thing that’d make this complete is if Lily were standing in here with us.

She’ll be here when school starts, I remind myself. But after not seeing her for eight months due to her frequent psychiatric hospital visits, I’m beginning to grow impatient.

I’m a pretty strong swimmer. Maybe I can just chase that cruise ship down.

River steps back into the room and hugs me. My own shoulders sag and I press my face into the crook of his neck, welcoming his familiar warmth.

“Love you tons,” he responds.

Just like he always does.

Four

River

I learned from an early age the difference between loving someone and being in love.

For instance, I love my older brother, Dae. Despite him never calling, I can’t blame him. He was out of the house by the time I was learning how to walk.

I also love my sister, Bora. Despite most of our conversations involving who she’s currently dating. But I don’t complain. Not when I at least get to hear all about her Michelin chef fiascos.

I guess I even love my parents, in a way.

Sure, their favorite pastime seems to be putting me down whenever they get the chance, but that’s love in their own way…right?

Yeah, I’m not sure either. Which is why I haven’t talked to them in almost a year.

Then there’s being in love.

It’s when someone can make you nervous and yet be your safe place to land all in one. It’s when you feel like you must’ve once been one full being, then somewhere in the process of the creation of the universe, you were split in two at the start of some sick, cruel game of finding the other half.

Who is the girl in my life with long, dark hair that she complains is too dry because of the chlorine in the pool. Her dark eyes that I find intriguing more than anything else. The girl who leaves her bracelets lying around like maps of places she’s been. Her sweet scent of nectar that I’m fully convinced isn’t perfume but just the natural scent of her skin.

Who is Summer.

And it’s been that way since I met her and Lily in fifth grade.

Little Summer Ingram-Ruiz.

All long, wild hair and scraped knees from jumping off swing sets just to see how high she could go and still successfully land.

I had just moved from Korea to America and to say people weren’t welcoming would be an understatement.

But as fate would allow it, I was handed the kindness of Summer’s best friend. Quiet and curly-headed, Lillian Hollis.

Lily noticed me always sitting by myself in class and recess. Even lunch. I grew to learn that when Lily noticed something, Summer would shortly follow.

But unlike the gentle smiles and polite waves Lily would offer me, Summer challenged me.

She dared me one day to jump off the swing set with her. She said that whoever could land the furthest won. If that was me, then I could hang out with her and Lily. If Summer won, I had to stop staring at them.

Well, I lost but Summer didn’t stay true to her word because after that, there was never a day I sat alone at the lunch table or wondered who I was going to pair up with for group projects.