(A fictional short story)
Pope trots down the staircase of the mangled pier that extended from the boat house, rotting more with every year that passed. It was September now, and summer was tip toeing away. The throes of autumn nestled in the outskirts of the lake, peppering the trees with fiery orange and red hues. Steady breezes send the occasional chill in strides across the water. The sun pressed on, but Fall was but an echo away. As she reaches the end of the dock, her towel, resting on her shoulder, slips to the ground and limps over into a pile of wrinkled red fabric. This would be one of the final summers with her parents before she took on her first job post graduation. The last summer free of commitments, the inklings of time left that she has to herself before asking permission from a boss for a day off. The time before calculating how many sick days she was permitted each year. The seasons were slipping quickly. She forces her tongue at the back of her teeth, creating an audible puff of defeated air at the thought of it all.
She inhales deeply and the composition of her belly slims and then expands as she lunges forward into the sharp surface of the cold water. It isn’t so much a relief from the sun as it is a place just further than it’s reach, her skin and bones submerged in the darkness of the lake, unreachable from the rays that try to grip her. She steadies herself, toying with the buoyancy that keeps her afloat, with just her nose now above the surface while the rest of her limbs burrow from the transitioning air. “Pope! Dinner!”, calls her mom from the wrap around deck, drawing out the ‘o’ in her name. She perks up from the rippling water and spots her mother’s hand waving in the distance. She acknowledges her mothers beckon and stalls in the water for a few seconds more with her head to the sky as her toes splash about just out of her gaze.
Pope’s parents are easy to spend time with. They don’t saddle her with massive expectations, parental judgment faded as time passed and they became more so roommates than authoritative figures. They even started cussing as freely as Pope did, in the casual humor ridden way she was accustomed to. That was the tell tale sign for her that the pressure of adolescence subsided and the confidence in her had been reinstated. She did well in school, made friends, played sports, there wasn’t much for anyone to gripe about. Over dinner the three chatted about the past, and then the future, and then the occasional present in reference to passing the salt or commenting on how the snapper ought to be prepared next time. Pope riddles off her list of accumulated baby names, future thinking like always. Her mom winces after the majority of the names, Sparrow, Cato, Juniper… too hippie for her taste. But her face softens at the last one. “Maude is a pretty name. That is Leslie Mann’s daughters name,” her mom adds. The queen of pop culture resided in her own family, Pope thinks to herself. Cosmopolitan and People magazine owe her mother a hand written thank you card. “I wanna be a young grandpa,” her dad retorts, “young, hip, and healthy with two generations below me… how cool is that?” He beams at the thought of this, a paternal sense of pride and provider radiated in his response. Pope’s scoff morphs into a smile with her head slinking below her shoulders, her fork shoving seasoned rice along the plate. Yeah, right. She doesn’t plan to have kids for some time, no suitors in her life have ever proven to be long term. Besides, she just entered her twenties.
After a few hours of decompressing after dinner and flipping through channels while sharing in easy banter, the three unanimously decide to retire to bed. Cheek kisses and hugs are exchanged and the three slouch to their respective bedrooms at the top of the steps, all separating at once as if a fork in the floor parts them. Pope’s mom and dad typically sleep together, but the full sized beds at their lake house have never boasted a restful night for the two paired together. Doors shut, candles are blown out and Pope kicks off her bedroom moccasins on the carpet before leaping atop the comforter. Her head collapses into the pillow. Too tired for doom scrolling, too tired for reading, she breathes in and calls for her mom. Something about being home always warrants extra affection from her mom.
The door peeks open and in the crack between hallway darkness and pale bedroom light, her mom’s face pokes through as she sighs begrudgingly, likely having been disturbed from her nightly crossword. Pope always saw that as a morning activity, but to each their own. “I just wanted a hug,” laments Pope. Her mom, battered from cooking, manages a soft smile. Her shoulders droop as she extends her arms just above her waist, hovering over her daughter to embrace her while she lay. The two squeeze their torsos together and then their bodies relax after a moment. "You feel cold," her mom notes. Pope shrugs. As her mom hinges from her hips to stand, she takes a step backwards, tripping over a singular moccasin flipped upside down on the rug. “Dammit Pope!”, cries her mom. She falls, loudly, on her bottom and lands parallel to the bed frame. As she begins situating to stand up, she spots a figure beneath the bed trembling. Her first instinct is to react, scream, yell. But hastily, the figure under the bed brings a singular finger to it’s lips, hushing. The figure has hair that is all too recognizable to Pope's mom. The same tangled locks she has brushed and tamed nearly a decade ago. It's limbs, long and tanned like her husbands. It's whimpers, all too intimate a sound. Pope's mom feels a terror greater than she's ever known. It couldn't be, she thought to herself. Then a familiar voice, trembling, whispers, “Mom, there is someone in my bed.”
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