Tiny Lights
Contest 2010
page seven
You must have been warned against letting the golden hours slip by. Yes, but some of them are golden only because we let them slip. Sir James M. Barrie
Honorable Mention: $100 Summer Swim by David W. Berner
Deborah Garber
I
t‘s early June, a Sunday, and Dad is trying to reassemble the backyard pool, the same one we‘ve had for the last five years. ―Pull the hose around the tree and up close here,‖ he says. I am ten years old, impatient for summer, impatient for the pool. I‘m already in my royal blue bathing suit, barechest, barefoot, my cherubic belly protruding over the white drawstring tied too tightly at the middle of my waist. ―When you get the hose up here, go back and turn the water on, but only when I tell you.‖ Dad tries to direct this project with the same simple, direct commands. It‘s a two-man job. You have to stretch out the thin steel outside wall of the pool onto the backyard grass so you can get the kinks out and wash it down with the water from a hose. The metal section of the pool has been rolled up and stored away in the garage for nearly nine months. I run over the grass and walkway, navigating my sensitive, shoeless feet around the cracks in the stone toward the outside faucet, nearly shivering in anticipation of the first summer swim of the season. I put my hand on the knob and peek around the corner of the house, poised for the next command from Dad. ―Hold on, get back here,‖ he says. ―I still need you to help stretch out the liner onto the grass.‖ How long is this going to take? I slump back to the yard, knowing now this isn‘t going to happen at the speed any young boy would hope for. The blue liner, nearly matching the color of my bathing suit, is thick, heavy, flexible plastic. It, like the metal, has been rolled up all winter and needs a bath. When we unroll it, there are two or three spiders inside and a dead moth.
―We‘re going to need a little soap on this,‖ Dad says. ―Go ask your mother for a small cup of laundry detergent.‖ Now he needs soap? The pool set-up is becoming a far more laborious job than I would have liked. Not what I expected. And instead of getting closer to a swim, I now seem farther away than ever. I take the long way into the house, stop at the refrigerator for a drink of milk from the bottle, grab a cookie from the cupboard drawer, and pause to pet the dog. ―Mom?‖ I yell from the kitchen, kneeling on the floor, my hand still on the dog‘s head between his ears. My mother appears from the basement. ―Dad needs soap for the pool,‖ I tell her, my eyes and hand fixed on the dog. She reaches under the sink and pulls out a large box of Tide, pours about two inches of it into a plastic cup. I give the dog a few more pets, grab another cookie from the cupboard drawer, and walk the soap to the backyard. ―Where‘ve you been, for god‘s sake?‖ Dad is standing near the blue liner with his hands on his hips, the hose hanging over his shoulder. ―You want to swim or not?‖ I don‘t say a thing as he snaps the cup out of my hands. ―Did you bring a scrub brush?‖ ―You want one?‖ Dad rolls his eyes and slaps the palm of his hand on his forehead. I turn and run to the door to the kitchen. ―Mom?‖ ―Jesus, Mary, and Joseph,‖ I hear my father say in a stiff, staccato beat, shaking his head and launching into a quiet laugh. I rush out of the kitchen, the screen door slamming behind me, hoping to ease my dad‘s infuriation with my waning lack of focus by quickly retrieving what he needs. ―Scrub brush, Dad,‖ I say, dutifully handing him what my mother had given me, the brush with the large handle and the worn, coarse bristles on one end. He takes it, says nothing, and looks at me slowly, shaking his head. I don‘t want to make him angry, so I give it a few seconds before I ask the question. ―How long to do you think, Dad?‖ ―Oh, for Christ sake.‖ He laughs in disbelief. ―Go turn on the hose.‖ This time, I don‘t hurry. It seems now that rushing isn‘t helping me get any closer to the cool waters of a backyard pool. I walk to the outside faucet as if I were walking to my school, a slow, meandering pace that‘s interrupted only for a second to kick an early season dandelion. ―Jesus, David, take your finger out of your ass!‖ Finger out of my ass? It’s not in my ass. ―I would like to get this done before August,‖ my father crackles, his voice rougher than before and unsympathetic. I start half-running, a visceral response. At the same time I feel my face flush. Did I have my finger up my ass? Why would I do that? I have never heard of someone with their finger up their ass. I turn the faucet knob and wait to hear my father‘s next command.
