Summer Loves You

Sometimes I think I can see it. The seat belt across your chest.
The music on the radio. The chlorine in your eye. Summer is here, and there, and everywhere. Dancing with the mosquitoes in the streetlights. Burning their tires in circles. Sending the streets up in smoke. I act too cool for them – like I’m tired of the romance, and the soap operas, and the sunsets – but I know what I want. I want to run into their arms. I want to get close to it – even if it hurts me. 

Summer loves you. They love me too. Even when we’re counting down the hours till the next cool change rolls over, they love us. They’ve known us forever. We set our hearts on other people, but when it’s over, we’re back, in the Summer, alone.

In my head I convince myself I could love someone the way Summer can. A love burning past 37 degrees. A love that sends the crowds to air conditioners and shopping centres. A love that can run its finger across a heart like it’s striking a match. Sun-kissed, and sunburnt, and starry eyed. I could do it. I could love someone like that.  

But not even I could get as close to love as Summer can. I pretend, like anyone, to be too tough, too icy, too far away for love. I can’t let it in like Summer can. Not now, anyway. Maybe one day, like the lovers in the cemeteries, I’ll be buried next to them- whoever they are.   

If you listen carefully, people talk about Summer the same way they talk about love. The rush of it ever gracing our lives. The heartache of it ever leaving. Wishing for it, grieving over it, like another Summer that’s slipped it's hand from ours. Soon it will be winter, and we’ll be waiting for a glimmer, a flash of it, to return. Listening to the girls and the boys talk and sing about it. Watching the rose ceremonies on TV. Hearing it on the radio. All this pop music like a dress rehearsal for love. 

It’s why the lovers are sharing headphones on the train. Why we keep dancing this dance that goes on and on. Because this town, like anytown, is built on Summer and romance. Lights flickering on the walls. Feet swaying across the floor. Eyes that meet. Hearts that spin. Maybe next time I’ll tell you how I really feel.  

Summer: brave, hot-headed, with nothing to lose. Freckling. Glistening. Invincible. I can see what you see in them. With Summer, the drama of our ordinary lives feels: dizzy, bright, worth caring about. Summer kisses my cheeks red. Summer hooks their pinky finger around mine. Summer says, I promise. And then one day, Summer will leave. The swimming pools will dry up. The sun will drop. You’ll roll down your sleeves. We’ll talk about when, or if, we’ll see them again. 

Another year waiting for Summer. Every day we’ll hold out for it. Hold onto love, onto the anyone who stretches out their hand, onto the next day. There is brightness in the shallows. Sometimes I think I can see it. I want to get close to it – even if it hurts me.