The Summer After

Chapter One

I KEPT WAITING FOR SOMETHING HORRIBLE TO HAPPEN. THE air was thick with tension as we all sat at the round table—Lenny Lipoff, the boy I loved; my parents, strict, old-fashioned, and totally against my relationship with Lenny; Ira and Joey, my pesty twin brothers, who liked nothing better than to stir up trouble between everyone; and me.

You can order anything you want, Lenny, so don’t be shy, my mother said, and I gazed at her in amazement. True, this was a special occasion. It was not only my seventeenth birthday, but my graduation from high school as well. Still, I had never expected my parents to invite Lenny out to a restaurant to celebrate with our family.

Don’t say that to him—now he’s sure to order the most expensive thing on the menu, Joey said nastily.

I would have loved to kick him under the table, but he was sitting too far away for me to reach. It was hard to believe my brothers were thirteen years old now, official teenagers. While Ira, who had recently developed an interest in girls, showed occasional flashes of maturity, Joey was still an absolute baby, and a bratty one at that.

Now, Joseph. My father’s bushy eyebrows drew together in a warning frown. As much as he disliked Lenny, my father was not about to let my brothers ruin this family dinner.

It’s all right, Mr. Berman. I’ve been around the twins long enough now to have learned not to take anything they say seriously, Lenny said good-naturedly.

You sure have been around long enough! Ira piped in. Three years of going out with Linda— unbelievable!

Unbelievably disgusting, if you ask me, Joey couldn’t resist adding.

No one asked you anything, big mouth, I reminded him.

How’s everybody doing? Ready to order? Fortunately, our smiling, redheaded waitress arrived on the scene. That ended the discussion before it could lead to any serious disturbances.

Actually, as much as I hated to admit it, my brother Ira was right, I couldn’t help thinking as the waitress went around the table taking everyone’s orders. It was unbelievable that Lenny and I had been going together for almost three years. In the beginning, I don’t think anyone would have given us three weeks.

I was the kind of kid who didn’t get into trouble. I was a serious student, and serious about my future, too. I guess it was because my parents had always hammered into my head the importance of getting a good education that I did so well in school At any rate, I graduated high school a year early, with honors, and would be attending Barnard College in the fall.

Lenny, on the other hand, was constantly in trouble of one sort or another, and his school history was a complete disaster. It wasn’t that he wasn’t smart enough—Lenny was a great reader of newspapers, magazines, encyclopedias, almanacs, and history books, and he absorbed everything that interested him. He had done fine in school when he was younger and could get by on brains alone. But once he started high school, things had gotten so bad for him at home that he was unable to discipline himself to concentrate on schoolwork. He had started cutting classes and failing courses. Finally, in his junior year, he was kicked out of school.

Lenny was an only child and came from a broken home. His parents never got along, and there was always so much tension, screaming, and fighting in his house that he found it unbearable to be there. His parents eventually separated, but that didn’t stop Lenny’s mother from fighting with him. Things had deteriorated to where right before Christmas Lenny had joined the navy.

I had been devastated when he told me the news. But as we talked about it I realized it was probably the best thing he could have done. Lenny had been going through some tough times in the city. He couldn’t get a decent job without a high school diploma, and his relationship with his mother was so bad she was about to throw him out of the house. The navy would give him a chance to straighten up and to get an education and a career. It would be hard for me to be away from him, but if things worked out and Lenny got himself together, it would be well worth it. By the time he got out of the navy I would be almost finished with college, and, I hoped, we would be able to get married.

This was not a hope my parents shared with me. They didn’t like the fact that Lenny had so many problems and that he hadn’t done well in school. All the fights, breakups, and makeups we had had when we were first going together and the hurts I had suffered trying to help him through his ups and downs served to make them dislike him more.

I didn’t like my parents’ attitude, but I couldn’t really blame them for it. Lenny’s faults were on the surface, there for them to see clearly; his good points were a lot less obvious. My parents never got to see Lenny at his softer, more tender moments, when his common sense and depth of feeling prevailed. I could talk to Lenny about things I never could with anyone else and listen to his mesmerizing voice for hours. Lenny was fun to be with, and so full of life he breathed excitement into everything he did. And then there was a powerful physical attraction between us I never could resist. I certainly couldn’t expect my parents to understand that.

But at the moment I wasn’t trying to get them to understand anything. All I wanted was to get through dinner without any disasters!

*  *  *

Maybe it was because this was such a special occasion. Maybe it was because Lenny was leaving in the morning to go back to the naval school in Florida, or because he announced to my parents that he just found out he had passed his test for his high school equivalency diploma, so in a sense this was his graduation, too. Or maybe it was because my brothers were so busy eating that they didn’t have time to make too many snotty remarks. At any rate, except for the fact that clumsy Ira knocked over his water glass and splattered Joey’s food, there actually were no disasters during dinner. Not only that, my parents invited Lenny to come back to our house for a while. Of course, with all the rules and regulations they set up, like no closing doors and sitting only on chairs, not on the bed, there was no privacy in my apartment. But at least my parents were showing some acceptance.

The best part of the evening came when it was time for Lenny to go, and I walked him out into the hallway of my apartment building to say goodbye. Finally we were alone! We stood on the staircase between the second-and third-floor landings, a spot where people almost never passed by, and he took me into his arms. He kissed me, and I immediately felt that powerful magnetic force between us that never failed to take my breath away. It was stronger than ever now that I knew I wouldn’t be seeing him for so long.

I gazed at him, trying to etch every detail of the way he looked into my memory. I touched his brown hair that curled around his adorable baby face. I traced with my finger his high cheekbones, his fine, aquiline nose, his sensuous lips. I stared into his warm brown eyes fringed with lashes that were long and straight. Oh, Lenny, I’ll miss you so much while we’re apart, I said.

I hope so. I’d hate to think you might find someone else while you’re away working in the country.

Lenny! How can you say something like that? You know I’m completely loyal to you. I’m not interested in finding anyone else. I love you!

And I love you, Linda. You’re the best—so bright and sweet and pretty, with your perfect little body, and those incredible big blue eyes. I guess that’s why I always worry that some fast-talking lover boy will come along and sweep you off your feet.

I had to laugh at that. I’ve already got a fast-talking lover boy—you!

He didn’t laugh back. I’m serious, Linda. You’ll find that working at a hotel in New Hampshire is totally different from being home in New York City. You’ll be on your own, with lots of freedom, and there will be plenty of college boys there with their minds set on one thing. Being in the country is very romantic, and I’d hate to think of you there on some moonlit summer night succumbing to—

Lenny! I’m not succumbing to anything—except my love for you, that is. I don’t even need romantic surroundings for that—it can happen right here in this dingy hallway. I’ll show you.

I kissed him then, with such passion that he had to believe me. I loved him so much that I didn’t want to think that it would be two long months before we could be together again, maybe longer if he couldn’t get leave from the navy. How I wished that I never had to part from him, that we could hold and kiss and love each other all night long, then on and on forever and ever.

There was nothing to compare with this love I had for Lenny—nothing. We had gone through so much together, I was sure that no one would ever come between us.

There was no way of knowing then that I was wrong.

Chapter Two

LENNY WAS GONE. I MISSED HIM TERRIBLY, BUT AT LEAST I had getting ready for the country to keep me busy. Before I knew it, it was Saturday, and I was saying goodbye to my parents and to New York City. Then I was on the bus, heading for New Hampshire and my summer job at the Grandview Hotel.

I owed this job to Roz Buttons, who had been one of my very best friends for years and years. The two of us were to run the preschool camp group for children of the guests at the Grandview, and we were to be roommates as well. Roz had been the one to find out about the job, and she convinced me to come along by promising the work would be easy, the place would be beautiful, and we would have a terrific summer.

I wasn’t sure about how the summer would go, but Roz was right about the place being beautiful. The New Hampshire mountains were gorgeous, the countryside dotted with majestic forests and quaint little villages and farms. And the Grandview was lovely, three large white clapboard buildings with big porches, surrounded by grassy fields, woodlands, and mountains.

Linda! I’m so glad you’re here! Already tanned and looking bouncy and pretty with her honey-colored hair swept back from her face, Roz was there to greet me as I got off the bus. She had come to the country several days earlier with her parents, who were spending a week’s vacation at the hotel. Let’s take your things to our room and dump them. Then I’ll fill you in on everything!

I followed Roz into one of the white buildings and up three flights of stairs. This floor is just for staff, she said when we finally reached the top. Our room’s at the end of the hall.

Our room was small, with nothing more in it than a bed, chair, and dresser for each of us, but the view of the mountains from the window near my bed was spectacular. How I wished Lenny could be there to see it with me. If only he had had a normal life and gone to college instead of the navy, he could have gotten a summer job at the Grandview, too, and we could have had a fabulously romantic summer together.

Dump your stuff on the bed for now—you can unpack later, Roz interrupted my thoughts. I want time to show you around and set up for the start of camp before dinner.

As we walked outside Roz told me I was one of the last staff members to arrive. "The kids that work here come mostly from New York or from Boston. The girls seem nice, and there are some guys that are positively gorgeous! I’ve got my eye on this waiter named Mel. He’s got the sexiest eyes I’ve