November, 1963
THE PIL O T
LOST SUMMER
by Joe DePriest
Grass, freshly cut and soRgy in the mourning dew,
collected on the boy’s bare feet as he walked towards
the front porch. Once on the concrete walkway, the boy,
who was eight years old June 5, day before yesterday,
began kicking his feet in an attempt to knock some of
the clinging grass off. When he reached the porch, he
used the door mat. There were still some long blades left
on his toes. He rang the doorbell, then peeked in through
the screen door, unable, because it was such a bright
day outside, to see anything except a fuzzy darkness. He
managed to distinguish a figure moving towards him
through the darkened room inside, and he held his
breath, hoping it would be she. It wasn’t.
“Victor. Come in,” said Mrs. Wilkins.
She made him clean his feet carefully before allow
ing him to enter her house. They went to the kitchen
where, as he had expectd, she gav ,him a slice of French
toast.
“Laurie not up?” he asked, iust before biting into
the toast. It was after ten. She alwa.ys used to be up by
“No Victor, she was out late last night.”
Used to be she’d come to the door when he came
down in the mornings and she never slept past ten. Late
ly though, she stayed in bed longer and longer in the
mornings. Sometimes she wouldn’t get up till dinner
time, something unimaginable to him. How could she
possibly be able to do that: sleep all morning? Why the
dew would long since be dried up and the morning
glories gone and everything hot already—and her still
e it. She must have been out pretty
Page Seven
n bed. He couldn’t
Victor did not mind talking to Mrs. Wilkins, although
she did ask him the same questions everytime he came.
“Your family going to the beach this summer?”
“Yes,” he said.
“I love the beach, don’t you Victor?”
“Yes ma’am.”
“Does your mother still work?”
“Yes.”
“At the beauty shop?”
Victor came down practically every morning and
Mrs. Wilkins still asked the same things, her back to him
as she washed dishes or tended to some something on
the stove, asking but not giving any indication of hear
ing.
He stayed about thirty minutes, then decided it was
long enough.
“I gotta go,” Victor said.
“She’ll be up this afternoon, Victor.”
“OK.”
Victor wandered home the back way: through the
Wilder’s backyard, through their blossoming peach trees
and over their tall hedges to his own yard. Walking to
wards the driveway, where the dirt was packed and
smooth, Victor picked a sprig from a nearby bush and
considered its possibilities as a cigarette. It was rather
big and somewhat irregular, but he popped it into his
mouth nevertheless, sucking on it and going through the
inhaling and exhaling motions. He bit into the sprig by
mistake as he shifted it in his mouth, and the bitter
taste of the sap made him discard it quickly. Victor made
a mental note never to use that particular bush for
cigarettes again.
He squatted in the driveway and drew his thoughts
in the dirt. The sun felt good on his neck and short hair
adn, kneeling in the warmth and smelling the sweetness
of flowers in the air. he thought of Laurie.
She never does anything anymore, Victor thought.
Last summer, every summer he could remember, in fact,
she was at home and whenever he came to see her she
would, if she were not attending to some ,iob for her
mother, play with him.
In the mornings they would eat French toast togeth
er. Afterwards, they would pick blackberries, maybe. And
sometimes they made things. Laurie showed him how to
soak morning glories, producing any number of differ
ent colored waters, which were magic, you know, she
In the woods, beyond the tangle of briars where they
picked blackberries, was a creek. Victor never went there
alone. The woods were dark, snakey. By the creekbank
there were small white rocks. One summer day Laurie
had said: “Those white rocks are magic, Vic.”
He had not believed her, of course, but he followed
her through the woods to the creek.
“There was an Indian burial ground here once,” she
said, “and the bodies turned to stone and washed down
to the creek. See? We’re picking up little white chunks
of old Indians that lived here long ago.”
The way she said it, the way the deep, silent woods
were, made him believe her. Besides, it was fun. They
collected rocks for hours it seemed, putting them in .iars.
Then she took his arm suddenly, and said in an
anxious whisper: “Hush Vic. Do you hear that?”
He listened. He could hear trees swaying in the wind,
birds crying. “What?” he whispered.
That noise across the creek over there. Coming
through the woods. Something running towards us, Vic.
A bunch of people it sounds like.”
He listened. The wind shook the trees harder, stirred
the underbrush into a steady, faraway tremor.
“Yes,” he said. "I hear it.”
“It’s the Indian guardians. Vic. They’ve come to get
us for disturbing the graveyard. Here, take a ,1ar. Let’s
go, quick.”
They ran, lickytisplit, back through the maze of vines
and bushes, all the way home.
They spent the afternoon with hammers, pounding
the white rocks, which they placed in an old sock. After
dumping the crushed, sugar-like contents in a cigar can,
Laurie took it and told him; “Now lets go to the base
ment.” He followed her. She turned the water spigot on
and let it run into the cigar can. Then, stirring the mix
ture, she put a top on it.
‘T’ll make you something tomorrow,” she said.
She did. The next morning when he came down and
was sitting in the kitchen, Laurie walked in with a salt-
white statue of an Indian. “Here,” she said.
He took the still wet statue, looking at it in unbelief.
It was perfect. He examined every inch of it and it was
indeed perfect, right down to the “Made in Japan” label
on the bottom.
“Keep it,” said Laurie with a smile. “It’s magic.”
They had fun together then. On summer evenings
there were fire flies to be caught and hardly ever did
she decline to help him. She was always somewhere else
Victor got to his feet. An irritating little smell came
to his attention. It was dead ants. He must have squashed
some with his heels as he was kneeling. Dead ants
smelled terrible. He made his way back around the gar
age to the garbage cans.
A nameless tune loomed from nowhere into his mind,
and as he began to hum it, he decided to lead his or
chestra.
Victor reached behind one of the garbage cans and
found his baton. He kept it there because this was where
his orchestra stayed. The largest can was where he stood
and before him was the orchestra. Victor tapped the
stick against the top of the can, called for silence, and
raised his arms iust so. Jerking and swirling the stick
about, he pressed his lips together and blew, producing
the desired, if not grotesque, sound effect. He began and
ended his production with something vaguely remin
iscent of Beethoven’s Fifth Symphony; everything in be
tween was original, contrived as ,he went along. He was
putting the last few brilliant touches on the symphony,
waving the baton in some labored, final motions, blovv-
ing deeply with slavia flying from the corners of his
mouth, when a voice shook him from his trance.
“What you doin boy?” A garbage man stood looking
at him, his white teeth gleaming in a huge smile.
Victor dropped the baton. “Whooping cough,” he
said, and ran.
After dinner, Victor returned to Laurie’s house.
“I’m sorry, Vic, but she's gone up town to have her
hair drae. She’ll be back sometime late this afternoon.”
The day she got her driver’s license was one thing
that changed her, Victor thought. She had to depend on
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