19. 7 Years Ago
Chapter nineteen
Graduation is one of life’s dichotomies. It’s an ending, but it’s also a beginning.
It was all I could think about as I listened to the provost’s eternally lengthy speech about creating positive social change in the world.
This was my second time graduating from UConn, so there was definitely an element of déjà vu in the air.
The first time was four years before, when I earned my bachelor’s degree in psychology.
Then, after a year of meandering, I went back to get a master’s degree in social work.
The commencement ceremony and saying goodbye to my aunt were the only things standing in the way of the next chapter of my life.
The car was packed with my personal belongings; the apartment I rented with my roommates in downtown Hartford came furnished, so I only had to take the contents of my bedroom, which really wasn’t much.
Aunt Lucy was kind enough to leave my bedroom in Beacon Hill untouched so I wouldn’t have to rush to figure out a plan once the summer ended.
But the thought of going back there was becoming less and less palatable.
For one thing, it was cramped. She had erected a wall in her own stately master to carve out a space for me in the old brownstone, but the room was windowless and small, and I wasn’t thrilled with the idea of sharing a kitchen and a bathroom with a woman three times my age.
Secondly, while most of my graduating classmates were moving on to chase big city jobs in places like New York, Chicago, or Boston (because the school psychology positions were abundant in those gigantic public school systems), I’d already tried the whole brand-new life in a big city thing at the end of high school, and I wasn’t a fan.
In fact, the last thing I wanted was another fresh start, especially now that I’d finally weaned myself off the anti-depressants I’d been taking for what felt like an eternity.
Also, my soul craved the sense of being home.
Unfortunately, for all of Lucy’s best efforts, Boston would never be home to me.
And since Queens wasn’t an option anymore, I was headed to the next best place.
Still, my stomach twisted into knots as I considered the fact that of all my peers it felt like I was the only one moving backwards.
At least I had a job lined up. And after the initial shock of being back, I was certain I’d find the comfort I craved in the smell of the air, that particular mix of salt and pine.
At least, I hoped so. One of my professors had said that when a young person is ripped from their childhood suddenly, their body might relocate, but their soul remains.
Perhaps that explained my unequivocal, nostalgic yearning to return to Sound Hollow.
Growing impatient, I listened to the remaining speeches, shook hands with the appropriate people, got my diploma and said my requisite, rushed goodbyes to classmates and a few select teachers. I scanned the crowd for Aunt Lucy, who waved from a seat towards the back of the outdoor pavilion.
I politely slid past families who crowded the aisle. By the time I reached my aunt, I felt claustrophobic, wanting more than anything to shed the cap and gown and light up a cigarette.
“There you are,” my aunt began. “That was a very nice ceremony.”
“Yeah,” I agreed. “They did a good job.”
“Are you sure I can’t take you out to lunch?”
“Thanks, but I promised Pat I’d be getting there by mid-afternoon. Plus, I don’t know what traffic’s going to be like getting down to the ferry.”
Aunt Lucy nodded. “Well, the least I can do is walk you to your car.”
“Au contraire,” I said. “I’ll be walking you to your car. I don’t need you wandering the mean streets of Hartford all alone.”
She laughed. “I’m in the parking garage.”
“Well, that works, because so am I.”
We strolled to Aunt Lucy’s car, a boxy blue Volvo that she’d had for as long as I could remember. Standing behind it, we stopped and faced each other.
“I’m proud of you, Taylor,” she said.
I shuffled my feet, staring at my sandals. “Thanks,” I replied.
“You’re a good kid. You’ve really made the best out of a bad situation."
I nodded. “I couldn’t have done it without you.
” Truer words had never been spoken. After my dad went to jail, Aunt Lucy and I packed up the apartment in Queens and moved me out to the posh hills of Boston, and even though it was only temporary as I had just one year standing in the way of going off to college, it was something of a home base, a place to not be alone at Christmas and Thanksgiving.
And so, despite our differing personalities and opposing views on a variety of subjects (most notably, whether or not my father was worthy of forgiveness), I was genuinely grateful for my aunt’s love and support.
We shared a brief, rare hug, and Lucy dabbed at her eyes with a tissue. “I will miss our laundry Sundays,” she offered.
“Me too. But you’ll see me soon enough. Summer’s not that long. And hey, keep out of mischief, okay? I don’t want any reports from the neighbors of wild house parties once I’m gone.”
Lucy cracked a smile. “You too. Here.” She placed a small wad of twenty-dollar bills in my palm. “For gas and in case you get hungry.”
“Thanks.”
We hugged again, and I walked away. When the Volvo taillights turned a corner, I was officially free.
I located my beat-up Taurus stuffed with garbage bags of clothing, my old footlocker, and a duffel bag of other personal items. I slid into the driver’s seat, lit up a cigarette and inhaled deeply, savoring the sweet taste of tobacco on my tongue.
The nicotine ran through my bloodstream, temporarily calming my nerves for the ride ahead.
The drive to camp took much longer than expected.
Punctuated by a lengthy wait at the Bridgeport ferry terminal, a boat that moved like molasses across the Long Island Sound, and a five-mile stretch of bumper-to-bumper traffic on the New York side, I had to keep the music blasting loudly enough to drown out thoughts that maybe this was the universe standing in my way of going back there.
Mom used to say, “Sometimes the only way to move forward is to go backwards first.” I’d been using these words as a mantra of sorts, helping to propel me through the end of the school year.
I first remembered the old saying back in February when I was writing my thesis on SSRIs and today’s youth and I came to the realization that it was time to wean off my own drugs once and for all.
I skipped my first dose that morning and couldn’t fall asleep later that night because my mind was racing.
I decided to busy myself on the Internet into the wee hours of the next day, looking up old friends on social media.
One click led to another, and before I knew it, I was on Sound Hollow’s website, completing an application for the assistant camp director position.
A shot in the dark, I figured. Really, what 24-year-old goes back to camp for the summer?
Yet, as I rounded the curve of the last exit of the Long Island Expressway, ogling the massive outlet mall and remembering how the only place to shop out here when I was a kid was a discount variety store called Cheap John’s, I took in my surroundings.
The growing commercialism on the main road still faded to open fields of fresh grass with huge irrigation systems. Small groups of workers picked strawberries on a farm.
A roadside stand sold fresh cut flowers.
I rolled down the windows, breathing in the smell of freshly mowed grass.
My heart skipped a beat as the scented air flooded my mind with my happiest childhood memories.
I turned my car through the main gate of the boys’ side of Sound Hollow Sleepaway Camp, passing the big old red barn and vegetable garden on the right, the faded blacktop basketball courts on the left, and the peach and apple trees near the farm cabin.
Everything looked untouched, exactly as I had left it seven years earlier, only I knew that now the entire camp was confined to one side of the property.
Low enrollment, I heard through the Facebook grapevine.
I half-expected to see Willow, my favorite old barn cat, napping on the hood of the broken-down John Deere tractor hidden at the far corner of the small orchard, which was also surprisingly still there.
But Willow wasn’t there. Seven years was a long time.
She probably died. The notion made my throat go dry.
Overwhelmed, I fought back the urge to cry, which caught me off guard.
"Big girls don’t cry," the old song whined during the opening scene to Dirty Dancing, which I remembered watching for the first time more than a dozen years ago on the floor of the Lodge. Pull it together.
I parked on the grass by the main office at the end of the road.
Opening the car door, I planted my feet on the ground, inhaling the fragrant cedar chips, feeling my shoulders naturally fall, the stress slowly melting away.
The sun shone through the treetops, radiating streaky rays of light on my face.
A mosquito landed on my forearm and began to bite me.
With swift precision, I smacked it, leaving a tiny splotch of blood, the remnants of an unfinished meal beside the bug’s corpse.
I wiped it away. One more deep breath. You can do this.
I opened the door to the camp office, hearing the spring on the wood-framed screen squeak as it stretched. Instinctively, I cocked out my hip to stop the door from slamming. Old habits die hard, I laughed to myself, amazed that I would remember such a little detail after all this time.
“Taylor Roberts?” the redhead at the desk squealed. “Oh my God! You haven’t changed a bit!”