Your Voice Was The Soundtrack Of My Summer

“Hi Paul,” Lacey voluntarily sat down next to me on the bench under the palm tree near the waves.

I didn’t tell her to go away, even if that was what I wanted right now.

“Hi Lacey,” I nodded in acknowledgment.

“Indigo at the hospital?” she asked casually, and I couldn’t (no matter how much I wanted to) blame her for her ignorance.

“Yeah,” I nodded, watching a surfer tumble carelessly into the waves.

“Is Indigo really okay?” Lacey turned to me in a more serious face.

“Yeah, she’s doing great, we dropped her off this morning,” I lied.

“Honestly Paul, do I seem as blonde as I look?” she asked.

I caught on that it was a joke, but to be brutally honest with you, jokes weren’t making me laugh today.
When I didn’t continue, Lacey gave me a concerned look and pouted in a way that I half wanted to slap her and half wanted to hug her.

Instead, I stared on to the sun that was bleeding heat onto the horizon and the waves ripping water and people from its unplanned path.

“I may be my brother’s twin, but I don’t have his brain,” Lacey practically put.

“Indigo’s fine,” I persisted, knowing that Lacey only meant good, but at this point I wanted to swat her off like an annoying fly.

The sun beat down relentlessly and the people just kept splashing. I half wanted to yell in their faces that people were dying and all you could do was have fun? I decided against it.

“Here Paul, Indigo doesn’t know I drew this, but, I just want you both to have it,” Lacey sighed, pulling a folded piece of paper from her over sized yellow purse and placing it carefully in my hand, encasing my fingers over the coarse paper using her perfectly pink manicured nails.

“Lace, what is this?” I asked, glancing at my fist, but not opening it.

“Give my regards to Indigo,” she never answered, instead she hopped off the bench and waved goodbye, before opening her Sidekick.

I felt the coarse texture of the paper and knew it was sketchpad paper.

Carefully I opened it wondering what she could have possibly drawn for the both of us. And when I did finally open it, I gaped long and hard at the piece of paper, wondering how talented someone could be to capture so much in one little pencil sketch.

It was painstakingly beautiful. I didn’t want to tear my eyes off of it. Tenderly I touched Indigo’s face creating a small granite smudge near her head.
I saw us, illustrated almost perfectly in black and white onto a piece of paper, holding each other like there was no tomorrow.

It was then and there I decided to tell Lacey everything; it was either the gravest mistake of my life, or the best decision I would ever make.
-

“Lacey!” I yelled.

It was like New York all over again. Pushy photographers and blaring lights with extravagant backgrounds littered the place. There were millions of girls looking like they stepped out of a Teen Vogue magazine. Posing eccentrically with other way too skinny but beautiful girls was Lacey, smiling, sticking out among the others.

“Another! Free! Light, like a bird! Think clouds, sky,” the director was shouting.

At this point, Lacey caught my eye and I winked at her, holding the sketch up so she could she. She did a freelance pose while looking at me and smiling goofily all the same.

That was the Lacey that I knew.

“Perfect Lacey! Just like that!” the director complimented Lacey while the photographer snapped on.

She did more poses, wearing a flow-y white dress in soft makeup I’ve never seen her wear before. Her blonde hair into elusive waves, blowing softly from the fan seemed angelic. I’ve never seen this Lacey before.

“Break! You’re on leave now Lacey, Julianne, Rachel” the director told her.

Lacey grabbed her Diet Mountain Dew and smiled at me, giving me a big hug. It felt different, almost awkward to be hugged by someone other than Indigo.

“I love it, how’d you do it?” I backed off, not wanting to muss her beautiful stepped-out-of-the-clouds look.

“You two, you have amazing chemistry. I just thought of you both and I wanted to draw it, I can’t say it did any justice but I thought you might want it,” Lacey smiled at me, pulling my arm as she lead me towards a more secluded room.

“Do any justice? It’s perfect,” I assured her.

She looked at me doubtfully.

“You’re just saying that to make me feel better,” she accused me.

“It’s the truth, I really mean it Lace,” I insisted.
“Really now?” she turned her head to look at me skeptically.

“Brutally honest,” I promised.

I realized we were at a changing room. I looked at her funny.

“Am I supposed to be in here?” I asked. She shook her head and gave me a small smirk as she disappeared into one of the doors.

I waited there, replaying the scene where Lacey was angelic looking, flawlessly smiling towards me. And then I thought of a black haired beauty, looking pale squeezing my hand, lying helplessly on a white washed stained hospital bed.

I felt guilty even thinking of Lacey.

“That’s much better,” Lacey emerged wearing what she typically wore, oversized shades, skinny gray jeans and a t-shirt, holding her Diet Mountain Dew and a huge yellow purse.

“I don’t know how I put up with all that. Stupid designer clothes and label whores. I can’t put with it much longer,” Lacey complained, tying her wavy hair into a bun.

“How’d your hair grow so fast?” I stared dumbstruck at her suddenly Isolde-esque hair.

“Paul, baby, they have these things called extensions which they add on to your hair to make it longer,” Lacey smirked at me.

“How interesting, like they say, you learn something new every day,” I shrugged.

“You have much to learn,” she smiled.

I thought over my genuine act of thanks plan for the incredible sketch, and thought that it was either now or never. The suns rays momentarily blinded me, as we headed out of the building and out in the fresh air with the sound of a fountain gurgling nearby.

“Uh, Lacey?” I started, wringing my hands nervously.

“Hmm? Oh wait, hold on, Bryan’s calling me,” she held up a finger as she reached for her Sidekick inside her gargantuan sunshine purse.

“Yo what’s up bro? Yeah, your guitarist’s keeping me company at the moment . . . . Yes Paul! Who else? No, of course not, it’s a whore fest. I’m sure you missed it. Great, I’m waiting out at the Plaza. Can you please pick me up?” Lacey was about to go on but I stopped her by abruptly placing my palm over her mouth.

“Look, Lacey, can I take you out to eat?” I said in a breath, as she looked at me incredulously.

She stared at me for the longest time before finally nodding and I heard a nearly hysterical Bryan screaming HELLO into the phone.

“Yeah, yeah, sorry! Um, cancel that, Paul’s going to give me a ride. Yes, of course. Please? Alright, thanks! I owe you! Bye, I love you!” she flipped her Sidekick and turned to me.

“What did you have in mind?” she asked.
“I need to talk to you, about Indigo,” I said, breathing heavily.

She looked at me shell shocked, but swallowed and nodded without saying a word.

“You sure?” she finally emitted.

I shaded my eyes from the sun and reached into my pocket to grab a penny. I turned around and tossed the coin into what I hopefully thought was the fountain. I turned back around just in time to see a tiny splash in the water. The rings in the water grew bigger and fainter.

Lacey watched as the coin sank down to join the millions of wishes that came true.

“I’m sure,” I nodded.

-

“Look, I know I was a total bitch this morning, but we just dropped her off at the hospital and I just needed to be alone for a while,” I explained.

She didn’t talk, she just nodded, and I took that as a signal to go on.

“Well, I’m telling you now. Indigo’s birth was unexpected, and her dad had sex with her mom. But he never told her that he had AIDS, and only during the pregnancy did she figure out that both her and Indigo had AIDS. Her dad disappeared soon after, and Indigo’s life expectancy was pretty much less than her mom’s, and that’s about all I know,” I said, all in a deep breath.

She looked at me her eyes watering, her smile faltering.

“How long does she have?” she asked quietly, her brown eyes looking innocently scared.

“Now, a couple of weeks only, if days she’s losing her T cells quickly,” I said.

“I didn’t think it was that bad,” Lacey said in a subtle low tone.

I didn’t answer this. Instead I took another gulp of my Coke and took a deep breath, as Lacey digested the information that she could probably no doubt live without.

“How did you guys meet?” she asked.

“The beginning of this summer, I saw her at the beach. She was crying, and I had Delilah so I went up to her and sang Blackbird to her. Apparently it was her favorite song, only because her mom used to sing it to her as a lullaby,” I explained.

She sipped her lemonade and smiled erratically at me, while I returned a baffled look. It was so unfamiliar to have a welcome smile during a time like this.

“What’s that smile for?” I looked at her and I couldn’t help but a tiny smile escape from my resisting lips.

“That’s so sweet of you, it’s so you, it’s like something you’d read in a book or watch in a movie, like a Nicholas Sparks novel,” she shrugged, still smiling that angelic smile she wore at the photo shoot.

“Nicholas Sparks?” I echoed unfamiliarly.

“The Notebook? Come on, it’s the ultimate chick flick, don’t tell me Indigo never mentioned it,” Lacey informed.

I racked my brains hard. The Notebook. The Notebook. And it came to me, the day I was at her house sleeping and she murmured something about our romance being forever, like how it was in The Notebook.

“She has, but she only said something about forever,” I admitted.

“Well, the whole synopsis is, it’s during like the 30’s or something and after World War II. So, this couple meets each other one summer, and they have the summer romance that we all dream about, and then she’s rich and he’s poor, so her parents disapprove of the relationship and so she goes away. The guy writes her notes that she never gets since her mom gets them and hides them. Anyways, like 14 years later they meet again, she’s about to get married and basically in the span time of 2 days they fall in love again and she has to choose between her fiancé and Noah, the guy,” she spoke so fast I was imagining a auctioneer.

“And let me guess, she went with Noah?” I concluded.

“Correct, and they grow old and later she has Alzheimer’s. And she has these bursts where she remembers him and then she doesn’t, and then they both die together one night,” Lacey continued, smiling at her ability to summarize a romance classic.

“How very chick flick,” I commented.

“Yes, you and Indigo like retell it, it’s so cool,” she exclaimed.

“Right, only I doubt me and Indigo will die together or grow old together, unless I kill myself the exact time that Indigo dies,” I pointed out.

“Then it’s more like A Walk To Remember. Dude, it’s EXACTLY like A Walk To Remember! Only Mandy Moore has leukemia,” Lacey rambled on.

“Does she die and the guy magically fulfills her life dreams?” I sarcastically asked.

“Actually yes, oh Paul you have to see that movie! It’s perfect!” Lacey jumped suddenly out of her chair with an eclectic smile on her face.

“What? Lacey, come on, chick flicks aren’t really my thing,” I started to protest, but that didn’t stop a vibrant Lacey from tugging my arm and leading me to the closest store that held an array of DVDs, which needless to say, wasn’t that far away.

And letting Lacey lead me, her spontaneous energy working at full max, I saw her in a totally different light. Someone I could possibly even be attracted to albeit Indigo was in the way. Her flawless character and her charm were just so addicting. She was the opposite of Indigo in almost every way, but they both had something in common.

They both found the key to my heart.
And honestly, as Lacey grabbed A Walk To Remember off the shelf from Wal Mart and paid it with her own $20.00 bill, I wondered if maybe I was falling for Lacey now and how guilty this made me.

-

“Make sure you both watch it together, promise?” Lacey was outside her breezy beach house, as I walked her to the front door. A typical date, under different circumstances I guess.

She handed me the plastic wrapped DVD and gave me that warm smile I saw so many times snapped under the pressure of bright lights and pushy photographers.

It was real this time. It was so real, that I wanted to reach out to her. I wanted to feel if she was just a figment of my own imagination. I wanted to see if she was a mirage, something that made my miserable world upside down, a treat for my eyes, and the rest of my senses.

Whatever I did next surprised us both. It surprised me the most, because I swore to myself that I would never love another but Indigo. And I’m not sure if I felt love for Lacey, because the intensity that I felt for Indigo was not nearly the same for Lacey.

But even as our lips touched under the lamplight of her porch, I wondered if love was forgiving.