One Last Day on the Roof

 The sun is shining, and my skin prickles as the warmth seeps in. I shiver from the heat and I take a deep breath, trying to remember how to fill my lungs with sunshine after a long week staring at a screen. It’s painfully bright, squinting into the glare in order to see his face. But I don’t want to put the umbrellas up. I don’t want the shade to interrupt this moment. 

There are no bees up here any longer, drunkenly pitching headlong into their hiding places; it is too cold at night for the bees. In the distance, a train rumbles through. I can hear the Big Wheels on the track off to my left, kids screaming in delight and wheels screeching in complaint as they go under the bridge and collide with the sticks and the leaves that have blown around in the park overnight. One hardy water skier is on the lake, the engine of their boat revving in the distance, while hoards of geese (gaggles?) squawk overhead, giant V’s of awkward flapping piloting their heavy bodies towards whatever deck they’ve chosen to poop on today.

Nathan brings two pints, not ostentatiously frosted, thank God. IPAs, hazy, fresh; they taste like summer. Nathan’s mask covers his adorable smile, and I think again about how to set my oldest daughter up with him. 

I know that, tonight, Michael and I will walk back home in the cold darkness, and that tomorrow it will be too cold to sit on the roof any longer. 

I drink it in, the last remnants of summer; we order burgers, clink glasses, breathe. 

Cheers.