"Uncle Eric!" I heard her exclaim brightly as I stepped out of the jeep.
I smiled with delight as she bounded down the driveway, her once tightly secured pig-tails now flapping like wings as she ran. I set my gift on the ground in anticipation for her embrace. She was Ryan's little girl alright-- cute as a button and full of energy. However, one look at her pink overalls, grass stained knees, and deep copper-tone tan made my mind fly back to the days when Emmy and I were her age. Never afraid of her own femininity but a farm girl through and through.
"Oh, it's been so long since I've seen you!" I laughed in my silliest voice.
She wrapped her arms around my legs and squeezed with all of her might.
Ryan stepped around from the side of the house nonchalantly. We had been keeping in touch via email but it had still been nearly five years since I had seen him. He looked almost exactly as he did when he was twenty-- tall and lean. He had somehow managed to keep his boyish good looks, and the only real difference in his appearance were the dark circles beneath his eyes from many late nights at the quarry. His charm and responsibility had not gone unnoticed though, after little more than three years of employment there he had become shift manager.
"Hey stranger." he said with his classic grin.
"God, you look old," I teased "It's so good to see you again."
He gave me a big hug, "and you, my friend, look like a million bucks."
When I arrived in Boston I knew instantly I would make it-- and I did. After paying my way through law school I began working for a small legal firm specializing in trust law. I climbed up the ladder quickly and was made a partner after eight years. Today my marine and I live in a white house that overlooks Gloucester bay.
"You think you could give me a hand with one of these?" Kyle growled as he lugged our three bags down the driveway.
"What you can't handle a couple suitcases?" Ryan asked playfully as he went back to to relieve his struggling friend.
After Kyle finished his tour during the first Gulf War he did desk work in DC for a while. I would fly down on the weekends to see him until I eventually made enough so that he could leave the department early and move up north with me. It was wonderful to be together again. Right now he is working on his master's in elementary education.
I waited for a moment but after seeing them disappear into the front entrance continued around to the back of the old farmhouse that I spent so much of my childhood at. It was destined to be a place full of children's' laughter for many years to come. Emmy has brought into this world three beautiful little girls (one of them was born just this past July) whom Ryan spoils like princesses. They are in his own words "Daddy's girls."
The backyard was a full of flowers. Birds chirped loudly from within the bramble bushes as bees buzzed from blossom to blossom collecting pollen. Bev and Emmy sat on a blanket in the dry grass watching the new bundle of joy squirm about in glee. Bev had aged with a beautiful dignity. Her face became rounder and her long hair grayer with each passing year so that she truly fit the role of grandmother. Emmy on the other hand looked looked just as she did on her wedding day-- dazzling in every way.
"Hi sweetheart how are you?" Bev cooed as I leaned down to give her a kiss.
"Not bad. It is nice to see everyone again. How have you been?" I replied as I gave Emmy a peck on the cheek before sitting down beside her.
"Oh, I'm alright... a little tired. I spend more time running around after my kids now than I did when they lived at home." she joked.
Kyle and Ryan came bounding down the cement steps from the kitchen laughing at the tail end of a joke. To see them together again was amazing. It was just like the good old times. The two strolled over and plopped down on the blanket next to their the respective partner. I wrapped my arm around Kyle.
"She's beautiful Ryan." I said as the baby crawled across the blanket in pursuit of a grasshopper.
"Just like her momma." Kyle chimed in. Emmy blushed.
Ryan's two older girls giggled as they played in the still dog-less doghouse.
Growing up I had always thought of the harvest as an ending-- the culmination of a season's worth of hard work. This philosophy changed after that memorable September fifteen years ago. No, the harvest is not the end of anything, but in fact, is part of the never ending cycle of decay and renewal-- of trauma and healing, of pain and growth. Together, amidst the knee high alfalfa we were taught lessons of life and love that would influence the men we were to become.
We all grew so much that summer. It is truly incredible to look back on it now and see the monumental changes that occurred in each of our lives. Through all of it though we held on with clenched fists to those who stood around us, and without that support, I am certain that we each would have faltered in one way or another. The friendships that had developed during our adolescence had become steel bonds of trust.
Looking back, I have come to realize that there are certain memories that mean more to you than all of the others combined. For me, the single most treasured moment of my youth was the afternoon at the lake all those years ago. The sky was blue, the grass was green, and we were all there... absorbed in the peaceful bliss of a summer afternoon. It was that afternoon that I realized how lucky I was. To have friends. To have parents who loved me. To have the self assurance to see light in times that normally would have been shrouded in darkness.
It was also that afternoon when I first looked into Kyle's eyes and knew that he was the man I wanted to spend the rest of my life with. I have never asked him about what was running through his head during that moment when he had me pinned to the ground-- I don't even know if he remembers it. I am certain though, that had it not happened then, it would have eventually. We were meant for each other and nothing-- not bigotry, catastrophe, or even war-- could keep us apart.
The sleepy afternoon faded into a peaceful evening. Kyle, Ryan and I sat on the back steps and watched the girls catch fireflies. The moon sat low in the deep purple sky. A thickness in the air made our words cling to one another.
"It is so weird," Kyle said as he took a sip of his beer, "how as I sit here I can see so much of my life out in that yard."
I looked over to him and smiled. It was happening to me too.
"Yeah... all these years later and here we are right back on these steps." Ryan laughed,
I shuffled my feet on the cracked cement just as I had done so many times before.
"Hey Ry?" I asked, "Promise me you will never sell this place."
That was the first time we had all been together since the end of the harvest. So much had changed in the world around us, yet the connection that we shared stood strong. The house was our only remaining link to the past. Both my parents and Kyle's parents had long since moved, and the town had exploded into a suburban metropolis. In the field where Kyle and I first kissed there now stood a CVS. To know that the places of your childhood now exist only in your memory brings uneasy feelings. I know however, that as long as I have Kyle and Ryan that summer will live on.
I listened as Bev and Emmy laughed softly on the other side of the screen door. A shadow of the three of us was cast on the ground by the soft glow of a citronella lamp.
I sighed. Ryan put his hand on my shoulder.
"You alright?" he asked with the concern of a father in his voice.
"Yeah, I was just thinking about Justin." I mumbled.
Kyle reached around and rubbed my back gently. "Me too actually." he added.
"Let me show you something." Ryan said as he picked up the lamp and beckoned us to follow him.
We walked around to the side of the house on the walkway leading to the driveway. Ryan stopped in the middle of it, set down the light, and got on his knees. He brushed some gravel off the path.
"Oh shit." Kyle said smiling.
Ryan poured the walkway on a steamy weekend and made the mistake of mentioning the presence of the wet cement in front of his immature teenage friends. Naturally, being the bad boy that he was, Justin sneaked over in the middle of the night and written "Fuck" in three inch high letters across one of the sections. Oh he got an earful from Ryan the next afternoon, but the deed was already done.
I rubbed my fingers over the chicken scratch handwriting and couldn't help but laugh. Boy did I miss him. We all did.
Ryan eventually meandered his way back inside to check the status of dinner. Kyle and I wandered out to the car to get the last bag.
As Kyle dug through the trunk, I stood in the middle of the driveway and looked up at the stars. They were hazy from the humidity but in my mind they were crisp and clear. Even on a cloudy night I can see the stars dotting the sky over the pastures. Like so many other things though, the way that I see them in my memory is probably very different than the way they really were. Having the luxury of hindsight it is easy to glance beyond things that you do not want to see, or focus on what you cherish, but not matter how you spin your yarn the prevailing themes stay the same.
Having found what he was looking for my guy came and stood next to me. His hand wrapped around mine. We stood there for a few minutes before I turned to him.
"I love you so much." I said.
"I love you too. Always." he whispered.
Kyle pulled me in close to his body and pressed his lips gently against mine.