I’d been watching Wimbledon when Antonia’s message came, to come get her out of there. I sent back right off that it was my one day of freedom. I didn’t capitalize so I’d come off angry, but of course I was pleased. All that summer I was thinking of her, and trying to spend my days off very classy. Until the weather turns, it’s a good time of year for doing it up just so. You can wear a lot of nice linens that time of year. You can drink peach and pineapple juice with all your meals. In the late dusk you can walk down to Jamison Square amid gleaming new buildings with the names of old royalty, like you’re on your way somewhere. It changes when the rains come, and by fall I would be sick of aspirational living and wistfulness and the simple emotions of summer. By then I’d be waiting for the wet to make the city swell with its sad, potent energy, and rot it with black moss.
From Ride Around Shining by Chris Leslie-Hynan ’02, HarperCollins, 2014