seven
Everything changed when Evan was seven years old.
Summer started the same way it always did. He, his twin sister Pandora, and his parents piled into the car and drove out to the lake. His grandma had a house there, so they’d always spend the summer with her. The lake was awesome, but in his opinion, the very best part was getting to see Gracie. His grandma had gotten her, a black labrador, just a few weeks after Evan and Pandora were born. They were only three days apart in age.
He and Gracie always spent the whole summer together. This year, he was finally old enough to go off on his own more. He wouldn’t need anyone to babysit him, as long as he had Gracie with him at least.
The car had barely even rolled to a stop before Evan ran off, celebrating his new-found freedom by sprinting to the creek behind the house. Gracie darted out the dog door, tearing up the dirt as she followed behind him.
The creek only really showed up in the spring and summer, when it rained, and flowed into the lake down the road. It was his all-time favourite spot, except when there were leeches. Those were freaky.
When Evan waded into the creek and skipped rocks across the water, he didn’t notice anyone else there. He threw a stick over and over for Gracie, her exciting whines and bounces filling the otherwise silent air. It wasn’t until she ran the opposite way with the stick that he realised he wasn’t alone. There was a boy a bit further down, perched on a stack of rocks, staring at him.
“Hi,” Evan squinted into the sun, holding a hand to his forehead to see better.
“Hi,” The other boy said, sliding down the pile of rocks. He looked out of place, standing there in a pristinely ironed polo and comically grass stained shorts. Gracie waited for him at the bottom, tail wagging vigorously as she waited to offer him her stick.
“I’m Evan, that’s Gracie. She’s my Grandma’s dog. We’re both seven.” Evan decided to introduce himself, figuring ‘Stranger Danger’ didn’t apply to little boys in polo shirts.
“I’m Barty. I turn seven in two weeks,” Barty was on the sand now, toes just barely dipping in the water. His arms were covered in temporary tattoos. It made Evan jealous. “I don’t have a dog.”
Barty tentatively took the stick from Gracie’s mouth, jumping back when she hopped excitedly in hopes of him throwing it. His eyes whipped to look at Evan.
“She wants you to throw it.”
“Yeah. Obviously,” Barty tossed the stick into the water, smiling to himself when the dog bounded after it.
“I like your tattoos. Mum doesn’t let me do those,” Evan pointed at his arms. They stood a lot closer to each other now, so he could see the pirate designs.
“My father doesn’t like them either. I don’t care what he thinks,” He sounded so sure of himself. Evan thought it was kind of funny.
Barty looked him up and down, scrunching his brow for a moment. “Nice, uh, shirt.”
Now, Evan wasn’t the greatest at picking up cues and subtle remarks, but he could tell the comment wasn’t very sincere.
Evan looked down, grabbing onto the bottom of the shirt and holding it out to look at it. Honestly, he never looked at clothes before he put them on. As long as his mom didn’t make him go turn around and change, it always seemed to turn out fine.
The shirt had a robot wearing a party hat on it. If he remembered correctly, his neighbour was the one who got it for him. “Oh, it’s my sisters. Thanks.”
—
For the next eight weeks, they were inseparable. It turned out that Barty lived on the opposite side of the creek, so that’s where they would meet up everyday. Sometimes, Evan would bring a big jug of sun tea that Grandma had made the day before. It was always gone before noon.
Occasionally Pandora would come along, but she was basically attached at the hip with the neighbours kid, Xeno, so it wasn’t very often. Evan thought Xeno was a stupid name (his full name was even worse).
Barty and Pandora got along alright whenever she came along, it just made things a little different than their usual dynamic. For some reason Barty was quieter when she was there, which was weird. Evan never mentioned it.
—
Most of the time, they’d stay around the creek. Or, if they got really hungry, they’d head back to Evan’s for lunch. Never Barty’s.
Though, towards the end of the summer, Barty asked Evan to come over to his. He said his parents weren’t there, that they could watch a movie or something.
Evan agreed excitedly, more than thrilled to finally see where Barty lived. His grandma told him that the Crouch’s were the richest people in the area.
She wasn’t lying either. The house seemed big enough to hold seven of Evan’s house, with plenty of room to spare. There was a weird man who met them at the door, scolding Barty when he walked on the carpet with muddy shoes. Evan took his shoes off and apologised. The man didn’t say anything.
Barty waltzed through the halls, pointing out different things. There were seven bathrooms, not including Mr. and Mrs. Crouch’s. Barty said he usually used a different one every day of the week, just to change it up. They went up to his room and it was oddly boring .
There weren’t any posters on the walls, toys scattered on the floor, or even a stuffed animal on the bed. It looked like someone cut it out of the grown-up magazines in the dentist’s waiting room.
“Not much to see here,” Barty mused, turning in a circle before grabbing a TV remote. He pointed it towards the painting that hung on the wall and suddenly it wasn’t a painting anymore.
“How’d you do that?” Evan scrunched his face, almost wanting to walk up and touch the screen.
“Mother thought a blank screen would make it look ugly in here.”
“Oh, that makes sense,” It definitely didn’t make sense, not at all, but he could pretend.
They didn’t end up watching anything. A car pulled into the driveway just before they put on The Fox & The Hound and Barty said they had to leave.
—
For the last night Evan would be there, they had a sleepover in his Grandma’s backyard. She pulled a big camping tent out of the garage and it felt like they had a whole palace to themselves. Pandora stayed out with them for a while, but ran back inside after a bunch of mosquitos got in. Evan wanted to go inside too, but he didn’t want to look like a wussy.
“You’re coming back next summer?” Barty flipped over to face Evan. They were laying on their backs, staring up at the stars and coming up with stupid stories.
“Yep. Every summer.” It had been that way for as long as he could remember, so it would surely have to stay that way.
“Swear it?”
“Swear it.” Evan stuck his pointer finger in the air, like the characters did in a movie they watched together a few weeks ago. Barty reached out and touched their fingers together, laughing.