Summer's Warmth: A Winter Reunion

"TV? Cartoons?"

"Noooo," she sing-songs.

My arms fall to my sides. "What then?"

She grins at me. "Read to me."

"Read?"

She bounces like she's lit on fire. "Yay, a story!"

I'm frustrated, but at the same elated. This is the first time Kara's ever asked me to read. What's changed, I wonder?

"If I read you a story, will you go to sleep?" I ask.

"Maybe," she replies in that sinister toddler way.

"Okay. It's a deal, Kara. We'll go pick out and book..."

00:01:16:12

I wake up on the kitchen floor. Kara is shaking me, hysterical.

"Daddy, daddy! Is daddy okay!?"

I sit up. "What the hell?"

"Daddy fell!" Kara almost screams.

"I...did?"

"Is daddy okay!?" Kara repeats.

"Daddy's fine," I reply, not at all convinced that I am.

"Call mama," Kara suggests.

"There's no need to call mama," I assure her. "I just fell. Let's go pick out a book for you."

Kara's mood is barely lightened as I take her back to her room. Halfway there, I stumble over. A blackout sweeps me away. I'm back just as quickly.

"Daddy?"

"Daddy's fine," I insist.

Seriously though, what the hell is going on? Should I raid the fridge for an energy drink?

No, I can't. Summer's coming. I have to be asleep for that.

When Kara is safely behind her crib bars, I have another weird blackout. Then I select books off her shelf.

"Oh, The Places You'll Go?"

"Nope."

I sigh.

"The Polar Express?"

"No."

"The True Story of the Three Little Pigs?"

"Nope."

This game is old. I'd rather have Kara asleep before these blackouts get worse.

"Alright, Kara. Name it and I'll read it."

"Tell me a story!" Kara beams.

I chuckle. "Seriously?"

She grins and nods.

I think a moment.

Something comes to mind. Jen will be pissed. But Jen isn't here, is she? Jen has pissed me off to where I don't care. Screw it.

"Alright, Kara." I clear my throat. "Once upon a time, there was this spaceship..."

00:00:58:11

"...and that, was when she not only discovered the company's plans for the monster and the crew, but that the android had gone rogue, and..."

Kara is in a deep slumber.

"Good night, Kara."

I start walking away.

00:00:57:15

"What the hell!?" I demand. "Why do I keep falling asleep!?"

"It's not me, Leon," Para explains. "It's the Time Nexus pulling you here. You keep waking up."

I collect myself. "Could you, kindly ask the Time Nexus to hold on? It's scaring my kid to death, Para."

"Doesn't work that way."

"Oh, for God's..."

00:00:52:43

Cold water splashes my face.

"What the, what!?"

Kara bawls and stands over me. An empty glass is turned upside down in her hand.

"Daddy's, sick!" she sobs and stammers.

"Kara? Kara, how did you..."

I examine her crib. The bars are scattered all over the floor.

Holy shit. She finally did it.

I survey the damage. Most of the bars can be fitted back in place. I repair the worst damage with duct tape. All the while, Kara cries and cries and worries over me.

I put her back in her crib. "Kara, listen to me."

She continues crying, but I have her attention.

"Daddy's not sick, okay?" I tell her gently. "I'm just really, very tired right now. I've had a long week. I need to go to bed, and when I wake up, I'll be fine."

Kara sniffles.

"But you need to go to sleep too," I continue. "If you go to sleep then I can go to sleep. Okay?"

Kara frowns and nods.

"Do you want me to finish the story?"

She shakes her head 'no.'

"Okay."

I sing.

00:00:04:27

By the time I reach my bed, I've fallen over and passed out three more times.

"Just hang on," I told Para after the first blackout. "Just let me lie down."

But then it happened again. And again.

I collapse on my bed.

00:00:03:00

I'm Summer. Summer Madison.

In the middle of the street, electrical currents crackle. A colorful maelstrom of clouds circle above my head.

"How long?" I ask Para.

"Two minutes, forty three seconds," she replies.

I gulp as I witness the chaos.

A walk in the snow wouldn't hurt anybody.

"This is happening, isn't it?"

"Two minutes, twenty seven seconds," Para says.

As if to emphasize her point, the electricity intensifies and the wind whistles with the pitch of a tea kettle.

I really hope you find what you're looking for.

After Summer, there was graduation. There was Blowjob Girl. There was Handjob Girl. There was my job at the Report and my new moniker as 'Rabbit.' There was Jen, our marriage, our child, and our divorce.

Seven years of milestones and major changes, yet I've spent of those years waiting for this moment, waiting to find out who Summer Madison was, where she came from, where she went after our night together, and hoping that I would see her again.

A hand clasps my shoulders, making me jump.

"Nervous?" Para asks.

"A little," I reply. "You?"

"Not as much."

I can't see her face from this direction, but I feel like Para's smiling.

Could you rub my back?

The clouds explode and spread outward in a blinding glow. For a second, night disappears and becomes day.

"What was that?" I ask Para.

"A Dimensional Clash," Para says. "The Mortal Realm, the Time Nexus and the Beyond merged together."

"Is she here?"

"Not yet. Soon."

"Give me an update?"

"One minute, forty-nine seconds."

You have a boner.

Something else I always wondered was what I'd want if I ever saw Summer again. Nobody forgets their first. No matter how terrible or wonderful it is, no matter how fast or slow it goes, regardless of whether or not he/she stays after it's over, it's a special moment, bronzed and frozen in time, painfully out of reach.

I've never known what I wanted more: to relive that first time, recapture that moment with her, fuck her...or ask the entire list of questions I started in my mind after it happened.

Or maybe I want to be that dumb college kid again. Better yet, maybe I want to wake up in 1992. Why not start over from the first day of first grade? I would make amends for everything I didn't do. I would make better grades. I'd get out more instead of letting that chronic bout of social anxiety keep me a prisoner by choice. I'd let friends and family be my guides to the world, not comic books or video games or movies. I would graduate high school with a 4.0. I would graduate college with a 4.0. Instead of being content with working as Rabbit, I'd have my first novel on the market by age 23.

If Jen and I met the same way, maybe I could prevent the fights, the tension, and the bitterness. I could save our marriage instead of letting it die.

I want Summer Madison again. I want to spend another night with her. And I want to fix the mess I've made of my stupid life. I want so many things that I can't have because I didn't reach for them when I had the chance.

Leon, I gotta ask. Are you a virgin?

Para breaks me out of a trance. "She's closer. One minute, six seconds."

Thunder claps and lighting bolts crash to the ground, slow at first but then faster and faster. In the midst of this, a miasma forms and shapes.

"Leon," Para says, "that's the gateway."

I'm too fixated on the theatrics, and the meaning behind them, to reply.

Closer. The gateway. Summer.

Summer is almost here.

Do I really turn you out that much?

The shape seems to have trouble figuring out what it wants to be. It lessens and smooths out into a vertical oval. Then it glows with a pulsating baby blue.

Less tongue.

That's where it stops. The wind, thunder and the lightning cease. Now there's silence. I stare, wide-eyed, at that gateway.

One step at a time. Don't rush.

The gate brightens.

Don't you think you need a condom?

Para touches my shoulder again. "Thirty seconds. I'll leave you to it."

She walks away.

It's shaved.

I take two steps forward and stop.

Does that feel good?

Two more, and then I stop again.

Fuck me. That's right. Come on. Fucking fuck me!

The light is brighter now, intensifying by the second. I have to close my eyes.

You were pretty backed up, huh Leon?

There's an explosion. A wind current on a Cat-5 hurricane scale flies into me, strong enough that it knocks me down. I fall backwards, hitting the pavement hard. All I see is white, blinding white.

And now you'll spend your first Christmas as a man.

The wind gradually recedes until there's silence again.

I know about rough times. Darkness.

I open my eyes again.

What does this mean to you?

The light dissipates.

00:00:00:00

Summer Madison's blonde hair, still the same length, blows in the light breeze.

She is silent, just looking at me with those familiar green eyes.

I pinch myself. I don't wake up.

"Summer?"

I climb to my feet. Summer cracks a smile when I stand and walk toward her. I leak tears.

"Summer."

Her smile widens into a full one.

"Leon," she responds. "Leon Rollins."

I choke. "Summer."

I'm close enough now that I can see she's crying too.

"I found you," I force through sobs. "I spent, so much time, wishing I could...and I found you."

We hug in a tight embrace.

"I'm sure you have lots of questions," she whispers.

"A billion," I weep.

"Follow me."

She breaks our hug and I trail behind her, in total disbelief, as she tries one of the storefront doors.

"Do you have your key?" Summer asks.

I notice that the door doesn't have a standard lock or knob. Instead, there's a key card slot, the same kind I used back at Hartland U.

I reach in my jeans pocket. Amazingly, next to the object Dirk Frierson gave me is a keycard.

I run it through the slot. There's a whirring sound and a click. The door opens.

I glance down the street, toward the big courtyard. I see Para's silhouette, sitting on her clock.

****

After the show earlier and Summer's reappearance, nothing should shock me anymore.

Then I step into the room.

It's an exact replica of my old college dorm room. There's my PC, which crapped out not long after I graduated. There's the Forbidden Sorority Initiations 3 case, sitting on my desk. There's my twin-sized bed with its dark blue comforter. There's my desk chair. There's the window. There's the carpet with its tiled design.

I've traveled through time.

Summer is dressed exactly as I last saw her: white puffer coat over an off-white thermal shirt, jeans, winter boots. plaid cotton mittens, a black toboggan, and eyeliner.

She takes off her coat, hat and mittens, tossing them on the chair Then she sits on the old bed, resting her back against the wall.

"Where should I start?" Summer asks.

I pull the desk chair close to the bed.

"Do you mind if I..."

"No problem," Summer smiles.

I move her winter attire to the floor and take a seat. Then I consider my options. Where do I want to start? After all this buildup, I still can't believe I'm in this situation.

"Is your name Summer Madison?" I ask.

She nods. "It is. Was."

The was registers with me. I know she's a Moon Nymph. That makes the next questions easier to determine.

"Where did you come from, Summer? What happened?"

Without stopping to think about it, Summer begins.

"I'm the thing that Dirk Frierson told you about. But we don't call ourselves Moon Nymphs. That's just the name he uses. Leon...I'm dead. I've been dead since December 24, 1998. I was 19 years old, on my way to see my parents, driving home from college. It was a long trip, and I'd been warned about the snowstorm. I was on a long country road. My cellphone battery was dead, but that wouldn't matter anyway."

She sighs for the next part. Her tone darkens. "A deer ran in front of me. I slammed on brakes. The car skidded through the snow. It flipped. I was trapped underneath the wreck with broken bones. I couldn't move, couldn't call for help. When they found me, I'd died of exposure."

As I visualize these horrible images, more tears come. "I'm so sorry, Summer."

"After I died," Summer continues, "well, what you should know is that there is something beyond this. And there are options. I was offered a job."

"As a Moon Nymph."

"The proper word is 'Sexlin,'" Summer corrects. "We're sex fairies. We seek out men and women who need to get laid and we break through the Barrier to visit them."

Her teal eyes captivate me. "And the people we visit are almost always virgins."

"And I got picked?" I ask.

"I picked you," Summer says. "After Jen stood you up, I saw that you were angry and frustrated. But I saw something else, too: your heart. I knew you needed something special. All I had to do was be at that party."

Summer scoots forward. Memories of the body that lay underneath those clothes stirs my blood. Her thermal shirt is a size small for her. It shapes her breasts.

"Do you remember what I said to you before we got to your building, Leon?"

"I do," I answer. "You said, 'I hope you find what you're looking for.'"

She shakes her head sorrowfully. "After we're done with our partners, we have to leave at dawn. That's why I was gone when you woke up, and why I didn't leave a note. I knew, Leon that you were going to get everything you wanted from me, but that your heart would break. I hated that more than anything. That's not how to treat good hearts."

I sit on the bed. Summer moves closer to me.

"You said you were 19," I recall. "If my math's right..."

"I was 27," Summer answers. "Sexlins don't age. No one in the Afterlife does. I gave you that number to keep my story straight."

"Why didn't you tell me the truth?" I'm not angry or accusing, just curious.

"I's sort of against protocol," Summer replies, stretching out on her back. "I wanted to tell you the truth, but I didn't want to scare you, or make you think I was crazy."

She lets out an infectious chuckle.

I prop my head on an elbow. "Can I ask you something else?"

"Mmm?"

"The storms," I point out. Whenever these Moon Nymphs, Sexlins, visit people, there's always weird weather. In your case it's snow. Why is that?"

"It's an effect of crossing the Barrier," Summer explains. "We all have our own signature weather pattern."

"And you mentioned Jen," I point out. "I guess that means you know everything that's happened."

Summer smiles and nods. "You're a father now."

"I guess," I sigh. "Biologically, anyway."

I look around the room again, continually amazed.

"This room. Did you, do this, Summer?"

"No, it's generated by your memories," Summer says.

I walk over to my desk drawer. The DVDs are in the same order. The clothes in my college are arranged as I remember. The special box is under the bed. It's all exactly the same.

"You know, it's weird," I say. "After seven years and everything that's happened, the one place I wanted to be was here."

I turn to her. "This is the one place where, no matter how I might have felt, I was perfectly happy."

"And that's why you're here," Summer says.

She smiles warmly. "Leon, there's something else I have to tell you, too."

"What's that?" I ask.

She pats the bed, still smiling.

I'm drawn back to her like a magnetic charge. I can't resist the opportunity to be with her again, in the same way that I couldn't resist her the first time. I retake my seat. She puts her arms around my neck, sending shivers through my body.

"The reason I came back," Summer says with warmth and sincerity, "is because you're my favorite, Leon. There have been lots of guys since I became a Sexlin. But there was one thing you had that they didn't."

"Yeah?"

"A spark."

We kiss. The fragrance of her hair and soft skin fills my nostrils. As our lips mesh and find a rhythm, I'm overwhelmed with emotion. All at once I'm happy, peaceful, and triumphant. Above all, I'm complete. My erection balloons to full mast. I want Summer again. I want to be inside her. I also want to hold her tight, relive every moment of that night through sex and closeness. I want love and the act of love.

Our kissing heats up. We collapse on the comforter, she exerting forward and me falling. Her tongue finds mine and mine hers. I remember this taste; it's the sweetest candy.

I stop to ask, "Summer, do you have to go again? When the dawn comes?"

"There's no dawn here," Summer whispers.

We fumble and kiss passionately. I guide her to the other end of the bed, where her head rests on the pillow. She hisses and moans as I plant kisses down her neck. I slip my hand up her shirt and fondle a small left tit. Her breasts are a little larger than handfuls, but their size and shape perfectly fit her figure.

Desire overruns my rationality. Reuniting with Summer Madison, kissing her, feeling her, tasting her, and smelling her shuts off my upper brain, and my cock struggles to take over. I calm myself to stay cool and be gentle.

"I've learned, a few things while you were gone," I say, my voice restless and deep. "There's something I never did for you that I'd like to now."

"Show me," Summer grins.

I pull up Summer's shirt enough to kiss down her flat stomach. I unsnap her jeans. I lift her legs to remove her boots, then continue kissing down her thighs. Moisture forms in the center of her pink cotton panties and spreads outward. I press my nose to the fabric, taking in a lungful of that wonderful pussy scent I've missed so terribly.

I suck that growing wet spot. Summer goes wild, grabbing her tits through her thermal shirt.

"Leon. Oh God, Leon!"

I pull a corner aside, exposing an inner thigh. I kiss it and then do the same to the other side. I slide her underwear down, past her knees, over her socked feet. Her pussy is slick, red and distended, and there's not a stitch of hair to be found.

"Still shaved," I chuckle.

Jen has been a good teacher. I lower myself to Summer's cleft, breathing it in and reacquainting myself I kiss circles around her outer labia, getting heavy breathing and groans with every application of my lips.

I splay her outer folds apart with two fingers. I tease and play with Summer's pussy, getting it heated and stimulated with attention to her pubic mound, thighs, legs, and perineum, maintaining a steady rhythm and a pattern. When Summer's on sanity's edge, I run my tongue through her slit, up and down, side to side. Her flavor is overpowering. I never tasted her juices before. Now I know what I missed.

As I eat Summer's cunt with wild abandon, I rub her clit with my thumb, She goes berserk and yanks her shirt the rest of the way off. Her tits and round and symmetrical in her black lace bra, which drops next.

"Leon, I'm, I'm close," she stammers. "Don't, don't stop, don't fucking..."

Her words are reduced to half moans and chokes as she cums. The twat beneath my working tongue spasms and floods. I continue to lick, savoring Summer's flavors. I give her pussy small finger rubs while waiting for her to return.

Summer grabs my collar pulls me to her face. Her tongue invades and violates my mouth. Suddenly I'm shoved down the opposite way. Summer hurriedly unbuttons and unzips my jeans.

She grabs my hard cock with a closed fist and pulls it from my boxers. She devours it, coating it in warmth and raw pleasure. She plops it out to stroke it with her saliva serving as lubricant.

"It's your turn," she whispers huskily. "Show me what an experienced man can do."

"H-how?" I sputter as Summer bobs up and down on my prick.