The First Warm Evening of the Year by Jamie M. Saul Read Free Book Online Page B

Laura and I did to him that day, but she was my good friend, and I helped her, although it meant that I didn’t go to Laura’s wedding, either, which was something I would have done otherwise.
    Simon had come to town not the day after, but on Laura’s wedding day, unannounced, running away from someone or something, which was not unusual as far as I knew, and what I’d come to know about Simon before I’d ever met him I knew from Laura. My impressions of him, my opinions, were made of Laura’s impressions and her opinions, like seeing Simon’s reflection in the store window, and no more substantial. Laura never told me much about their childhood. To me, Simon was just Laura’s beautiful younger brother, a talented seventeen-year-old being groomed for a career in ballet. Laura raved about him the first time I met her.
    But I’d only seen him once or twice, the whisk of his body hurrying up and down the stairs, when Laura and I lived in the same building.
    It was during our junior year. Laura and I liked to meet at least once a week after classes at a coffee shop on upper Broadway. One afternoon, when it was still winter, she told me that Simon was coming to the city for the weekend. She was hoping Simon would follow her to New York when he graduated high school, and she wanted to show him around Juilliard. She was very excited about my finally meeting her brother.
    Laura borrowed one of my futons to sleep on so Simon could have her bed. She’d bought fresh flowers and groceries.
    I didn’t see or hear from Laura that entire weekend. I went down to her apartment Monday night. When she opened the door, the futon was rolled up against the wall.
    Simon had shown up at her apartment late Friday morning, in wrinkled clothes and in need of a shower. He offered an unenthusiastic hello, dropped his shabby overnight bag in the living room, and was about to leave when Laura grabbed him and sat him down. He seemed distracted, wouldn’t tell her what was bothering him.
    Laura told me that she’d managed to convince Simon to clean up and have lunch in the apartment with her. She started talking about the things they might do that day and for the rest of the weekend, but Simon cut her off, said he had an appointment downtown, and he’d be back in a few hours. Laura waited for him the rest of the afternoon, all that night, and all day Saturday. Simon still hadn’t shown. When he walked in on Sunday morning, his eyes were bloodshot, he smelled of stale beer. He wouldn’t say where he’d been or tell Laura what was going on. He lay on her bed and slept for the rest of the day. Early Monday morning while Laura was still sleeping, Simon took the bus back to Shady Grove.
    Laura called her parents that same morning, but they didn’t seem at all upset. They assured Laura that Simon was going through one of those sulky teenage phases and would grow out of it by summer.
    Laura didn’t talk to me again about Simon and I didn’t ask questions. I knew if Laura wanted to talk to me about her brother she didn’t need my invitation. And that same year, she’d met Steve, and Simon and his problems seemed to fade into the background.
    If Laura did mention her family at all it wasn’t to talk about Simon. Her parents were not at all happy to hear that their daughter was seeing a jazz pianist, twelve years her senior. They had not, her father reminded Laura, sent her to Juilliard so that she could waste her talents on jazz and a jazz musician. It was bad enough that Simon was being so selfish, Laura had better stop thinking only of herself and come to her senses. They insisted that she end the relationship. Laura insisted that she would not.
    Laura told me that she felt as though her parents were asking her to make a choice, and it wasn’t an artistic choice of jazz or classical music, but choosing them over Steve.
    It was during the autumn of our senior year that