The Heat of Summer

By Mariel Gonzalez

Summer vacation was a time I wasn't too fond of growing up. This sounds strange for a child, but when you're extremely shy, uncoordinated and overweight, a summer day camp held in a rundown public school gym with a primary focus on sports-based activities isn't the place you’d want to spend seven hours in every day in the hot, sweltering heat of summer. Luckily, some higher power, or maybe some cosmic force, decided to take pity on my soul by blessing me with a friend⁠—a boy my age named Damar.

“Do you want to play with me?” were seven simple words that saved my day, and the rest of my summer. He was like a frolicking flame, feeding off of the summer’s heat and radiating warmth to all those around him.

I like to think meeting Damar taught me about the ephemerality of most of the relationships we encounter in life - the whole notion that there are people that simply aren't meant to stay in our lives, and that not all relationships last. I'm not just talking about romantic relationships. Friendships end, the bonds that tie families together can loosen, and people part ways all the time. While the concept of relationships can be considered ephemeral, there are important things from those relationships that can stay with you forever.

“Stop it!” Damar exclaims, “You’re so annoying.”

The blond boy towering above us parrots Damar’s words, waving around the toy I had brought for us to share. The toy was simple; several random, colourful shapes and accessories that go together to create a creature you could call a friend. But Damar and I had grown attached to its simple charm and the stories we'd created out of it, and this silly boy was not going to take it from us.

...That’s what I would’ve liked to say, but at the time, I had been shaking in my skin. I’ve never been good with confrontation.

“Give it back, now.” Damar, however, was. He had risen to his feet, his shoulders wide, and toes tipped in an attempt to size up the blond boy.

“Or what?”

“I’ll tell Mabel, and you’ll be in trouble,” Damar threatens, “Maybe I’ll even punch you.”

I watch the flame inside him burn, its light found in his passionate eyes and strong stance. He shows no fear, and I find myself captivated and inspired. 

Looking back on that confrontation, I find it amusing that he wanted to fight so hard for a simple toy, but maybe it wasn’t the toy he’d been so heated up about. Call it wishful thinking, but perhaps he had looked into my little girl eyes and got swept up in the waves of my fear. If Damar was a flame, I was more like the dark depths of an ocean - quiet and somber. If he had inspired me, could I have inspired him too?

            “Come on, the water’s nice!”

“Are you sure?” I ask from the pool’s edge, “How do I know you’re not just pulling my leg?”

“Good idea!” Damar swims towards me, “I’ll get you in by pulling your leg!”

I laugh as I protest, carefully getting into the pool on my own accord. The public pool was about a five-minute walk from the school, and every Friday was a swimming day. While the other kids were eager to crowd into a chlorine-filled rectangle, I was perfectly content with sitting on the brown bench under the gazebo on the side. However, Damar had been particularly persuasive that week, so there I was, in the water next to him. We’d found a clear corner, allowing us to talk without having to shout over other kids to hear.

“You know what feels nice?” he asks, basking in the heat of the sun. His neon green scuba goggles sit comfortably on his head. “Floating on your front and just staring at the bottom of the pool.”

I should’ve known that doing something like that in a public pool would get us into trouble, but as I mentioned, he’d been very persuasive that week. So, I let my body float, and submerge my face into the clear water.

In that moment, the world around me disappeared. The cooling depths of the water, and the sun glimmering on the ocean floor was all there was. Fire had met water. Damar was doing the same. Like me, he had found a piece of peace in such a rowdy place. That is, until the screech of a lifeguard’s whistle blared through our ears.

            I have too many memories with Damar. We’d been joined at the hip for so long that I had begun to lose myself in him. By the fourth summer, at ten years old, I realized that I had developed feelings for him.

It was really gross. Up to this day, I cringe at the fact that I had once centered my life around a ten-year-old Filipino boy with an intense passion for puns and fart jokes. But I understood why it happened - I was drawn to his inner flame: his warmth, his energy, his passion.

At ten, I was easily impressed. Damar doing the moonwalk and singing Jet Lag by Simple Plan has me stumbling over myself like a fool. It didn’t end there. Our shared interest in art brought us closer.

“As promised, here’s my piece!” Damar holds up the most majestic pencil crayon drawing I’ve ever seen. It’s my favourite Pokémon, in serpent form. His skill is superb; you can even see the clean lineart beneath the harmony of blue and orange. I smile at him toothily. I feel like I’m on fire. This was supposed to be an art trade. A piece for a piece. But mine wasn’t nearly as good as his. So, I hide it in my back pocket and make up a lousy excuse. I take his paper home, inspired yet again.

Art, like Damar, had been the center of my universe ever since I was small. But while artmaking has stayed with me up to this day, Damar has not. Despite our days being filled with nothing but paper kites, ice cream, and playing Monopoly on a dusty gym floor - youthful activities meant to draw kids together - something didn’t stick between us. I’m not sure when I noticed us drifting apart. It was like we were face down in the pool again, but when I brought my head back up, he was gone.

            “I’ll see ya around, buddy.” Damar tells me nonchalantly on the last day of the sixth summer. He slings his arm around my shoulders - I smile a bit at the fact that he’s still shorter than me - in some sort of a half hug, which I return. I watch him walk all the way down the street until my eyes get tired of squinting. I find myself thinking that the end had come too soon. I wanted to dance with him more, draw with him more, swim with him more, be with him more. I wished for more time.

Time became my greatest enemy. With every friend I made, I began to count down each moment, in fear that they would fade out of my life as well. Damar and I had grown together, and then apart, so who’s to say that that wouldn’t happen to the next friend, and the next? It was at that time the meaning of ephemerality dawned on me - the concept of things existing only briefly. Just like a flame.

I send my birthday greeting email, anxiously awaiting a response. It’s been over a year since the last day at Summer Fun Camp. Turning twelve meant that we could no longer stay in the program, and that we could no longer meet. So we did what any other preteen did in the year of 2012 did - we turned to email as a method of communication.

With a loud ping!, my bulky Toshiba laptop displayed the words “Thank you!”.

We speak for an hour or so after that. The chain of back and forth emails gets long enough to mess with Hotmail’s formatting, but it doesn’t matter to us.

“Whatchu doin Marigon” Damar emails.

I realize that it’s an abbreviated form of my first and last name, but I’m puzzled. He never called me by a nickname. I quickly type a reply message, though it’s more of a question than anything else. “Marigon?”

“That’s your new nickname!”

“...Okay? It’s fine with me,” I say, “I should give you a nickname.”

Following his nomenclature, I combine his first and last name, and create “Damar”.

We never had the chance to use those nicknames. I thought they were going to be like the endearing names friends gave to one another all the time, but I suppose it mattered little to him. He had lots of friends, so he had lots of other nicknames to remember. Mine was just another one of many.

I’ll never fully understand what cut our friendship so short. Maybe the fire in him guided him to other places and people. Maybe the ocean in me put those flames out. I carry a piece of him with me for a long time until the day I finally learn the lesson that not everyone is meant to stay. So, I keep his playfulness, his fearlessness, and his creativity.

Gently, I let the waves take him.