The lucky ones are the people who come for a weekend or maybe even a week They stay at the Seagate Inn or they find a last-minute rental The luckier ones are the people who rent a house for the whole summer Memorial Day to Labor Day They usually come back summer after summer and stay in the same house On Seagate Island there are three kinds of people the lucky ones the luckier ones and the luckiest ones And the luckiest ones are the people like me I don’t want to sound conceited I’m grateful for how lucky I am Because when it comes to Seagate Island there’s no doubt that I am the luckiest I’ve spent every summer of my life on Seagate Island in my grandmother’s house
I was born at the end of May so I spent my first three months here And I’ll spend every summer here for the rest of my life It’s probably weird for me to think that far ahead since I’m only eleven But trust me I will Remy I hear my mom calling from inside the house I give her a few minutes to come outside and find me It’s kind of an unofficial house rule that if one of us is outside the other one has to come out if they want to talk No one should have to go inside to talk unless it’s raining On Seagate Island our time outside by the sea is sacred We’ve only been here for a week and we have the whole summer stretched out in front of us but we still don’t take our outside time for granted I hear the quiet creak of the screen door and then my mom pulls over the other wicker chair to sit next to me Don’t be mad okay she asks but it sounds more like a command than a question This can’t be good I just ran into Amber Seasons and she’s in a pickle my mom starts I wonder why people use the word pickle to mean a problem In my mind pickles are one of the most delicious foods But I also get why people hate them Bennett hates pickles In fact if he orders a hamburger and someone puts a pickle on his plate he has to send the whole meal back He feels bad about it but he does it anyway That’s how much he hates pickles But Amber Seasons’s being in a pickle isn’t surprising I’ve known her since I was born pretty much and she’s always been in a pickle She’s fifteen years older than I am and no matter what’s going on she always seems frazzled What kind of pickle I ask
She offered to teach an art class for Seagate Seniors on Monday and Wednesday mornings at ten But then her babysitter ended up staying in New Jersey for the summer and now she needs someone to watch her son She told me that’s when he naps so you’d just be sitting in her house every morning for a few hours I can’t believe this is happening This was going to be the first real summer that Micayla Bennett and I were allowed to roam free all day and do whatever we wanted In previous summers we were allowed to go off on our own but only for a few hours at a time and we needed to check in and always tell our parents where we were But this summer was going to be different We’re eleven now going into sixth grade That’s middle school for Bennett and Micayla it’ll be the last year of elementary school for me And now I have to cut into that completely free time to watch Amber Seasons’s son On the other hand babysitting is kind of cool and something real teenagers do I guess I’m older now and my mom thinks I’m more mature I’m flattered that she thinks I can handle it Please Remy my mom says She’s sitting on the wicker armchair with her head resting on her hands and she looks pretty desperate It’s not even a favor for her it’s a favor for Amber Seasons but I bet my mom already said that I’d do it My mom has this weird thing about helping people solve their problems She gets all jazzed up and has this intense burning desire to help them like she can’t stop until she makes whatever situation they’re in a little better Helping other people makes her happier than anything else
Fine I sigh all defeated but knowing I would never get out of it Maybe Micayla and Bennett can come with me some mornings My mom considers that for a moment Well you can certainly talk to Amber and ask her if it’s okay She goes inside to finish getting ready for her afternoon swimming session and I sit back in my chair and think How bad will it really be It’s only a few hours two mornings a week My mom always says how good it makes her feel when she helps other people So maybe I’ll be like that too I’ll help Amber and then I’ll feel better About everything Being sad on Seagate is kind of an oxymoron The two things don’t go together at all But this year is different I’m sad on Seagate and I can’t seem to help it I got you two scoops Micayla tells me when she walks through the house and finds me on the back porch That’s another thing about Seagate no one locks their doors and we all just barge into each other’s homes It can be awkward sometimes like when I saw Bennett’s mom getting out of the shower but she had a towel on and we just laughed about it But the rest of the time it feels like the whole island’s our home The turquoise ice cream cups from Sundae Best Seagate Island’s oldest and best ice cream shop somehow make the ice cream taste even more delicious I always get espresso cookie and Micayla always gets cherry chip When it comes to ice cream we are as different as can be But when it comes to almost everything else we’re pretty much the same Well except that I’m white and she’s black And then there’s also the difference of our hair she wears it in braids year
