May 18, 2010

Prompt: “Summer afternoon, the two most beautiful words in the English language…” (Henry James)

I lie on the old porch swing, one foot on the porch floor to rock myself gently. Uncle Oran rocks gently in his old wooden chair. "Hot one today." "Yeah." "Think it'll be hot tomorrow?" "Probably."

            The porch door swings open and I jump up to take the tray for Gramma. She sits in her rocker while I serve the ice tea--tall, light brown, sparkling, the glasses dripping. I take my own and back into the swing, staying upright, still pushing gently with a foot.

            "You going to sleep in the swing tonight?" Oran asks. 

            "No," Gramma says at the same time I say, "Yes. If it's hot." Not wanting to contradict her but feeling a bit mischievous, I add, "Grampa will let me. He'll even fan me."

            Oran laughs, while Gramma grumbles quietly. "He spoils you." 

            The ice cubes fall with a lovely crackling noise. Mmmm. Sweet tea. My tongue explores my cold mouth. How I love cold sweet tea. 

 * * *

Summer afternoon, the two most beautiful words in the English language, painting a concentric bull's eye of time on a scene of leisured happiness that we all can imagine variously:  the parlor, full of indirect light and breezes from the window and you in an overstuffed chair with a book laying on your chest; the hammock swinging in the sun dappled space between two trees; the beach chair and floppy hat and the rhythmic slap of the water hitting the shore;  the long green trail through the warm woods to the swimming hole; maybe even the posh deck of a resort's swimming pool, decorated with handsome people and furnished with cool drinks.  Summer afternoon is as close as you get to time stopping at a nice place and letting you rest for a while.
--Tom Hoyer, RBWG member

* * *

The phone rang and her mother called “For you.” The two most beautiful words in the English language, he said he would call and now he has.

“Hello? Oh, hi Jack,”

Did you think about what I said?”

“Yes.”

Well will you do it?”

“I need time to think about it.”

‘Take all the time you need.”

“That’s nice of you to be so understanding.”

“That’s me. I’ll call you later OK?”

”OK.”

“What did Jack want dear,” Mary’s mother said.

“He wants to know if I would go to the Country Club Dance this Saturday.”

“What did you tell him dear?”

“I said I needed time to think it over.”

“Why what’s there to think over?”

        “I promised Bette Sue she could wear my good dress and I told Danny I’d go to the movies with him. That’s what.”
--Eileen Callan, RBWG member