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MAMMA MIA

act one ━ chapter one

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━ AUGUST JACOBS ━
june fifteenth 2022

          AUGUST JACOBS HAD GOTTEN PRETTY GOOD AT ROMANTICISING HER LIFE. Ever since her brush with death (a boy broke up with her), she took it upon herself to treat every day like a blessing.

          After the horrible first three months, which sort of just felt like a very long and heavy period, August vowed to get herself out of the sad hole she found herself in. That stupid boy didn't deserve to make her feel like shit without even being present and it got to a point where she even felt sorry for herself. So she got out of her cess pit (her bed) and started by cleaning her room. After that, romanticising life seemed like the only logical next step. She mostly just does it with good music and iced coffees, but you get the picture.

          Returning to normal society was not as easy, however. She was behind on her school work, had lost all conversationalist techniques, and was stuck with the drizzly London weather. The past summer felt like a distant dream that had never actually happened. August would like to think that it never actually did happen, but her depressed era was as much proof as a bad bruise.

          But with her closest friends' encouragement and her teachers' relentless tough love, August got herself back on track. By the following spring, she had colour in her cheeks, was top of her class, and got into a routine of buying herself tulips to remind herself (and all her girlfriends) that they didn't need a man to do it for them. By the summer, a whole year since the heartbreak, Conrad Fisher was but a memory.

          Fast forward another two years and that gets us to right now: the window rolled down, Greta Van Fleet in her ears, and a long expanse of road stretching out in front of her. The sun was beating down on her skin and it was finally hot enough to wear shorts. The wind whipped through her hair and she had a half-eaten peach in her hand. These were the details she would like to focus on.

          The not-so-nice details were as such: she had just finished year 12 at school which left one final year with her best friends of all time in her favourite city ever; she was sweating up a storm and was not looking forward to getting out of the car at the end of the journey; oh and, she and her mother were on route to their new home.

          Moving house might seem like an exciting feat for some, but not when August finally felt like she was just settling into living in Houston. The politics sucked and the coyotes were terrifying, but it constantly felt like summer what with the scorching sun and dusty sands. Her neighbours were lovely, and she was finally getting along with her mom's new boyfriend. Until he dumped her and they were on the road again.

          August's life has looked like this for as long as she can remember. Her dad didn't make it passed her first birthday, and after that, it was a new romantic interest for her mother every couple of months. But when it inevitably ended badly, Louise packed them up again, and they moved to a new state.

          California was okay; she hated Florida. Ohio was boring, but Minnesota had potential; they just weren't there long enough. Next up was Massachusetts. Cousins, to be exact. Louise had already decided on their next state since it was easy to transfer work branches, but she let her daughter pick the region. August said anywhere near a beach, and I'm happy.

          So Cousins it was. It wasn't until the house was bought (thank you, rich grandparents!) and August was researching the best coasts to surf that she realised where she was moving to.

          The resident beach home of Conrad Fisher.

          To cut a long story (actually a painfully short one) short, he broke her heart and she hadn't spoken to him since. And that is how August would like to keep it. However, from the Google Maps she had been stalking for the past few weeks in anticipation of the big move, Cousins was pretty small. The only saving grace was that the Fishers didn't live in Cousins all year round and so she just had to survive the summer. Inconveniently, her favourite time of the year.

          "I hear Maine is supposed to be nice."

          Louise's eyes slid over to her daughter from her perch in the passenger seat. August was browsing her various playlists but was not distracted enough to keep hounding her mother about her choice in locations.

          "You're not going to stop this from happening, Augustine, so you might as well stop now."

          August knew she gave her mother full freedom when picking their new home, but that was before she realised her fatal mistake. God forbid she tried to present better options (such as the very close-ish Maine!), so the universe didn't push her and Conrad together at any point during June through to August (the month, not the girl).

          August groaned and threw her head back against the headrest. And not a moment too soon because Louise swung the car into a private cluster of houses, the water catching her eyes between each semi-detached house. At least it would take a total of five minutes for her to get out onto her surfboard from her bedroom. The next second, they were pulling onto a spacious drive from the last house in the enclave; the end of the road.

          It was plenty big enough for the two of them. Encircled with neatly trimmed ferns and resting in front of a cobblestone drive, the house was a crisp white, planked wood with green shutters. A bricked roof and wrap-around porch. The previous owners had taken good care of the front garden ─ a brightly coloured mix of hydrangeas, lavender and daffodils. How this place would look in winter, August dreaded to think. It reeked of summer and all things warm and happy.

          Just from the outside, August knew this was a glorious house. Which made her feel ungrateful that she couldn't help but think how much she wanted to be anywhere else. There were fifty states ─ why did they have to move to this one?

          The guilt she felt, however, was not enough for her to turn to her mother as they got out of the car and say, "Can't I just stay at grandma and grandpa's house?" There was hope in her voice as her mother rounded the back of the car and dropped the first box of many into her arms. "That way, I'd be out of your hands?" Not to mention, a thousand miles away!

          Louise scoffed, "Yeah, wouldn't that be lovely?" She smiled. Maybe there was hope.

         Hope that was instantly shot down when Louise followed up by saying, "Augustine, you are stuck here. And that's the end of it."

          Leaving her daughter on the porch, Louise fetched the keys from her pocket and unlocked their new front door for the very first time.

          August watched as a new realm formed in front of her behind the sage pine door. She sighed. So her mother wasn't on her side. Let's hope the universe was. 

          At least she could rely on the fact that she wasn't going to be here long.

❀°。🌺 .ೃ࿐

          SHAGGY CARPET, FRONT-FACING WINDOWS, AND FOLDING-DOOR CURTAINS. It was easily the nicest house she had ever lived in, and the bedroom matched that description perfectly. August imagined how she'd furnish it, but more importantly, she was transfixed by the view. Cracking open the window, she was met with the salty bite of the breeze and instantly felt less tired.

          August stared around at the piles of ugly brown boxes all labelled August's room and huffed. Unpacking was always her least favourite part of moving house, and so after concluding that doing it alongside her mother wouldn't be as bad, she retreated downstairs to make a start on unpacking elsewhere. She dragged her hand down the pristine white bannister and noticed how the entire house smelled like the sea. 

          When she made it into the open-plan kitchen ─ oak cabinets, the colour duck-egg blue, exposed brick walls ─ her mother was fishing through a box labelled Lou's old shit. August wasted no time getting tucked in.

          "I don't know why I kept any of this," Louise chuckled as she brushed off the dust from an old eyeshadow palette that had seen better days.

          But August knew why. She got her nostalgic side from her mother. They were both the kind of people to never quite get over anything ever. August thought that was why they were always on the move ─ if her mother stayed in the same place where her heartbreak happened, she might have actually stood a chance at healing.

          A tattered composition book lay at the bottom of the box August was now rifling through. The block words, SOPHOMORE YEAR were written in black marker on the front. August could have squealed. Hearing her mother's inner thoughts to better understand the teenage mind in the 1980s was practically a dream of hers.

          Louise's gaze followed where her daughter was looking, and she rolled her eyes. August was nosy, but she respected her mother's privacy. But that didn't stop her from flicking to a random page where January 1988 was scribbled at the top. That would make this her mother's teenage self's diary. Fifteen, to be exact. This she had to read. Especially since her mother had deemed it worthy enough to keep after all these years.

          August feigned a curious look and turned the page. Louise didn't make a move to snatch the diary from her daughter's hand, so it clearly wasn't a big deal if she read it. Which August did, out loud. 

Dear Diary,

I saw James again today. He's so cute.

It's a shame he doesn't know who I am. There's always a downside to being the new girl and Cousins is no different.

He and Adam Fisher run this town, so I've heard. He's like royalty.

I can't wait to see him again.

          August's gaze slowly lifted suggestively to her mother's. "Dot dot dot."

          Louise rolled her eyes yet again. It did not say dot dot dot, but the results of her math test probably weren't as exciting to August as her mother's failed dating life when she was fifteen.

          "This isn't Mamma Mia," Louise said before extending her hand. "Now that's enough of that."

          August did not want to stop there, a million questions flitting through her sleep-deprived head, but she huffed, eventually relenting and placing the diary back into its owner's hands.

          August and her mother were close. It was just the two of them after all, and so Louise's daughter was very involved in her love life. This, however, was a romantic pursuit she had not indulged her daughter in, and Louise wished to keep it that way. August wondered whether her mother had had a summer romance just like hers that still ached somewhere in her chest when she thought about it.

         But something nagged at August, why would her mother not tell her that she's been to Cousins before? That she had spent some clearly significant years here? So much so, she had her own summer fling? What was her mother trying to get out of their stay in Cousins? And please, Lord, can this Fisher not be related to the one August knew?

          Knowing her mother probably wouldn't tell her even if she asked, August decided to do something else, since unpacking was already a boring task.

          She decided to take herself out onto the back porch. Glass walls lined the edges where steps led to the golden beach and sea beyond. There was a stretch of grass below that met with the tall marshes growing in the shallowest part of the water. The sky was a clear blue and met the sea right at the horizon. The ocean lapped gently against the sand, and she could close her eyes and feel her heart settle. With few clouds in sight and not a single person on this closed-off beach, she almost forgot about the potential proximity of Conrad Fisher.

          Shaking away that thought, August took in her neighbours. The house next door was much bigger, with a pool and a gazebo on a pier she was envious of. She imagined a house like that was packed with little kids running around. Its floors would be constantly dusted with sand and the walls filled with raucous laughter. There would be a constant flow of crisp ice-cold sodas and daiquiris for the parents. They'd spend all day on the beach and then have a barbecue in the evening. 

          August sighed at the thought. She had always yearned for siblings, and being in a place like Cousins always made her wonder what could have been. Come Christmas, when she would be home for the holidays from school, it would be quiet. Void of loud families, and children with buckets and spades. She would be sitting on this porch, chilly but content, soaking in the peace.

          She sensed her mother behind her but when she finally turned around towards the back door, Louise was retreating back inside to the kitchen. A quick look to her left and August noticed her surfboard propped up against the wall. A waft of wind ran its hands through her hair and salt landed on her tongue.

          Maybe she could get used to this.

          "Hey, welcome to Cousins!"

          The voice rocked her out of her thoughts and deposited her right back into reality.

          When she went looking for the source of the question, August was taken aback by what she found.

          Standing on the adjacent porch, in swimming trunks and a worn cap, was a boy grinning back at her. He was waving probably because she was frozen and hadn't clocked that it was her he was talking to.

          August was frozen, however, because she was focused on something else. This boy was the striking image of someone she once knew, only younger, softer, blonder. Striking blue eyes, athletic, and exuding joy.

          Trying to prevent her new neighbours from thinking she was an uncommunicative hermit, August timidly waved back and said, "Thank you."

          August lifted her hand to block the sun from her eyes, and just like that, she figured it out. Without the glare of the bright rays, the boy appeared clearer in her view, and the pieces clicked. She was in Cousins, after all. This was the boy she had never met, the one she had only heard about. A ghost of the boy she had fallen for.

            Jeremiah Fisher.

❀。🐠 ⋆.ೃ࿔*:･ 🌊 ❀°。🌺 .ೃ࿐