Our Perfect Summer (Sample)
Description
Vocal Characteristics
Language
EnglishVoice Age
Young Adult (18-35)Accents
North American (General)Transcript
Note: Transcripts are generated using speech recognition software and may contain errors.
The next day, they made an appointment with a real estate agent in Morehead City. We'll just be discussing the possibility, my mother said. It's just a meeting, nothing more. We wanted to join them, but they took on Lee Paul, who was two years old and unfit to be left in our company. The morning meeting led to half a dozen viewings, and when they returned, my mother's face was so impassive it seemed almost paralyzed. It was fine, she said. The real estate agent was very nice. We got the idea that she was under oath to keep something to herself, and the effort was causing her actual physical pain. It's all right, my father said. You can tell them well, We saw this one place in particular. She told us Now it's nothing to get worked up about, but but it's perfect. My father said a real beauty, just like your mother here. He came from behind and pinched her on the bottom. She laughed and swatted him with a towel, and we witnessed what we would later come to recognize as the rejuvenating power of real estate. It's what fortunate couples turn to when their sex life has faded and their two pious for affairs. A second car might bring people together for a week or two, but a second home can revitalize a marriage for up to nine months after the closing. Oh, Lou, my mother said, What am I gonna do with you? Whatever you want, baby, he said. Whatever you want. It was queer when people repeated their sentences, but we were willing to overlook it in exchange for a beach house. My mother was too excited to cook that night, so we ate dinner at the Sanitary Fish Market in Morehead City. On taking our seats. I expected my father to mention inadequate insulation or corroded pipes, the dark undersides of home ownership. But instead he discussed only the positive aspects. I don't see why we couldn't spend our Thanksgivings here. ****, we could have income for Christmas. Hang a few lights, get some ornaments. What do you think? A waitress past the table, and without saying please, I demanded another Coke. She went to fetch it, and I settled back in my chair, drunk with the power of a second home. When school began, my classmates would court me, hoping I might invite them for a weekend, and I would make a game of pitting them against one another. This was what a person did when people liked him for all the wrong reasons. And I would grow to be very good at it. What do you think, David? My father asked. I hadn't heard the question, but said it sounded good to me. I like it. I said. I like it. The following afternoon, our parents took us to see the house. Now I don't want you to get your hopes up too high, my mother said, but it was too late for that. It was a 15 minute drive from one end of the island to the other. And along the way we proposed names for what we had come to think of is our cottage. I'd already given it a good deal of thought, but waited a few minutes before offering my suggestion. Are you ready? I said our sign will be the silhouette of a ship. Nobody said anything. Get it? I said the shape of a ship. Our house will be called the ship shape. Well, you'd have to write that on the sign. My father said. Otherwise, nobody will get it. But if you write out the words, you'll ruin the joke. What about the nut hut? Amy said, Hey, my father said, Now there's an idea. He laughed, not realizing, I guess that there already was a nut hut. We'd passed it 1000 times. How about something with the word sandpiper in it? My mother said. Everybody likes sandpipers, right? Normally, I would have hated them for not recognizing. My suggestion is the best, but this was clearly a special time, and I didn't want to ruin it with brooding. Each of us wanted to be the one who came up with the name. An inspiration could be hiding anywhere. When the interior of the car had been exhausted of ideas, we looked out the windows and searched the passing landscape too thin. Girls braced themselves before crossing the busy road, hopping from foot to foot on the scalding pavement. The Tar Heel Lisa called out. No, the wait and see Get it s E a. A car trailing a motorboat pulled up to a gas pump. The shell station, Gretchen shouted. Everything we saw was offered as a possible name, and the resulting list of nominees confirmed that once you left the shoreline, Emerald Isle was sorely lacking and natural beauty. The TV antenna. My sister Tiffany, said the telephone pole, the toothless black man selling shrimp from the back of his van. The cement mixer, the overturned grocery cart goals on a garbage can. My mother inspired the cigarette butt thrown out the window and suggested we look for ideas on the beach rather than on the highway. I mean, my God, how depressing can you get? She acted annoyed, but we could tell she was really enjoying it. Give me something that suits us, she said. Give me something that will last. What would ultimately last were these 15 minutes on the coastal highway, but we didn't know that then when older, even the crankiest of us would accept them as proof that we were once a happy family. Our mother, young and healthy, our father, the man who could snap his fingers and give us everything we wanted, the whole lot of us competing to name our good fortune