John in Autumn

Love and loss and blueberry pancakes.

You were getting out of Philadelphia any way you could. That was decided at sixteen. By seventeen, there was no doubt. Your parents and friends argued that everything you could possibly want and need was in Philadelphia. Except it wasn’t.

A few weeks after graduation, your dad drove you to a summer program at a state college. It was two hours away, the campus surrounded by Amish farmland. The most popular majors were agriculture, animal husbandry, and nursing. Seven weeks later you were kicked out for being the restless city kid failing English grammar lessons and algebra’s incomprehensible equations.

The night you settled all your things back into your room, you met your friends at the same field you always gathered. Everyone crowded around a bonfire, drinking beer, making out. The summer grass bleached, the leaves already turning. No stars in the sky. Not even the moon. Across the way was one of your friends with her head buried in the neck of the boy beside her. The fact that he was long limbed, his face framed in ragged black hair and settled into studied ennui until he smiled at you, had nothing to do with why you didn’t look away.

Your friend raised her head and saw you, pulled him up and crossed the circle. She sat down beside you, high and drunk. Swaying against you, she introduced him–John–and yelled how much she missed you. John sat silent on the other side of her until she mentioned you being thrown out of a state college and then he wanted to hear everything about it. He had graduated from high school the year before and was now saving for tuition by working in a landscaper’s crew. He wanted to study environmental science, be a forest ranger. Your friend rested her hand on his thigh. He quieted and looked away.

And so it went, through the autumn and the spring and the following summer. You, your friends, John and his friends almost always together. You never drew near him, nor he near you. Your friend told you once that you would be the reason if he ever broke up with her. It kept you and him further away.

It helped that your friends labeled you a permanent virgin. Too weird, too pensive, to attract any boys or, know what to do with them if you did. You kind of believed them, wanting more, what you found in books and movies. See? That’s how weird you were, they said before leaving you behind to expand their sexual adventures.

Given this and everything else about Philadelphia, you were packing up again for another college, this one three states away. No matter what happened you weren’t coming back.

But before you left, your friends pressed you to accompany them on a three day camping trip. Four couples—and you. They in vans, you in your dad’s old army tent. You took on the role of cook to stop from feeling useless and brought along hot dogs, chopped meat for chili, eggs to scramble, potatoes and onions to fry. It wasn’t much but it provided an excuse for why you wanted to be by yourself.

In the afternoon when everyone seemed to need a nap, you went down to the brook and floated away through the small rapids until you reached a deep pool. Then you trekked back along the bank in your soaked shorts and tee-shirt and floated off again and again. You can’t remember what you made them for your dinner but with everyone being so stoned, it honestly didn’t matter. The second day you waded into the brook to a boulder and opened the book you had taken along for companionship.

“Hey,” John said and sat down next to you.

“Hey,” you said.

He asked what were you reading. You said Thomas Hardy. He said he had recently finished all of Tolkien. Your bodies’ leaned together, your feet circled around each others in the water. This was the extent of your conversation until he returned to his van.

On the final day, and like the previous mornings before, you were the first to rise. It would be a sultry day, the heat already shimmering in the air. You decided to swim in the brook for the last time and stayed as long as you could, hoping that when you returned they would all be up. That’s why you took a longer path and how you found blueberries bushes. You picked as many as you could hold in the bowl you made with the bottom of your tee-shirt.

You had the foresight to buy a bottle of ready made pancake mix. You would make everyone blueberry pancakes.

Maybe it was the scent that drew him out. Maybe it was just the early hour he was used to waking up for his landscaping job. Either way, John couldn’t believe there was a stack of pancakes waiting for him on the picnic table. And there it was, the reason you made pancakes. Here was the first man you would cook for to declare how much you wanted him. Onion soup, tuna casserole, your mom’s spaghetti sauce, beef bourguignon, lemon meringue pie for those who came after him. Love is as simple as that.

In ones and twos the others awoke. Your friend reclaimed John. You left him to make more pancakes.

Two years later you came back for his wedding to your friend. She was pregnant. He left school to marry her. You had just returned from a writing retreat in Ireland. It was so crowded in his parents’ house that you couldn’t get near enough to congratulate them. So hot and loud with frisky relatives, cocktails in hand, dancing and laughing. All the boys and girls you came of age with jammed into John’s room which roared with one album after another. You climbed out his window to sit on the roof, wishing to catch the first flush of autumn across your skin. In a few weeks you’d be off again, this time forever.

Credit: Zoé Haynes-Smith

He found you on the roof. After sitting for an eternity you fell back into his arms. Between kisses he asked why you had never shown him how much you wanted him, as much as he wanted you. Because he belonged to your friend. Because you kept going away. Because that was the way it was.

You straightened together, climbed back through the window.

It was the last time you saw John.

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Sourdough Blueberry Pancakes
Courtesy of King Arthur’s Baking Company, complete with a recipe for a sourdough starter.

Begin by making a quick starter
2 cups King Arthur Unbleached All-Purpose Flour
1 cup unfed sourdough starter
2 tablespoons granulated sugar
2 cups (454g) buttermilk

Stir down your refrigerated starter.

In a large bowl, stir together the starter, flour, sugar, and buttermilk.

Cover and let rest at cool room temperature (about 65°F to 70°F) for about 12 hours, or overnight.


Make the Batter
2 large eggs
4 tablespoons butter, melted
all of the overnight sponge
1 cup blueberries (feel free to add more blueberries)
3/4 teaspoon table salt
1 teaspoon baking soda

In a small bowl, beat together the eggs and butter together. Add to the overnight sponge, stirring just to combine.

Add the salt and baking soda, stirring to combine. Don't worry if the batter expands or bubbles a bit.

Pour the batter by the 1/4-cupful onto a preheated, lightly greased griddle. Cook until bubbles form and pop on the top side of the pancakes, then turn over and cook until browned underneath.

Serve pancakes immediately with good maple syrup; or hold in a warm oven until ready to serve.

Store any leftovers in the refrigerator for a day or two; freeze for longer storage.

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