Born in 2006, lil’ Summer (originally the Kerwin twins, Elara and Rhea) was the adorable byproduct of the relationship that married man Nick Newman struck up with Phyllis Summers after his and wife Sharon’s daughter met an altogether untimely end. Despite the couple’s formation of a mom-and-pop operation, the on-again/off-again couple never seemed to tire of practicing to give their child a kid brother or sister — as you can see!
Given the trouble magnets to whom she was born, it shouldn’t have been that much of a surprise when Summer (then Samantha Bailey) was targeted by Patty Williams in hopes of driving a wedge between Phyllis and her ex, Jack Abbott, aka the object of the madwoman’s obsession. Not only did Patty turn Summer into a bona-fide mop top, she ate a peanut-butter cookie, then kissed her, thus triggering a severe allergic reaction in the youngster.
After recovering from Patty’s deadly smooch in Switzerland, Summer (then Lindsay Bushman) returned to Genoa City, only to watch her parents’ relationship crumble over allegations — truthful ones, we might add — that Phyllis once attempted to use nemesis Christine Blair and Paul Williams as speed bumps. To cover her tire tracks, Phyllis faked an affair… which had become real by the time Summer walked in on Mommy getting busy with someone other than Daddy.
In an effort to stick it to Mom’s lover Ronan Malloy, Summer (then Hunter King) began messing with the mind of his ward, Jamie. Though she eventually realized, “Gee, I’m kinda being a jerk to someone totally innocent,” coconspirator Fen Baldwin didn’t get the memo and continued tormenting Jamie to the point of a suicide attempt. See also: what’s the matter with kids today.
When Summer took an interest in Kyle Abbott (then Hartley Sawyer), Nick was dead set against it. Not because he disliked Jack’s son with Diane Jenkins especially, it was just that… well, Nick knew that there was a pretty good chance that Summer was actually Jack’s daughter, not his, meaning that she was hoping to lose her virginity to… her half brother.
On the plus side, there was no chance that Summer’s next love interest was in any way related to her. On the minus side, Austin Travers (Matthew Atkinson, whom Bold & Beautiful fans will recognize as Thomas Forrester) not only kidnapped her aunt, he shot Paul Williams. And sorry, folks, messing with Paul, never mind shooting him, is something that just can’t be tolerated, no matter how good you look in a set of sheets.
We don’t wanna say “We told ya so,” but Summer, we did. We so did. After Austin’s murder, his bride discovered that he’d been carrying on with her Aunt Abby. (There’d better have been more than 20 bucks in that next birthday card! Just sayin’.) As Summer mourned, to the rescue rode Kyle (then Station 19’s Lachlan Buchanan), and since by then they knew that they weren’t half siblings, they dulled their pain with sex. (Not pictured: any semblance of sex.)
Summer’s subsequent relationship with Luca Santori was… Gosh, how to put it that won’t sound mean. Disastrous? Unfortunate? Any way you sliced it, it was not a great idea for the ingenue to get mixed up with the cad who was responsible for the destruction of Newman Enterprises’ oil rigs. Also of note: Newman Enterprises has oil rigs? How very Ewing Oil of them!
Eventually, the chickens came home to roost where Summer’s childhood and adolescence were concerned. In other words, she took out her resentment of Phyllis by revealing that Mom had schtupped ex-husband Nick during his return engagement to Sharon and had herself “tucked in” Phyllis’ latest lover, Billy Abbott.
When Billy insisted that his night with Summer had been retaliatory against Phyllis, not romantic toward her daughter, the young woman took off for Dubai. Upon her return to Genoa City, she set out to reclaim for herself Kyle (then Michael Mealor). If that meant giving her liver to his new girlfriend Lola Rosales in order to strong-arm him into marriage, so be it!
Color us shocked. Kyle did not stay in his marriage of inconvenience to Summer. On the rebound, she hooked up with Theo Vanderway, who turned out to be related to her latest ex in a roundabout way. The relationship started nowhere and ended in the same place, but damn, they sure made us want lemontinis.
Eventually, Summer and Kyle gravitated back towards one another. This time, there was no liver at stake. No life-or-death extortion. Just a couple of exceedingly attractive people admitting that they were exceedingly attracted to one another. What could possibly go wrong, right?
No sooner did Summer start making plans for her life with Kyle than they learned that he was the father of Ashland and Tara Locke’s baby boy, Harrison. Quicker than you could say, “D’oh!” Summer had removed herself from the family portrait, lest her true love miss out on the chance to be a part of his son’s life. Of course, Tara’s status as an outsider and persona non grata was as obvious as her refusal to adhere to the color theme of the day.
Eventually, Kyle learned why Summer had really dumped him and fled overseas, and the two of them were able to start over. Well, over-over. They got their 22nd second chance. And this time, they swore, no matter what calamities came their way, they weren’t going to blow it. “We’ll be the judge of that,” replied the audience, already displeased at the fact that they’d left Genoa City for Milan.
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