every page matters (chaelisa)

We forgot what we wanted (and became what we become)

Lisa drums her fingers against the steering wheel, switches on her turn signal. She's driving in circles. She only ever drives in circles with Roseanne in the car. She slows down when the green lights come and stops completely at the yellows, always waiting for a red so she can lean over the console and kiss her.

It's a too perfect metaphor and Roseanne's tired.

(Title from Anis Mojgani's poem "Here I Am")

~

It's January and the heat is everywhere: the vents on the dashboard angled down so Roseanne's skin won't burn as Lisa pushes her back against the passenger side window, up against the glove box, Lisa's tongue soothing the stinging bites along her collarbone, her neck, her pulse point, Lisa's hands on every inch of her skin at once, and the heat-packets in her boots that she doesn't kick off even as Lisa slips two fingers inside her at once because her toes will freeze off if she does.

It's basic physics, laws of life numbers one, two, and three: Lisa can't keep her completely warm, can't keep her warm forever. Can't keep her, period.

Roseanne glances at the clock over Lisa's shoulder. 12:02 AM.

"Happy New Year," Roseanne mumbles when Lisa finally pulls away, sucking her fingers clean in a way that makes Roseanne all hot and bothered all over again. Lisa smiles through her smeared lipstick and shrugs her jacket back on, running her hands through her tangled hair and flicking the vents back up.

Roseanne's still leaning too close to them. Her skin burns.

"Happy New Year," Lisa says, nodding her head like she agrees. "Do you have a resolution?"

"Not really," Roseanne says, too casual, not shifting. Her sweater's still pushed half off and her pants are unzipped, and the air is too hot. The fresh hickeys on her skin are sore.

And Roseanne loves her. Despite the fact that this is always how it goes. Because this is always how it goes.

"Me either," Lisa says, but her eyes betray her as she turns the key to the ignition. She always has a resolution. For as long as Roseanne has known her, she's had one, every year. And for as long as she's known her, Lisa pretends she doesn't have one so that when she fails, she's the only person who knows.

Except Roseanne. Roseanne always knows. It's in the slump of Lisa's shoulders, the dark tinge of her eyes, the beds of her nails bleeding and torn from her pretty white teeth. Roseanne always knows.

She wonders if this is why Lisa hates her. She wonders why Lisa looks like this now, why Lisa is raising her hand off the wheel to gnaw at her fingers.

"I love you," Roseanne says.

She says it by adjusting her sweater and turning away.

*

It's February and it's raining.

There's nothing new, she thinks. It always feels like it's raining. Since she's not always looking at Lisa it always feels like it's raining.

The sound of the storm can still be heard over the booming voices, and Roseanne can still feel the rumble of the thunder through the pounding bass, and can still see the lightning through the thick crowd of horny, grinding teenagers in one massive clothed-orgy they call a party.

Roseanne nurses her second rum-and-Coke and thinks about Lisa.

A girl from one of Roseanne's classes (probably bio, or maybe calc, who knows) is staring at Roseanne from across the room. She can't really remember her name—Suzy, maybe? Sana, probably. Something S—but the girl definitely knows her by the way she's staring.