On Friday the brunette who sits next to me had a stolen bottle of vodka in her backpack. Her cat eyeliner was black, her cheeks were fleshy peach.
And it was the middle of English class. And I don't know her. And she's too pretty for it to be okay for me to talk to her but I asked, "Can I have some?"
She looked up with a grin and said sure, and poured it under her desk into her water bottle. We shared. The room was freezing but I felt warm the whole time.
Mrs. J was talking about poetry and I had narcotics in my veins.
My arms were water. I felt like I was spinning. I remember her grabbing my arm and laughing, and the whites of her teeth.
Her smile reminded me of somebody.
She said, "Holy shit, I didn't know you drank."
I just laughed in response, because I don't. And my loose tongue didn't have the muscle to tell her it was because of a girl I know. Who is my friend, and my very best friend. Who maybe I wanted to not know for a little while.
Who decided that when boys hurt us we'd eat ice cream together and watch old movies. Looks like the summer, named after a flower in the spring.
Who I never want to be around anymore cause I can feel us moving away from each other. Gravitating like planets. Drifting like rowboats and islands in the middle of the ocean and there's nothing I can do about it.
And who I don't want to let go of but have to because these emotions are oceans and I can feel myself dragging her down.
She's good, and free, and happy and I'm making her drown.
Who said we'd get drunk together off the old bottles in her parents cabinet, but decided to do it with fresh liquor from the store on Lincoln with some kids I don't really know.
So I guess we both broke that promise.
Who will be laughing at lunch with them in a couple of months. I wonder how light she'll feel without me.
I took another swig after that and it burned. But everything else hurt a little less.
A girl who makes it hard to be emotionless cause I can feel the sunrise over the mountains in my ribs when I remember us falling off our chairs from sore cheeks and aching sides in Algebra. The summer before last, when we dove under the whitewash with biting saltwater in our eyes and jangling laughter dripping off our lips.
We didn't give a shit. About the sharks, about the riptides. We floated in the surf, past where the waves break.
We swam farther out than anybody else. We weren't scared.
We had each other.
Our adolescent hands locked like the seaweed tangled in our hair.
Yeah. A girl I know. A girl a knew. Who will be a ghost in my memory by June. And the sea too cold to swim in. Who is the last person I want to say goodbye to. Who I miss all the time when she's sitting right next too me.
There's a toothless gap in her sunny smile.
