The Final Project

Chapter 85

Ivy

Sometimes, life feels like a haze. Some delusion I must've stepped into. Sure, days are passing, but how am I to know they've really passed? Maybe because the food's running out, and I have to go grocery shopping again. Or because I have an assignment due tomorrow that I swear was due in two weeks. Had two weeks really passed?

And sometimes, nothing feels real. It isn't real, probably. Any of it. I bet this is all some big, cosmic joke, but then again, what do I really know? What does my tiny, insignificant self really know about realities, and non-realties. About certainties, and uncertainties. About anything at all?

Well, I do know one thing, perhaps. Perhaps just one thing that's really only significant to me, but significant nonetheless. If all of this, my life, this world, everything is a lie, he's the closest thing to the truth I've ever encountered. His lips are the closest thing to heaven I've ever touched.

I watch as Aaron plays guitar, blue, and beautiful like him. The stage lights shine over his features, his lips almost pressed into the mic. Is it weird to be jealous of a mic? I am, anyway.

And he starts the song, slowly then all at once. The same way he loves. "And I'd give up forever to touch you, Cause I know that you feel me somehow." I swear I float in that moment, to where I don't know, but somewhere far, far away. Maybe among the stars. Maybe to the sun. I think I'm burning.

"You're the closest to heaven that I'll ever be, And I don't want to go home right now." I want to say, I don't want to go home either. No, actually, home is here. Home is you, and me. Maybe we're home, us two together.

And then I think Ed was right. He is a natural. I study Aaron's stance, the way he moves so fluidly on stage, and how he demands attention without doing much of anything to demand it. I wish I could capture this moment.

But to truly capture it is impossible. I know a picture wouldn't do it justice. It wouldn't capture the sparkle in his eyes, or the hum of his voice, or the way it feels like a million galaxies are dancing in synchronicity, telling me, "This is it. This is what you were living for. This is that moment."

And now I think I want to drown in this moment. Smother myself in his voice, and I want to be buried in it. Buried in this feeling. "And I don't want the world to see me." He looks at me now-no, he looks through me now, and into my soul.

"Cause I don't think that they'd understand." Time just doesn't exist, does it? That's what I think. Maybe we're just floating, he and I. Maybe I need to do my groceries. Maybe I need to hand in my assignment. Who cares?

"When everything's made to be broken." He moves closer to me, and leans down, moving the mic away from his mouth, and moving his lips closer to mine. "I just want you to know who I am." I hear the crowd scream the lyrics, but he says it only to me. Only for me. I smile a really big, silly smile. He smiles one back.