Let Them Talk

(Two)

There's a fire going, and a few kids farther down the beach are grabbing bottles out of a truck.

I'm not exactly sure why they think this is something original and inspiring. Drinking on the beach wearing a beanie is still drinking on the beach, however you dress it up.

"Hey, Joss."

I glance up. Tall guy, stretched out face, unbuttoned flannel shirt.

"You know where Madeline is?"

Oh, satan in a sundress. Yeah, I know where she is.

"Joss? So do you know or-"

"I'm not sure. I haven't seen her."

But I have, and I'm supposed to cover for her. I have a year's worth of IOUs from Madeline and I guess this is just the most recent one. She'll have to pay me back by taking a bullet or something- the debt is monumental.

"She said she was going to be here."

"Are you sure it was today?"

"What? Yeah." The guy (a boyfriend?) shrugs and turns toward the shore. "I guess I'll stay here though."

Twenty dollars says he ends up inside anyone not Madeline by midnight. It's probably the way his jacket pocket crinkles- a wishful thinking condom. Or maybe not- I can't really read him.

I sip from a water bottle and toss another branch onto the fire. There are new people tonight- the newest trust fund kids have arrived from Manhattan or wherever and they're ready to follow in the footsteps of...everyone before them.

Like I said- for whatever reason, they think this is something amazing. Get drunk on the beach and then stumble back to your cinderblock dorm room and sleep until noon- decadent.

"You go to Cold Valley?"

The walking embodiment of fire brushes past me and sits crosslegged in the sand, red-gold-orange hair swooping around his head, a trail of embers painted along his cheekbones (freckles, for the less artistic).

Goddamn.

I cough. "Uh, yeah."

"Cool." He fidgets with one of the branches, sparks whirling up toward the stars. "I stay at the Institute."

"Because...?"

"Family tradition- send the kids away for school. I'm absolutely useless at art though, so..."

You are art.

(Er, better not say that.) I clear my throat, so now he probably thinks I have the flu or something else. "The people that go there can be interesting."

He glances around. "What is it about them that everyone loves?"

I raise my eyebrows. "Trust. Fund. Money."

He laughs. "Yeah I guess that makes sense."

"But you'd think they could pay for something better," I say, nodding to the empty plastic container on the ground. We, or they, rather, finished it half an hour ago. "It tastes like 'fuck me up.'"

"I don't like losing it," he says after a minute, embarrassed. "Sobriety, I mean."

"Yeah?"

"I don't have much to lose, so what I can save..."

"...You do."

"Exactly."

Poetic.

Like the slant of a smile in the half-light of a fire.