I'll be honest, I couldn't stop looking at the picture for the next few days. I never made it my phone's lock screen or anything like that, we weren't dating. But I did set it as her profile picture for my phone and would occasionally pull up my pictures just to see it again. She was posed with one hand on her hip and the other around me. I was leaning a bit on my left leg due to a fall down a rather steep hill two days before, but my right arm was still around her. My hair was an absolute platinum blond birds nest that was contained under a beat up Detroit Tigers baseball hat. Hers was a collage of shades of brown that cascaded down her shoulders. I've got my black drum major bandanna tied loosely around my neck and a massive water bottle in my left hand. We had matching shirts that were just handed out a few minutes before and we were supposed to have on during the pictures. But most noticeable were our matching smiles. Her's full and wide, maybe a little more wide than round. Mine is lopsided to the left and more than a little goofy. Both so happy and full of life. We were giving each other that life. That energy. And we somehow caught lightning in a bottle with that picture. The sun is bright but her energy shines brighter than any star could ever dream of. I almost match her too, but not quite. I'm not that radiant, but still not dull in that picture. I usually have to fake a laugh in pictures to get a genuine smile. In this picture, I felt the smile long before I even thought about laughing. Sometimes when I need to put on a smile, I try and remember the feeling I had in that moment and feel it again. I've yet to capture that exact feeling, but I still hold out hope.
YOU ARE READING
The Forever Inside Twenty-Eight Reasons
Cerita PendekShe asked me why I loved her, so I made a list. That list became our story. A story of having it all and losing it all. A story of love becoming friendship and friends becoming strangers. This is our story. This is us.
