Meet Me Halfway🖇

it happened.

The party is tonight and i haven't changed out of the same clothes I wore to school. It's just a party, dressing up was never really my calling. Who even has a party on a Tuesday? Whatever. Free food so I ain't complaining. As I'm at my front door, I lift my leather jacket off the small hooks hammered in the wall beside me and slip it on. As I'm about to grab the door handle, my phone pings and a notification appears on the screen.

NIXON FACTORRRR
need a ride to that party?????????

                   howd u get my number and y r u in my contacts list?

remember when you "accidentally" left ur phone in Chem a few days ago?

                     yeah

well let's just say u shouldn't leave ur phone unattended on ur desk, stalkers can take em and put their phone numbah in so they contact u and give u rides to parties

so u still need a ride?:p

                      u don't even know where I live

                      pls tell me u don't know where I live

unfortunately nope. that's y I need u to send it to me silly goose!

                      I don't need a ride thx

I see those bubbles coming up signalizing that he's typing but instead of waiting for his reply, I lock my phone and head out the door.

On the driveway is my dad's motorcycle that he didn't even bother to bring before he sped off with some retired stipper.

So that's one benefit of having a coward for a father. Hurray.

I climb on and start the ignition, soon leaving my crumbled home in a cloud of dust.

I should get a helmet soon, but when you have a dumbass for a dad, you'd learn he grabbed the wrong things like a useless helmet instead of the motorcycle that costed 20x more. Well maybe helmets aren't useless but without a reason to have one. it is.

I still wonder to this day why he didn't take this bike with him. when I was a little girl I remember waking up to the sound of a hose being turned on and the laughs of a sober mother. I remember looking out through my pink framed window and seeing sprays of water against his bike and then turning it on my mom with my dad behind the hose, laughing his ass off as my mom laughs at his goofiness. I remember running down the flight of stairs, anticipating joining their laughter on the green dewy lawn. Then I remember tripping over my own feet and tumbling down the last few steps on the flight of stairs and crying and hearing rushed footsteps getting closer. The feeling of two pairs of arms embracing me, calming me from the pain in my ankle, I remember all too well. Back when I had a family to lean on, to cry on, to laugh with, to reminisce about.

But that's all gone and there isn't a reason to remember it all anymore. He's gone and he'll never be back. The grass has been dead and I see no recovery any time soon.

I rouse myself back to reality and I feel the wind on my face again. As I maneuver between the cars to get to the front, I then stop at a stoplight.

I seriously need to stop daydreaming during the wrong times. Like what if a stampeded of dancing frogs come jumping my way and I'm over here not paying attenti-

A loud honk behind me makes me jump and then the car that disturbed my daily slumber drives around me, giving me the finger as he passes by.

Dang, if it wasn't my fault I'd be chasing after the guy.

The party starts in two hours and the drive there is only about two minutes, I literally could've walked there. Since I have time to kill I decide to stop by a flower shop and pick up a few sunflowers and carnations. Her favorite.

since the place I need to go to is in my home town which is just the next town over but is a good fifteen minutes drive down the freeway. I take the familiar exit and

Drifting myself downtown, I past all the old building that have standing since this town was born. Building are built close together here, just like the people here. Lanterns hang and memorials are placed everywhere. The roads here are more narrow and people are walking everywhere, the people here like spending time here since it's a call back to their roots I'm guessing. Whenever I pass here, I sense a close community, everyone greeting each other like long lost family members and childhood friends. Considering how small this town is, everyone probably is.

I hate it.

I twist the handle harshly, causing me the bike to jerk forward, the wind slapping me harder in the face. I'm so determined to just get myself out of this homely, mellow surrounding. This isn't my scene anymore.

Once I pass the friendly side of downtown, I recognize the cracked sidewalks and the broken water hydrant and I know I'm close.

A few flower petals break off the bouquet because of how fast I'm going and I worry that she won't like them, until I remember. it doesn't matter anymore, she's not here to appreciate them anymore.

I finally see the tuge bridge that holds a train track in my view and stop on the sidewalk.

I'm not going on the bridge, I'm going underneath it.

Water doesn't flow underneath the concrete bridge anymore, which is why she made her home there. I walk off the pathway and down the steep slope leading to my destination.

Nothing has been moved. Blankets are partially covered in dirt and leaves blown from trees a few feet away. It's like a mini forest down here. I'm stepping on leaves because there's no other surface that isn't covered and the only thing providing shade from the heat is this cold bridge the the swaying trees. Dead bouquets of flowers that I've planted in the dirt before still slouch from lack of companionship. A few rays of sunlight peek their way through the branches and something glimmers in the small patch of dirt that isn't covered in dead leaves

Her wedding ring? I've never seen it here before but then again, it's only been a few weeks since that happened, I wonder why is it only now that I've noticed it.

I bend over and pick it up off the ground, laying down the flowers in its place.

Rust hasn't taken over the the whole ring and some dirt sticks to it but it's beauty still shines through. It's a gold wedding band with no diamond but it still tops all the others with its beautiful simplicity.

I hesitate on just leaving it here before deciding to slip it on my own finger. A reminder of her being here with me calms me significantly, making me remember what I'm here to do.

Ever since the incident, I've planted flowers in her place so there's still life here that I can visit, but I know it's a dead cause since I'm not around as often to water them as I was before. But I plant them anyway.

I swipe away some leaves to reveal a patch of moist dirt and I dig a shallow hole to give these carnations and sunflowers a new home, knowing they won't live long enough to see me plant another bouquet next to them. I still plant them anyway.

Satisfied at the flowers standing tall with half its stems protected by the earth's ground, I take a last look at her ring on my right hand. Twisting my hand around to make it glimmer, I smile a small smile at the thought of her being by my side all the time like I've wanted, and now it's actually happening. Maybe not in the way I hoped but it's still happening.