Swan 2

5. Change

5. Change

Since the moment I had voluntarily smoked, I'd been afraid to tell Tyler. Never in my life had I actually been afraid of disappointing someone. It felt like I'd been above the fear of disappointing the people I loved since I'd always been afraid of punishment and hurt. Punishment just seemed far worse. But Tyler was this sort of big brother to me and that made him special. I looked up to him and he provided me with this type of sibling love that my sister and I never shared. He filled that void.

And maybe I feared I'd become like Robin. The little, scrawny kid who was obsessed with his image and only smoked bud to keep this "hardcore" status he never had. I was afraid Tyler would look at me with the same disgust I had with Robin. But I felt I had an obligation to tell him. He needed to know his little sister was a swan with singed wings.

I told him on a Saturday in his car, the windows rolled down, his eyes on the road, and country music blasting from his radio. (He'd been going through some country music phase)

"Wanna do it again?" He asked, turning down the radio and not even looking at me. "I've got some stuff in the back. We could burn."

"...nah." I shook my head.

"Good." He turned up the radio.

I wondered if he remembered telling me about how he hated how all his friends smoked. And how if you didn't have weed nobody wanted to hang out. And how his stoner group of friends were driving him crazy. He wanted to quit and had tried so many times, but it never happened.

Tyler was so good at testing his friends. I was just lucky to catch this test and say the right answer.

***

We found ourselves at Zane's house at about 3. I didn't understand why Tyler had brought me here, but I wouldn't deny another chance to see Zane again. B-mac, Jake, and a couple of Zane's other friends were there as well. I'd started to become used to Jake's loud, obnoxious behavior. I had to. He was Zane's best friend. Jake was sweet and flirty to most every girl he met. But he was adamant on Zane and I being together. He knew (just as everyone had) that I loved Zane for everything he was and I'd treat him like he was my world. But of course, Zane never saw that.

We all sat in a circle in the garage, passing a blunt around. Zane purposely sat next to me, separating Jake and I. And after about 20 minutes, Tyler was gone, telling Zane and Jake that they could take me home.

"I hope I didn't get Tyler mad," Zane sucked his teeth. "You know, by letting you smoke and stuff."

To this day I still wonder if Tyler was angry at Zane and I then. Maybe he'd seen into the future. Sometimes I felt he had the ability to do that. I think back to that day all the time, the day Tyler had abandoned me for awhile. Maybe he'd seen the person I was becoming and didn't want to see me change. I wish he would've warned me.

But instead I was here, smoke in my lungs and clouding my brain. I couldn't remember what made me upset. Rather, I couldn't remember how to be upset. I couldn't say I felt free, but I did feel okay. And "okay" felt better than how I usually felt. And I became addicted to this "okay" feeling. I wasn't sad, and mentally I couldn't care about the things that made me sad.

I didn't remember how much weed I smoked that day, but I came home and had the best sleep of my life and I woke up feeling like I could do anything. Nothing existed but me and what I was doing right now. All my worries had suddenly erased from my brain, I couldn't remember them at all. It was a miracle.

The days of summer 2013 sped by quick. I visited family in New York while Zane visited family in Puerto Rico. We texted each other every second of the day throughout the entire summer. And soon enough, Zane became my best friend far above everyone else. Even as school started, I texted him all day, everyday.