dreamland

thirteen

The snow had covered the ground, it was silent, and the temperature had dropped to a couple degrees below zero. The streets were quiet and all I heard was the faint sound of silent night on repeat, just three houses down.

The Christmas lights twinkled and flashed and glowed softly as another snowman waved it's hand slowly.

I was leaving my friend's house, the one I'd caught shoving her tongue down your friend's throat, when the accident occurred.

I'd agreed to come by after two full weeks of avoiding her successfully.

I remembered, as I drove up to her home, the day I'd met her.

I had gotten seated next to her in my first period science class in sixth grade. She was awfully shy and quickly darted her eyes from mine when I sat down beside her. Although she didn't say much, I talked and talked for the both of us. Then she started to unfold and speak up and laugh loudly and she became more than just the girl I spoke to in science class.
Now all I could think was of how she had unfolded.
How she hadn't cared.
There was no way she could have actually cared and have done that.

I was finding it hard to picture us hanging out on her bunk bed and listening to music as she painted my toenails.
I found it hard to see her as a part of my life ever again.
Her words were still echoing on forever in my head, the words that I somehow already knew. I knew them because they were words that loomed over my head as I remembered her face and saw mine in the mirror. The darkness of her hair against her peaches and cream complexion and then the sharp red of her fingernails.

It was your fault, you should have known, she said finally after I had simply said you already knew.
She already knew of his name and face and who he had been best friends with.

And at first, right when I had stepped into her house and felt the warmth of the fireplace, I saw that she felt guilty.
She was darting her eyes from mine and mumbling her greeting like if it was middle school all over again.

We moved upstairs into her seashell colored room and I stood near the door.
I think I already knew my visit was going to be short.
I spoke up after awhile and said the only words I could, you already knew.
She was suddenly annoyed at me.
It was funny how little her guilt could last—when I could feel mine bite at me everyday and especially now that the words had been said aloud.
It felt like now all my moments were spent driving away from something hurtful and ugly. It was me gripping onto the steering wheel and thinking fuck, fuck, fuck.
Until it turned into a louder fuck as I swerved and skidded across the black ice.
I should have screamed or even held onto my chest, breathing hard, terrified—but I didn't.
It felt like this was expected, why wouldn't I get stuck in the snow, everything had been going so badly after all—so why not?

My car just stopped and shut off and all I could do was stare at what looked like a frozen over pond.

I wasn't in a state of shock or anything because for there to be shock, there has to be a feeling of unexpectedness.
There wasn't any of that right now.
I think I was there for about forty minutes in which I kept asking myself if perhaps it was my fault. Never mind the accident of just now. How could I not have known or suspected?
The excuses, the arguments about time and time and more time—how there never was enough of it spent with you.
How you were always late.
How it felt like the minutes were counted by a third party.
I finally cried out the fuck that had been clawing its way up my stomach and up my throat and now was out my mouth.

It was like I wasn't allowed to forget you.
There always had to be some sort of reminder of you and what you did.
I said fuck and hit my steering wheel with my full fist, the same fist that had come in contact with your friend's face just a couple weeks back.
Involuntarily, tears sprang to my eyes as I regretted even hitting the stupid wheel.
I had never punched anyone before.
I think I sort of expected for it to hurt him more than I. I was wrong.