Kamber

Chapter 4

Becoming a nurse was sort of a whimsical thing. Throughout my childhood I’d loved going to emergency rooms- not being in them, to clarify, but merely attending as moral support- so I guess when it came time to pick what I wanted to do with my life as teachers and counselors were growling down my neck about how I’d better pick something I loved, I decided to go with that.

Whenever it did happen where someone had to be rushed into the ER, my parents usually tried to go out as late as possible because they said the traffic was easier that way, but I can’t say I believe them. Not that it mattered to me, as I always thought seeing the place in the stillness as careful as a breath between a heartbeat brought out an entirely different side to the facility, though I know they really chose to go late because it brought them back, even if for only a few hours.

For some reason this makes me incredibly proud of them, my parents. When most people go through something traumatizing, they go through everything possible to avoid anything that could stir up even the faintest memory of it, but if anything my parents almost went out of their way to remember.

I’ve heard people say it’s because of what they got out of it, each other, which I guess is bittersweet and would make sense in the case of anybody but my mom and dad’s. They aren’t sentimental people, and that’s the simplest way I can put it. Honestly, their relationship surprises me in the way that it’s lasted so long and so certainly. It’s not like they don’t love each other, because I know they must, but it’s not as if they sneak kisses in whenever they can or go out of their way to make their love known. They have a love of a smaller magnitude than that. It is a great love, no questions asked, but it was not built from love and it certainly isn’t maintained through love.

Suffering. Pain. Nostalgia.

That is what their love is built from and maintained through.

I loved her a lot and I always had, don’t get me wrong, but I don’t think there was a time when I could remember having loved her more than I did that night.

The whole night was perfect, and for a million reasons more than the pretty dress she wore when I picked her up for the dance, although I’d be lying to say that wasn’t one of them. You see, Amber shined no matter what she wore. She could wake up an hour late and come to school without a lick of makeup on her face and nothing more than faded jeans and a dirty sweatshirt and she’d still be mesmerizing. Angelic, really.

The dance was alright, nothing much different from the sequence of events that had happened during our first Homecoming or even our second, though this one was certainly less awkward than the former. We danced on the gym floors that were transformed from what they had been earlier in the day as our feet had pounded across them during fitness hour by confetti and balloons. We kissed, which was only made different by the added stickiness of her lipgloss and the bubbly-electric taste to her hairspray when a curl got stuck between our lips. The real excitement, however, we knew wouldn’t happen until the after party.

Each year a mutual friend of mine and Amber’s hosted a party at his house, which was huge because his parents were totally loaded and- perhaps, suspiciously- never present the night of the big event. It was one of those stereotypical teenager parties that was loaded with alcohol and horny kids falling out of their dresses and tuxes, but I liked to think Amber and I were classier than that.

To start, Amber didn’t drink. She didn’t have a relative that died of an overdose or any other kind of personal reason not to do it, she just didn’t. “Didn’t like how it tasted,” she’d often try to convince me. I, on the other hand, wasn’t afraid to get my hands on a can of beer every now and then, but that was it, I swear.

As for the other part about falling out of dresses, Amber didn’t do that either. She was raised a type of Christian that didn’t necessarily love the idea of premarital sex but didn’t send her straight to hell for it either. As for what her dad would’ve done, however? He’d probably carry me down to the Hot House himself, which wasn’t something Amber wanted to watch so we didn’t do it. But like I’ve said; by that point I was a step and a half away from asking her to take my hand as it was.

With all of that in mind, I guess I don’t really know why her and I always made the point of going to that party after all ,since we mostly just did the same kind of stuff we did at the dance with the exception of maybe kissing a little sloppier without worrying about the chaperones- aka our teachers- looking on.

There was one point when we were standing in the middle of the living room surrounded by loud music and classmates waving around red Solo cups, that her makeup started flaking off due to the muggy heat of the room and she reached up to wipe some of it away when I beat her to it. I grabbed her raising wrist in one hand then reached up with my other to wipe at the bottom of her eye myself. She held my gaze gingerly as I did this while I watched her back, and I swear, reflected between our two sets of eyes, we watched our entire six years together replay itself in an instant.

“Wow,” she smiled, bringing her face down to rest against my hand that was still stroking her face. “Can you believe we were once just little kids with no idea what we were doing and now we’re here?”

“No,” I grinned back. “I can’t.” Then I kissed her. Hard, full force, not in danger of being spotted by my english teacher and maybe not caring what she would’ve thought if she were there.

Some people might’ve called him crazy for thinking what he did about them both being able to see themselves grow up between that hold on one another’s eyes, but I don’t. I think somehow Amber was already beginning to go, even if she didn’t know it, and yet she wanted that part of her life to flash before her eyes with him.