The Last Ten Years: Joshua and Colleen

Part I

Colleen POV

The United plane, with the afternoon sun on its wing, sped down the tarmac on its way to JFK Airport. Further West, in the heart of the city clotted with skyscrapers, she had set up a venue, last minute, to perform Saturday night. Here, however, the plane buzzed down the runway-- she couldn't rest her head against the window--and inside the terminal, Josh was waiting to pick her up.

She turned on her phone. I'm here! He had texted. They'd leave from the airport and after that they would go to Josh's favorite sushi restaurant. You don't eat sushi, her sister Rachel had said to her that morning, lying across her bed. When her family found out she was flying across the country to meet a man who first messaged her on Facebook, they nearly held an intervention, tied her down and threw holy water on her. When she left the house that morning, she felt high on her new-minted adultness. Like a balloon lolling into the sky. In clear view. For everyone to see.

Rachel had said she expected the entire thing to be awkward. You've never even had sex, she said pragmatically. That was besides the point, it wasn't even like that, Colleen said, although perhaps it was. Rachel, with the obedience of a younger sister, fell silent rather than risk an argument with her sister, who could call up Rachel's inexperience harshly when she needed to.

Sure, Colleen had never met Josh, but she'd learned everything about him in the five weeks since he messaged her on Facebook after he saw her Miranda video on Youtube. She received dozens of messages from strangers each day. She opened them when she was lonely, tired, sitting on the toilet. She almost never responded. This time was different. This time he asked about her. I like Miranda but I personally find you very interesting Colleen, lol :), he wrote and without thinking she immediately began to respond. Then stopped herself. Then returned to the message six minutes later, sitting at her laptop, and sent a rather long paragraph back, unedited.

After that her everyday life became a dialogue. She punctuated every rehearsal, family dinner, interaction with friends with a long email to him describing it. One night he asked for her number, and when she saw an incoming call on her phone not two minutes later, she ran to her room and locked it. He was from Georgia but he lived in New York now. She hadn't expected him to sound so Southern. He kept saying Call-een, with a round aw, and she still hadn't corrected him.

That whole month they talked on the phone. Their conversations gained momentum easily, lasting into the night, when all the color had drained out of her house. She hated the dark, but she liked feeling like his voice was the only thing in the world. A few days ago they'd stayed up until it was 5am on the East Coast. The sun is coming up, he said, I'm walking outside now, and his keys jangled on the end of the line. It was such a nice feeling, knowing he was only walking outside because he was talking to her. She stared at the shadow of branches waving across her wall. The moon was bright and it poured through her window, turning all the black things blue-grey. She imagined the sky bursting into color on his side of the country, like a show just for them.

I was going to send you flowers, she said, but I thought this would do.

He laughed, then fell silent. When he spoke his voice was soft and bottled. Colleen, I'm not a religious person, but I sometimes do think that God made you for me.

The plane stopped at the gate. A couple in front of her was wearing matching black shirts with Mr. and Mrs. engraved in sequins. The bride was staring out the window, her face partially obscured in the neck of her lover. They had leis on and she wondered if they were getting off here. 

The seatbelt sign switched off and they all stood up. Bags clanged down from the overhead. She glanced down at her phone, her palms sweaty. Would it sweeten the moment not to text him back? Her Mom said she suffered from a desire to control situations. As a child, when her Mom did her hair she would march to the bathroom, take it down, and redo it until there were no lumps.

Colleen wasn't sure what she suffered from, but as long as she could remember she would stand in the mirror and practice sad faces, sighing faces. Reading books as a child she she would sometimes lie on her back on her bed and imagine she was the girl in the fairytale. In the mornings, before everyone woke up, she would walk around the small yard with a stick, singing all the words she knew to Disney princess songs. She liked Part of Your World from the Little Mermaid and the Belle Reprise from Beauty and the Beast. I want adventure in the greaaat wiiiide somewhere, she would sing, then wack her stick against the shrubs that lined the fence.

Just landed, she texted. Her face broke into a smile, like a whole sun devouring her face.