Vicissitudes

She’s colored black daisies on her weathered sneakers; dirty, shredded, nasty things, but obviously retained and respected as a labor of love.  On sunny days, when the dazzling deluge pours through the battered blinds, her face is haloed and her smile reflects.  She’s silent, but I’m sure she’s thinking.

I idled in the parking lot, my fingers tapping an irregular cadence against the steering wheel.  The New Polllution shook the chassis with Beck’s indecipherable lyrics.  It didn’t make any sense.  My friend stood under a cracked and flickering streetlight; the dirty orangish glow strobed the dealer’s shadow across the volatile concrete sea.  I cracked open a Coke and laughed quietly.  It sounded suspiciously like sobs.  But I couldn’t stop.

Her body had started to sprout thick hair; deprived of all insulation, her skin attempted a defense against the cold.  She wore my coat from class to class, the thick flannel hanging from her clavicles like heavy curtains on a rod.  I wrote her a note in study hall.  Unwrapping it slowly, hands slowed by caution (wisdom), she glanced down from me to the loose-leaf in her hand.  You are beautiful, and no matter what.  Her eyes met mine; she smiled and cried at the same time.  Frustration, gratitude, and disbelief.  I wept to see it.

The snare beat infects me, and the lyrics unbidden rise from my teenaged throat.  Hoping for the best is hoping nothing happens/A thousand clever lines unread on clever napkins/I won’t ever ask if you won’t ever tell me/I know you well enough to know you never loved me.  No one has heard of this band.  It’s 2002, and Taking Back Sunday draws only forty people to a concert.  I smile and hope they make it.  They do.  Will I?

The fogginess lifted.  I was naked.  I shifted underneath the sheets.  She was naked.  Shit.  I rolled out of bed and walked to the bathroom.  My eyes met themselves in the bathroom mirror.  Red-veined green.  How festive, I thought.   My nose caught the unmistakable telltale smell of sex in the air.  I sat down on the toilet and wrestled memories.  The squeaky door swung open slowly.  She walked in, clad only in bra and panties.  She stood there, shining shallow like a false revelation.  How long have you been in here?  I had no idea, and I fear I might still be there. 

He roared with laughter, clapping me solidly on the back.  You are the funniest man I know, Mitch!  I knew then that he didn’t know me at all.  But I let him buy me a drink and told him wildly embellished stories, secretly hating him for enjoying them.  He bought me tequila.  I fucking hate tequila.

Half-conscious, I moved closer to her, barely even cognizant of what I was doing.  Before I knew it, I was wrapped around her, my arm holding her close with her heavy and firm breast in my hand.  She smiled, and I finally forgot the other.  I wondered how long it would take for you to get a little closer.  Rolling her shoulders like a cat searching for comfort, a contented sigh escaped her lips.  She pushed back against me, and promptly fell back asleep. I stayed awake, happy.