young and unharmed

On Tuesday afternoon, I found myself chortling with a boy who’s very nearly a man but in spirits I still look at as a boy. He was of course at one point, the very nearest thing to my cherry heart and I lay with him, this boy, the one with the endless amount of fists between his teeth, in bed, on our very last day together, before the conclusion of our final affair.

-jack… your hands are very cold…
-they’ve been on your hips all afternoon, so what would you expect?
-something more, I suppose, but you were never good at that now were you?

I stop talking to sip on the champagne bottle Jack has brought. “Champagne?“ I thought. ‘Cheap Liquor for a cheap ride.’

We had been at these afternoons for some years. It was promised that he’d give his hand and name to one inconsiderable yet hauntingly gorgeous girl when the clock strikes eleven on Sunday.

-I stopped biting my fingernails time and time ago for you, you know.
-I’ve stopped looking at them.
-Look at me Jack, and look at you, you’re like this mass of facial hair and cigar ash, and you’re constantly getting whiskers on my sheets.

I turned away and Jack lays almost completely still. He’s been trying to ask me for one more date before Sunday but he knows I’ll never agree to it. Upon these circumstances, this is probably the last time I’ll have him to hold my hand. I don’t want him to let go. In my brief pause away from Jack I notice that he notices the picture of us at seventeen, spinning around at a school dance across from the bed, hidden next to a box of tissues on the mantel. His eyes sink and the saltwater rises.

“We were so young, young and unharmed” Jack mumbles
“We’re still young. And you’d be a lot more unharmed if you’d stop smoking.”
“And if you’d stop talking about my habit like it’s your problem… you’re not going to be the one having to live with it, anyway.”

He curved his neck away from mine and letting go of my palm he brought his hands to his waist and buckled his belt.

“I’m going to have to be leaving shortly.” he said with little sentiment in his voice

I said nothing and brought my fingernail to my mouth

“Actually, I should go now.” He kissed my forehead and spoke again.

“So I’ll be seeing you on Sunday?”

“Actually no, and I think you should go now too.”

Mister Ferante, the bachelor clad in black, who dined on saltines and taught me how to change the needle on a phonograph lifted himself from the bed and brushed the hair from my eyes. “You might be marvelous one day, kid.”

“Good evening to you too.” I responded before wrapping a sheet around my skin, and then walking into the bathroom, with slim hesitation and slight reservation, wiped away the first and last droplets he’d ever made me spill. I heard a door creek close and when I went back into the room he was gone. His blanket folded in a square on my pillow.