You had long brown hair that had a slight curl and that you often wore half-down, half-up, with the half-up part held back by a large clip-on bow because it was the late 80's/early 90's and that was the style. When I think of you now, I think of you in our matching white-washed pink LA Gear shorts, the ones that came with that cool holographic square of plastic attached to the belt loop by a small circle of metal beads, the shorts we used to wear when we were dancing and doing cartwheels to Paula Abdul's "Straight Up" in your living room. Or I think of you in your blue bathing suit, the one with the white polka dots. I think of you teaching me how to dive, the long length of you sliding into that other world where we spent so much time weaving between each other's legs, playing Marco Polo and searching for treasure.
We were friends in first and second grade, maybe kindergarten too. I can't remember, it's been so long, and time with you has always been bent by the shapes we made when your parents weren't watching, by our hands on each other's skin. I remember your fingers were always cold, even when they passed me a hot bag of buttered popcorn those nights I stayed over and we watched Ghost or Sister Act, laughing with Whoopi, loving her smile and her braids, the way she shimmered like a rainbow.
I remember your breath on my neck: Swedish Fish and Sour Patch Kids and Ring Pops and the minty gum you always plied from your mom. We liked to lie on the floor on the side of your bed furthest from the door. The carpet was soft, and we'd prop a few pillows against your nightstand, yank our t-shirts up and over our heads, and begin. Your whisper was warmer than your fingertips, which fell lightly on my shoulders, like snowflakes (but I didn't have that analogy then). When you laid on me, your ribs filling the gaps between mine, the balloons of our diaphragms pressing toward each other like static electricity, I felt as if I'd been hungry without knowing it, and I was grateful the way a fed body is.
Do you remember the hard press of the faded red picnic table in your backyard? I can still feel its fists in my spine, can still recall the starry ponds of your eyes floating above me, the way you squeezed them closed when I pushed up against you, how our legs met like two halves of a page that when opened reveal a finger-painted butterfly.
Maybe it began with the magazine we discovered in a littered parking lot as we peered over the edge of the bed of my mother's truck. You might remember how my mom had left the Nissan running while she disappeared into a dingy building at the edge of the small lot, how exhaust swirled down around the glossy pages, mixing with the smell of vomit rising from the greasy green dumpster a few feet away. I remember worrying she would come back before I could grab it. And then, after my sneakers had hit the glass-dusted pavement, after the Reader's-Digest-sized magazine had filled my hands, I feared she'd catch me before I could conceal it. Do you remember how I sat on it when she came out? How red our faces were? We paged through all those exquisite shapes on the drive home, our backs against the window separating the cab from the bed, my mother oblivious to the fire starting in the back.
Your mother was also clueless. At least, for awhile. I wonder how we slipped, what led her to fling open your door that day. I remember how you jumped away from me like you'd touched a hot stove, how we scrambled for our clothes and the fire burned in our cheeks as she told us we would go to hell. I remember her finger pointing, her voice as sure as the white dress you wore to your First Communion. I remember the wafer on my tongue, how it took all the spit from my mouth, how hard it was to swallow.
I remember the day you slapped my face in your bedroom and how we both cried afterwards. You had never touched me like that. I can't remember if you hit me because I'd said I wanted to go home or because I'd refused to do something you wanted me to do. You were spoiled, and I suppose you weren't often denied. I remember how you begged me not to call my mom, how you begged me to stay. Your mom materialized at your bedroom door, and when I, holding my hot cheek, told her I wanted to go home, she looked glad.
That is my last memory of you before my parents divorced and my mom moved my brother, sister, and me across the country. It's been over twenty years since we last talked, but I want you to know I haven't forgotten you. I see your profiles on Facebook and MySpace, see how you've lightened and straightened your hair, how you've caked your soft lashes with mascara so that it looks like you're wearing spiders. You graduated high school but never went to college, and all of your pictures show you in bikinis and costumes that show off your cleavage and tight midriff. You give duck face in half the shots and stick out your tongue in nearly all the others. Are you what would have happened to me if I'd had your mother? Are you happy? Was I just a phase? I hope you still worship the sun, I hope you are still quick to laugh, I hope if you ever think of me you remember who you were before you knew the world could turn on you for burning so bright.
No comments:
Post a Comment