Seashells

July 27th, 2007

I almost died.

It was the happiness and flattery that almost killed me. I thought it was a strange coincidence that Austin had flowers along with you, but then Karen told me that this was planned. All the guys on the island got their girls flowers (if they had one). Sim got yellow roses from Matt.

Then, after catching up a bit with everyone, you asked me to hang out with you the next day on the beach. Obviously, I said yes. I wanted to ask you the same thing and I'm glad you got to it before me.

Des asked, "What about me?" But then Karen dragged him away from us. He did always have a thing for ruining moments, on purpose or otherwise.

I set the lilies in a vase on the kitchen table, rearranging them a million times until I got them just right. They were pink with long green stems, my absolute favorite. My parents saw them but they never asked anything about it. I think they knew about us, even though we never really talked to our parents about it.

After lunch, I got ready to meet you. I put on my bikini underneath my clothes, just in case we decided to go swimming. Or you decided to tackle me into the water like you had before. I threw everything else I needed into a bag, then I put on my flip-flops and walked down to the beach.

You were already there, sitting on the sand. Not even on a towel or anything. Just the sand. I hesitated before sitting down next to you. It would kind of ruin it to go and spread out a towel, but I didn't want to get a sandy ass.

I sat down next to you anyway. "Hey," you said.

"Hi," I said back. "What's up?"

"Sitting."

"Oh, how fun." There was an awkward silence then and I wondered if you even liked me. I mean, all the signs said yes, but sometimes I just felt like you could do so much better. "So... what are we going to do today?"

"I dunno," you said. "Whatever you want."

I had the urge to say you but instead I just said, "Hmm..."

"We could go to the shack again," you said. "I know you'd love that."

"No. Never ever again. That was just nasty."

You laughed. "Yeah, I know."

I didn't know what to say after that because I had no idea what to do. I started making lines in the sand with my finger. I felt a hard object beneath the sand, like a rock or something. I dug it up to see that it was a seashell. I gave it to you. "Here."

You brushed it off. The shell was a light shade of purple. "Can I keep it?"

"Sure," I said. "I thought you threw most of them back into the sand, though."

"Most. Not this one, though."

"What's so special about this one?" I leaned over to inspect it. There was a small chip in the middle.

"It's purple. I haven't found many like this in one piece."

"Let me guess, purple is your favorite color, huh?"

"No," you said, flipping it over. The inside was a pinkish color. "My cousin's."

"That's nice," I said. "Going to give it to her? Or him, I guess."

"I wish I could," you said, turning it over again and again in your hands.

"What do you mean?"

"Do you remember? The year after I met you. I got you an ice cream cone," you said. "You had the money and everything in your hand, but I told you it was fine and got you one for free."

"Yes," I said. Of course I remembered, Aden. How could I forget?

"That was because my cousin was working at the window. That's why I was there so much. Seriously, a little kid wouldn't pass up free ice cream any day."

I tried to remember back to that day. Now that you brought it up, I did remember the girl at the window. "Yeah, I remember. How come she doesn't work there anymore?"

"She would have been in college right now."

"Would have?" I was starting to get a bad feeling about the story you were telling me.

"Yeah. She's gone now."

"That's horrible," I said. And it was. I'd seen her, talked to her at least once (about ice cream, but that still counts). Now she's just... gone. And I never knew. "What happened?"

"You know how I left for four years?"

"I do." I couldn't forget that either.

"It was because my family was just so messed up then. After nine eleven, they just kinda... lost it."

"You mean she was killed in those attacks?"

You nodded, still staring at the shell. "She was on United 93. You know, the one where the passengers rebelled."

Just picturing being on that flight made me sick. And you knew someone who went through it... "That's horrible."

"I know. But I knew she would have been happy, in a way. I know she would rather have herself die than many others if the plane reached its target. This shell just reminds me of her. She's why I started collecting shells anyway. My dad went missing for a few days then, too. There were just people everywhere and he got stuck in the city."

I closed my eyes and inhaled. "That's just... I'm so sorry."

When I opened my eyes again, I saw you shaking your head. "It's not your fault. There's nothing to be sorry about."

"I know. I just never knew."

You shrugged. "It's not really something I bring up a lot."

"I get what you're saying."

"I'm over it, mostly. The past is the past. I can't change anything now. Just the future."

"That's good, then."

You looked at me and tilted your head a bit. I just looked back into your eyes. "And you know what? I think my future looks pretty good right now, too."

That was it. I started smiling like crazy. "Mine, too."

We talked about so many things that day. It was the first time we really talked. In a previous letter, I said there was so many things to know about a person that it was impossible to get bored. This is what I meant. There were so many things about you that I didn't know, like the fact you loved the smell of gasoline or that Velcro kinda freaked you out.

I was learning so much about you, getting closer and closer to you. And even so, I still always wanted more.