Waters of Disillusion

Sometimes the summer nights so so hot you can't sleep inside. The humidity is so thick it feels like you're drowning and no matter where you sleep, unless you got one of them fancy air conditioners, you wake up with cold sweat matting your neck.

"So he's got a chainsaw for an arm, right? And get this: he can enter people's dreams and kill 'em that way. I ain't even fuckin' around, he kills 'em by killing 'em in their dreams."

"You're full'a shit, Tyler," I say, but goosebumps suddenly appear all over my skin.

"Don't worry, Nic, I'll protect ya when you're by my side," he breathes into my ear. I pull my head back, recoiling from his tobacco mixed with strawberry breathe. I swear, this kid eats so many strawberries, his lips will be eternally stained with a red tint. We sleep outside sometimes because inside our trailers it's hot as the Inferno itself. The blankets we lay on are thick and smell like grass and we wait for the relief of a breeze or even rain.

"I sure hope you don't kiss your mamma with that mouth."

"These lips are all for you, my lady."

He held the door open while I all but walked into that one, didn't I? Still, I feel a tingle in my face and thank the night that it's dark. "You're sucha charmer. I'll bet that's why Amanda Mae loves you." My watch says it's past midnight, but I'm still sweating, especially with Tyler laying practically on me. I see him make a face.

"Shoot, Amanda Mae don't love me. She loves the idea of love, and jus' really badly wants to go to prom."

"Have you asked her yet?"

"Heck no! School jus' ended, you think I'm thinkin' 'a that shit already? 'Sides, I had my mind set on another little lady," he waggles his eyebrows at me. Tyler was well known in school because he is quite possibly the dumbest thing to walk the planet. And not like it matters, but he's not so terrible looking. When we were eight years old, he swallowed two whole fish he'd caught out of the lake on a dare and became known as "that kid with a really big mouth." He accepted all kinds of dares after that: drinking turtle guts, streaking across our elementary school playground, swiping some chewing tobacco from the drug store. You dare him, he did it.

What people didn't know, though, was after swallowing those two fish, he kept complaining about how he could feel them moving around. Back at my house, it must've gotten so bad, because he ran to my bathroom, slammed the door shut, and was retching for ten minutes before they came back up again. Only one had died, he told me, and said his throat felt like it'd been to hell and back.

"Then you're dumb'n a sack of potatoes, Tyler Joseph," I say. Besides, how could you respond to being that "other lady?"

He nuzzles his face into my neck. "You love it, Nicolette Leigh."

What I say: "Go to sleep, Ty."
What I mean: "Yes, I do."