Kiss Me Hard, Pretty Girl

You are eighteen, and so am I. We have known each other since we were six, but lately you don't really know me at all. Of course you don't know this, but I do. I have kept a secret from you, my best friend forever, and I plan on never telling you. I will keep it in my chest and let it erode into my bones, or until the flowers of my intestines grow over it like untrimmed moss. It's not you, god, it never was you. If I told you I know you wouldn't be ashamed or angry or anything other than supportive, but I can't. I've tried, trust me I have - so many times - , but every time I open my mouth nothing comes out. The words die on my tongue, or maybe they die before that, even. They lay waste in the bottom of my lungs, meaningless to everyone besides myself. Anyway, I would have my mouth half-open and I would leave it like that, like maybe if I just waited something would come out, but then you'd laugh and I'd have to swallow away the dryness of my throat.

"Stunned by my beauty, right?" You'd joke, but it was true. You're so beautiful, I hope you know that. And I'm not talking about the boys who whistle as you walk by, or the drunk confessions in a stuffy room, those are just things boys say to get in your pants. I hope you know that you are the pull in my center of the universe and the smoke that is getting in my eyes at the moment. I have to blink away the irritation and wave the lingering wisps away with my empty hand. You laugh but it isn't mocking, never is.

"Pretty, isn't it?" I nod, but want to clarify that the pretty thing isn't the ocean in front of us but the you by my side.

"I can't believe we're graduating," you say as an afterthought, or maybe you're talking to yourself, I can't tell. You do that a lot, talk to yourself, but you don't mind when people look at you weird. I've always admired that; you're ability to brush off what people say about you. Especially the more positive things.

"It's crazy." Your hair is doing that odd-wavy thing because of the ocean water and it hangs down your back. You begged me to go to the salon with you a few weeks ago so I could "make sure the hairdressers don't give me a bob", so now your hair isn't in the sand but a few inches above. My hair is long, too, but never looks as healthy as yours. You tried to give me tips once or twice but they never helped so I just gave up and accepted the perpetually frizzy hair that was curled around my shoulder.

"Promise to keep in touch?" You hold your pinky out, waiting for me to link mine with yours, even though we've had the same conversations since the beginning of senior year and I've said the same thing every time. "Promise." I lock my pinky with yours and you shake both our hands for a brief second before you drop them. I want to keep my hand in yours, at least for a while because your skin is warm, but I know better so I don't. It feels like I put my hand in ice water once it falls from yours, and I wonder how long it'll take me to get used to the feeling. Because in four months you won't be here and I won't be there and I'll have no more warm hand to hold when I get cold. I burrow my hand in the sand, popping my fingers up so I can see them through the grains.

If you asked me how I ended up here I could say I was here all along, but honestly, I wouldn't know the answer. I don't know myself; all I know is that I'm here and you're here but not, and I am going to tell you the story of how I fell in love with you until the air leaves my lungs and until you remember.

(And the story of how you fell in love with me, too.)