Hold My Bones Together

You normally wouldn’t have found yourself in a place like this.

Although you really wouldn’t have normally found yourself in many places other than your dimly lit apartment, curled up under the torn-up blanket that your grandmother had given you the last time you had gone to visit. You preferred the comforting hum of your television to the bustling noise of real people, as your mother liked to put it. You need to see real people, Mason, she had said the last time she spoke to you over the phone. Your father and I talked about it and we think you need to leave your apartment more.

You knew they thought things were bad when they actually spoke to each other.

So you pushed yourself off of the cushions that threatened to swallow you whole and pulled on a cardigan, despite the sun that was shining through the small window above your kitchen sink. You took a deep breath, feeling the air slowly leave your lungs until all that was left was an emptiness that matched the pit in your stomach, and walked through the door that kept you safely shielded from the rest of the world.

The walk was short, your apartment was located in a part of the city that was advertised as being rich in daytime sights and nightlife, and you found yourself in front of a worn-down building after about five minutes. You sighed, hoping that you would have had a few more minutes to gather up the courage you needed to push through the frosted glass door that your hand was resting on. You paused for a second, looking up at the neon sign that read LUCKY STRIKE BOWLING CENTER, and silently cursed your parents as the doors opened to reveal a brightly lit room full of flashing colors and loud noises.

It didn’t hit you all at once like you were expecting it to – mainly because the sun outside had been so bright that you were temporarily blinded and partly because a bowling center wasn’t the most popular place to be on a Tuesday afternoon. The first of the senses to send impulses to your brain was sound; there was a song that you recognized as classic rock playing a bit too loudly and the hum of electronics filled the space. Once your eyes readjusted you looked around, taking in everything from the discolored grey carpet that covered the floors to the flashing lights that created a border around every sign.

You walked forward, slowly, allowing yourself time to think about what exactly you were planning to do at a bowling center in the middle of the day. After a minute you realized that eating seemed like a fairly logical thing to do and you moved towards to sign that read LUCKY STRIKE GRILL.

You ordered some French fries from the bored looking guy behind the counter and drowned them in ketchup before sitting down at a table in the middle of the room – though you could have picked any one because the place was relatively empty – and began to pick away at the food in front of you. You had started to settle in to your new surroundings when a loud bang caused you to jump.

“Shit.”

You focused your eyes on the direction of the noises while slowly eating your French fries, wondering if this was the entertainment you needed in order to convince your parents that you had, in fact, interacted with real people. A moment later a door opened and a boy walked out, shaking his head full of wet hair as he walked towards a stack of folded towels.

“Maybe you should consider showering before you come to work instead of taking one with the mop, Oliver,” the guy behind the counter yelled at the boy who was now using towels to dry his hair.

“Yeah, fuck you,” he replied with a hint of laughter in his voice. He shook his head one last time and walked towards the table that you were sitting at. You looked away from him, hoping that he hadn’t noticed that you were staring for a bit too long but quickly realized that, unfortunately, he had, and, unfortunately, he didn’t seem to have any intentions of ignoring you.

“Sorry about that,” Oliver apologized, leaning on the back of another chair at your table. You half-smiled at him and shrugged your shoulders just a bit.

“Nothing to apologize for,” you replied, your voice almost cracking from lack of use. His lips curled up and formed a smile that looked too big for his face before he pushed off the chair and started walking away. You let out the breath you didn’t realize you had been holding in before you heard him stop and he turned to face you once again.

“What are you doing at a bowling center in the middle of the day, anyways?” he asked, sounding genuinely curious. “Shouldn’t you be in school or something?”

You raised an eyebrow at him as he continued to stare, waiting for an answer. You cleared your throat and folded your hands together, resting them on your lap before saying, “it’s the middle of summer.”

“Hm, right,” he nodded at you before turning to walk away once again, “carry on.”

You sat for a minute, processing the interaction that had just taken place when you heard him start singing to the song that was playing on the overhead speakers. You glanced backwards and saw that he was using a broom as a microphone, awkwardly dancing with it as he cleaned. You felt yourself smile, just a bit, before turning back to your food. You finished eating and walked yourself home, the remains of something that resembled a smile still resting on your lips.

You normally wouldn’t have found yourself in a place like that, but maybe you wouldn’t mind going back.