Summer's Dry Nights

He remembers that night. Their fingers laced, moist with nervous sweat. His heart was racing, a smile of contentment and curiosity on both their faces.
The tree house glimmered from the reflection of the lake, which was still, except for the occasional ripple caused by the frogs that swam up to land for the night’s cool air. She lay on the dry grass, crossed her arms behind her and silently stared at the stars above, yearning for her wishes to be heard. He lay down beside her and watched the stars too, both of them in a hushed reverie.

He couldn’t remember how long they lay like that, quietly watching the night sky, listening to the cricket’s symphony. It wasn’t until she slid closer towards him and laid her head on his chest that he knew it was real. He ran his fingers through her hair, which slipped through like vapour.

“I love you,”

The words ran out of his mouth like wild animals, beautifully natural, the way it was meant to be. He waited for her body to stiffen with shock, but it didn’t. Her breathing did not quicken, did not stop. He was not sure if she even heard, but then she slowly lifted herself onto her elbows, faced him, and her own words slipped gracefully out

“I love you, too.”

He leaned up to get a better look at her, the angelic, beautiful face, the cascading hair, the eyes that made him want to cry; he edged forward and met his lips with hers, a soft pledge of the love he was so sure of, innocence and purity blended into perfection. It swept across his heart with a cold breeze, sending shivers down his spine. He wished he could stay like that forever, just the two of them, the stars and summer’s glory.

Returning to the same place he had not visited for years, he could see her in everything. The now broken tree house and the old tire swing. The ghost of his young love lingered beneath the cool, blue water, and was singing with the long grass, shaking in the wind. He remembered exactly which tree they had carved with their hearts, and it saddened him. What had once felt so real, so sure, had disappeared with the breath of summer, leaving only the haunting memory of what had been.

Hourglass shards

Who am i? Who was I? Who will I become?

I watch as my talents slowly drip through my fingers like misty vapour delicately dancing around trees. I watch as my grades spin from good to bad, and as my heart prances around two forbidden boys.

I feel the person I know as myself slowly shrinking in the place of a different person. An introvert, a pessimist, a nervous wreck. This is not me. But it is becoming me. How do I stop it? How do I go back to the bubbly, happy girl I once knew as myself? What is changing me? The happiness. I have no ultimate source of joy. Nothing that lasts forever, nothing I am not afraid of losing.

Bruised

My fingertips run along my stomach, they’re cold. Tears drop from my eyes, they’re wet. Cold and wet. Like a raindrop in December.

How did I get myself into this? Months ago, nobody would ever see this coming. Nobody would believe it. But here I am now. I should have listened to my parents. I should have let them into my life, let them know what was wrong. Let them help.
I look into the mirror; I want to see my eyes. I want to see who I am beneath all of this, or if I’m still there. I start at my chin, and move up: My lips, red and cut, from biting them out of anxiety; my nose, crimson from wiping it so much; the area beneath my eyes, grey from fatigue, sunken from the lack of sleep. I move upwards, cell by cell. I see a glimpse of the deep brown, but I can’t bring myself to look into them. I quickly pull away.

I’m afraid of what I’ll see. If my eyes are no longer bright and full of hope for the future, but instead hollow and haunted by my mistakes. My eyes have always been the only betrayer of my hidden feelings, the only glimpse of who I am on the inside. Will my eyes give away my current secret? Will they strip down my defenses in the outside world and throw me out in the cold?
I lie back down and place my cold hands on my stomach. Images hazily dance through my mind: His warm, loving hands; my racing heart, so desperate to feel love, to feel beautiful. Thinking about where I am now, I would give away all the beauty in the world for my innocence back.

Watch your heart when we're together.

He lay on his bed reviewing for his exams but he absorbed nothing. All the notes he had taken during classes looking like black, meaningless squiggles. He couldn’t get the image of her curious eyes out of his head, her cute face and her overall reputation among the entire student body. It pained him to think of her talking to that guy. The guy she was always with in the mornings, during lunchtimes, after classes. It sickened him to his core. What was a girl like her doing with a guy like him? She would belong much better in his arms. Oh, how it would make his week if she would just appear online and talk to him. He tried to approach her so many times, but the fear of causing trouble with the other guy stopped him. He wondered if she noticed him. They made eye contact on an average of once a day, electricity jolted through him when they did and he hoped the same effect had happened to her. He could read the playful curiosity in her eyes. Or were they just meaningless glances? He couldn’t tell, infatuation always did this to him, overanalyze every little thing, magnify it into an action of glamorous, yet silent love.

Why did he have to think about her so much? Was she really all that? How could he like a girl he had never even had a conversation with? It seemed so weird. He convinced himself he didn’t like her, it was just a playful thing, something out of boredom. But he couldn’t ignore the voice nagging at the back of his head, “you like her! Admit it!” it screeched. He thought once again about her, he had asked her something once and her simple, charmless reply left him empty. She had no flirtatious spring, no cool appearance. She just answered him and walked away blankly.
He thought of himself, what made him think he had a chance? Maybe the fact that he was good looking, the fact that he was smart, the fact that he was funny and people liked him because he was daring and cool.

Why wouldn’t she notice that?