in her black two-piece bathing suit,
with her long legs and sweet-looking body.
I’m a guy.
It’s normal to stare at an attractive girl.
Especially when she’s wearing a bathing suit.
I can’t help it.
I’m a guy.
Not just a guy,
but one who has pretty much been a loner
this past year and hasn’t asked a girl out in so long,
I’d probably have to do something lame
like use e-mail to do the asking.
I’m such a guy.
Fri., Jan. 27th—Brooklyn
Kyra’s waiting for me
at our locker with a smile as wide
as the Golden Gate Bridge.
She grabs my hand
swings it side to side
and tells me Tyler asked her to go
to the movies with him tomorrow night.
I hug her.
“I’m happy for you.
You’re going to have so much fun.”
“What about you?” she asks me.
“What about me?” I say.
“You need to have some fun.”
I shake my head.
“Don’t worry about me.
Besides, we’re going to the dance tonight, right?
That’ll be fun.”
“Brooklyn, what about—?”
“Stop it,” I say, pointing my finger at her.
“Don’t worry about me.”
Fri., Jan. 27th—Nico
Brooklyn sees me
in line, paying for my everyday lunch.
“Come sit with me,” she says.
“You can share my leftover pizza.”
I sort of glance around, to make sure she’s talking to me.
She continues. “I realize your family makes your own,
and you’ve probably never tasted pizza from a cardboard box.
But trust me, it’s better than that crap.”
She points to the processed food in my hand.
“Besides, you’re training for a race. How can you eat like that?”
I rip open the bag of chips, take one out,
and put it in my mouth.
“See?” I say. “That’s all there is to it.”
She smiles. “Smart-ass.”
I wave a chip in front of her nose.
“You know you want it.”
She bites the chip out of my hand.
“Fine. We’ll have chips and pizza. How’s that?”
Best lunch I’ve had in a long time.
Fri., Jan. 27th—Brooklyn
Friday night
bodies
bump it
grind it
shift it
crank it
work it
make it
to the
hot
loud
mad
music
on the
dance
floor.
A group of girls
pulls me up,
draws me in,
wraps me up
in their sisterly
love.
I let it
out
let it
loose
let it
go
and
I
d n e
a c
Fri., Jan. 27th—Nico
My friend Charlie
talks me into going to the game and the dance
even though I feel like going home
and doing a Rip van Winkle instead.
The game is a slaughter, our team the bloodied ones.
I think about calling it a night,
but Charlie spreads guilt on
the way he likes his cream cheese on bagels.
Thick.
So we head to the dance.
I run into Gabe’s sister waiting to get in.
“Hey, Nico,” she says.
“Hi, Audrey,” I reply. “How’s it going?”
She shrugs. “Okay.”
I feel like I should say more, but what?
Besides, it’s not exactly the easiest place
to have a heart-to-heart.
and I feel like a popcorn kernel
being tossed into a pan of fiery hot oil.
Charlie and I take a seat in the corner,
trying to stay out of the heat.
A group of girls pull another girl up
and into the pan of popping people.
I look closer, and realize it’s Brooklyn.
When I see her dancing,
having fun, it makes me smile.
It makes me glad I came.
Fri., Jan. 27th—Brooklyn
It’s fun until they play
the song You and Me,
and that’s when I decide
to head home.
Kyra and a couple of others
beg, beg, beg
me to stay
but I
hug, hug, hug
each of them
and wave, wave, wave
and walk out
into the cool night air.
I pass by
a girl and a boy
against the wall,
hooking up,
their bodies
crocheted together
in a double love knot.
Lucky in love,
that’s them.
Fri., Jan. 27th—Nico
When I see her leave,
I tell Charlie I’m going outside
to get some air.
“Brooklyn!” I yell once I’m out there.
She stops in the middle of the parking lot
and waits for me to catch up.
“Hey, Nico.”
“What’s up?” I ask.
“Going home.”
I grab her arm.
“Everything okay?”
She smiles.
“Yeah, I actually had fun. Until …”
She doesn’t have to say.
I know. You can be fine, and then,
out of nowhere,
a memory blindsides you.
Distraction works for me. So I say,
“Man, can you believe they played that disco crap?”
She laughs, sticks her hip out, and puts her finger in the air.
“See you tomorrow?” I ask.
“At my place with your bike, right?”
She looks at the sky. “I wonder if it’ll rain.
Wow, Nico, look at that moon.”
I look up and see it shimmering behind some clouds.
She says good-bye and turns to leave,
while I stand there awhile longer,
watching the clouds and the moon
dance together.
Fri., Jan. 27th—Brooklyn
I get home
and grab my notebook.
I open it and suddenly realize
my everyday letters
are no longer being written
every day.
That’s not like me.
Not like me at all.
#289
Dear Lucca,
I miss you.
I miss your beautiful blue eyes and the love I saw in
them for me.
I miss your hand that held mine.
I miss your arms around me.
I miss your lips on mine.
I miss your laughter.
I miss the way you called me Brooker the Looker
I miss your voice and the sweet everythings you
whispered in my ear.
I miss the drawings you showed me before anyone else.
I miss our midnight conversations for no other reason
than to say, “I love you.”
I miss how I felt safe when I was with you.
I miss you, Lucca.
For my whole life, I will miss you.
Love always,
Brooklyn
Fri., Jan. 27th—Nico
Ma’s awake
when I get home.
Just sitting at the kitchen table,
her hands glued to a coffee mug
that’s as empty as a rain barrel
on a hot August day.
“You all right, Ma?”
Her sigh says she’s not
while her words say, “I suppose.”
She does this.
Every now and then, she sinks into a pit of despair
and Pop and I wonder if this is it.
If this is the one time we can’t pull her out,
if she’ll just sink deeper and deeper
until she’s so far gone,
there’s no way to reach her.
I stand behind her and start rubbing her neck and shoulders.
“You should go to bed,” I tell her. “It’s late.”
“I suppose,” she says again. “Did you have fun?”
And because it’s good for Ma to hear
and maybe me, too, I say,
“Yeah. I think I did.”
Sat., Jan. 28th—Brooklyn
This time
my dream
begins in the cemetery
where I’m visiting Lucca’s grave,
my arms weighed down
by dozens of beautiful roses,
their sweet fragrance
surrounding me.
I’m fascinated by the color
of those roses.
A deep,
rich,
luscious
red.
Everything else
is gray.
The sky.
The tombstones.
The ground.
The trees.
I bend down to put the
red roses
on his grave,
when he appears.
Gabe.
My arms extend
as if I’m a bird
ready to take flight,
and a flurry of
red red red
red red red
red red red
drops silently
to the ground.
Then I turn
and run,
wishing I really could fly
into the grayness
above the red,
away from the fear.
Away from him.
When I sit up,
forcing myself awake,
I’m thankful for the lit lamp
on my nightstand
that lately, I never turn off.
And then I see it.
A deep,
rich,
luscious
red
rose
laying at the foot
of my bed.
Sat., Jan. 28th—Nico
It’s not the best day
for a bike ride.
I get up,
an hour before we’re supposed to meet.
Rain pounds the roof,
like Mother Nature is throwing one hell of a tantrum.
I call Brooklyn and suggest we swim again instead.
I can tell she’s upset.
Something’s happened.
There’s a hint of something in her voice.
Sadness?
Fear?
What?
She won’t say.
And she doesn’t want to swim.
“Well, we have to do something,” I tell her.
“Let’s have a picnic,” she says.
Not exactly what I had in mind.
“Come over,” she continues.
“My dad isn’t here. He’s doing emergency surgery.
We’ll have a picnic in my living room.”
Maybe this is it.
Maybe she’s finally going to tell me.
Sat., Jan. 28th—Brooklyn
I want to tell him.
I want him to come over here
and I will tell him
about these nightmares
and the rose in my room
and how Gabe is chasing me,
and watching me
and giving me things
in the dead of the night.
I want to tell him.
But I don’t know if I can.
Sat., Jan. 28th—Nico
I want her to tell me
what’s going on.
How can I get her to do that?
What would Lucca have done?
He would have told her to draw
and then looked for clues there.
That’s what artists do, right?
They express themselves through their art.
I need to get her drawing.
Only problem is,
she draws flowers,
and there aren’t a whole lot of flowers
blooming in January.
Unless …
Sat., Jan. 28th—Brooklyn
While I wait for Nico to arrive,
I peel and slice apples
because a pie is good and wholesome
and I’m feeling the need
for some of that right about now.
Green skins lay in the sink,
shredded like raincoats
after the storm has passed.
When the pie dish is full,
I spread a blanket of pastry
across the naked pieces
of golden fruit.
I tuck them in,
my fingers carefully crimping the dough
in just the right places.
Forty minutes later,
the smell of apples mixed with
cinnamon and sugar
greets Nico at the door.
He smiles and pulls a dozen red roses
from behind his back.
Hands to my mouth,
I jump back as if he’s just tried to hand me
a dozen grenades.
What the hell is going on?
Sat., Jan. 28th—Nico
This isn’t good.
The look on her face.
Does she hate roses?
Are they too commercial or something?
“I thought maybe you’d want to draw,” I say.
“But you don’t like roses?”
“No, it’s just …”
I step inside.
“Don’t stop,” I plead. “Tell me. What is it?”
She reaches out and takes them.
“They’re gorgeous. Thank you.”
The timer lets out an annoying buzz.
She practically throws the roses
on the counter as she runs to the stove
to get a pie that looks like
it just stepped out of a magazine.
“You baked that?
Wow. Is there anything you can’t do?”
She starts to speak.
Then stops.
Why the hell won’t she talk to me?
Sat., Jan. 28th—Brooklyn
When he asks me
if there’s anything I can’t do,
I start to say,
Yes, I can’t stop Gabe from haunting me.
But I glance at the flowers
and wonder if there’s more going on
than I understand.
As the sky opens up
and pounds the roof
in a rage of raindrops,
we spread a tablecloth
across the living room floor
and feast on pita bread with hummus,
crunchy carrots and juicy grapes,
cups of warm tomato soup with basil,
and apple pie, of course.
He’s very sweet,
talking to fill the empty gaps
giving me tips about the race.
I look at him and wonder.
Wonder about things.
There’s so much we haven’t talked about.
“Do you ever dream about Lucca?” I a
sk.
“Sorry. Another random question, I know.”
He nods.
“Do you?”
“Hardly ever.
Even though I wish for that every night.”
“Sometimes it can be a downer though.
You know, like I wake up, and reality hits me.”
I nod.
And before I can stop myself, I ask,
“Do you ever dream about Gabe?”
He shakes his head, no.
“Do you?” he asks.
“Once or twice,” I say quickly.
“I was just curious.
You haven’t really talked about him.
About what happened.”
“He was an idiot, that’s what happened,” he says.
“There are a hundred places to go if you’re having trouble.