Take A Risk

Colliding

        By the end of the first day, I both loved and hated Kiera.

            I sat in the empty classroom and aligned my pen to be parallel to the paper.  Tapped a rhythm with my toe.

            Kiera walked in then.  Pulled up a chair and sat down.  She had eyes that were a pale blue, yet very vivid.  Like looking into an icicle with the sunlight shining through it.

            “Hi, Emery,” she said.  It was the first time she had talked to me.

            My mouth was dry.  “Hi… let’s see— let’s see your story.”

            She put a bundle of papers on the table.

            I flipped through them.  It quickly became apparent why Mrs. Meyers had wanted me to help her.  I studied the words, sifted through the extraneous, urged up the half-hidden images.  Repaired and mended the punctuation and adjusted the wording in my minds eye.  I closed my eyes and saw the words burst open in resplendent sprays of color.  I drew out the smells, orchestrated the sounds, and perfected the taste.  And then I saw it— the world Kiera had wanted, the world she couldn’t— or wouldn’t— transfer onto the paper.

            I opened my eyes.

            Kiera was on her phone, texting someone.

            “It sucks I have to be in here during lunch,” she said.

            I searched for something to say, for a place to start. “Ok… well, the beginning needs to establish setting, and character, and— and the general direction of the whole piece.”

            Kiera ran her hand through her hair, brushing the wavy length over her shoulder.

            “Look,” she said. “All I want is to get a better mark on this.  That’s all.”

            I had never been this close to Kiera, and yet I had never been further away.

            “This,” I held up her story. “Is something.  I can see it.  You need to see it. You need to… you need to care.”

            “I don’t care!  I don’t want to write.  I don’t want to waste anymore time on this than I have to.”

            “Then go waste your time with all your friends.  I don’t care.”

            But I did.

            We glared at each other.

            Then the bell rang and Kiera got up and walked out.                                                                         

***

            I lay in bed, listening to the rain.  It was a song, each drop an instrument, each leaf and each branch, rustling and creaking.  I imagine the smell, deep and clean and fresh.

            I don’t want to waste any more time on this.

            It was as if she had known.  In her eyes, her words, taunting me.  I can’t write anymore.  The words dance at the edge of my grasp, evading me.  My inspiration has died away and no matter how many times I poke at the ashes, no spark will return.

            What do I have, without my writing?

            I think of Kiera.  She has all her friends, people to talk to whenever she wants to.  People that can comfort her.  I hate her.  I hate her because she has what I could never have— the ability to be extroverted.

            I didn’t want to sleep anymore.  I listened to the rain and—

            My phone buzzed.

            Rolling over, I peered down at the screen. 

            Hey Emery, its Kiera.

            My heart was thudding.  Hey, I typed.

            I watched my phone until the screen lit up with a reply.  I can’t sleep.

            I closed my eyes and tried to picture her, in her room, her bed, texting me.  Me.  I couldn’t.

            Me either, I sent.

            I waited, in a moment that seemed displaced from time, filled with a million possibilities of what could happen next.

            Hey I’m sorry about what I said. 

            It was then I realized I loved her.  Whether it was my heart, starved of friendship, or my mind, seeing a more vulnerable side to her that she tried to hide, I’ll never know.  Maybe both.

            Thanks. Writing is not a waste of time.

            And neither are friends.

            My fingers hovered over the keys.  I can’t write anymore.

            I don’t know why I told her. I hadn’t told anyone else.  Why did I feel like I could trust someone I had just started talking to?

            I’m lonely sometimes.

            I had shaken her, like she had shaken me.  A collision, sharp, loud with the unknown.  We recoil, spinning away, leaving with the other a taste of risk and uncomfortability.  Balance returns, and with it a film of doubt, nigh on undetectable, yet spreading, seeping into our thoughts like a steady drip of water.