Minnesota Goodbyes

Entry #33

There are too many people for such a small space, but you keep hoping for just one more. Your nerves fizzle, and you and Lacy do another shot. The lights swell and the room seems suspended in time, waiting.

(You get the feeling that you're the only one moving. Everyone else is frozen in laughter and you wade towards the door and there

she is.)

Lacy elbows you in the ribs. "Now you can talk to Nick."

She doesn't mean it cruelly, but she doesn't mean what she said, either. Now you can talk. Now you can talk to anyone. Now you can talk to Nick.

You nudge her back, a little too hard. "Thanks, Lace."

(No one else is in the room, or so it seems. Clair's eyes devour everything until they light on you. You are there. She is there.

Together alone.)

But neither of you says this. Clair flits over to you and Lacy, and you all congratulate Nick, and take a couple shots with a group of Lacy's friends.

Your world feels as though it's softened, made of blurred edges and warmth. The tautness of waiting is over. It is drowned in alcohol, in the night, in Clair's presence.

Nick is the one to call it quits on this suspended moment. "Party!" he yells before staggering down the hall, down the twists of stairs, and out out out into the night. A group clusters at the door, and they crowd the halls in a rush after him. You and Clair (and Sam and Jay) straggle behind.

That's how all walks to parties go. (The coolness staved off by alcohol. Tripping, jostling, joking. Brash laughter turning away the silence, until music spills out of a shitty house or a shitty apartment. That's what the walk will always be.)

The moment you walk into a party is like being reborn. Light and noise assault you, welcome you.

Bodies are everywhere, twined with light, and Sam shoulders his way through the crowd and to the keg. (It's in the corner of the basement. Parties always seem to happen downstairs. The music throbs louder, people dance closer, light and shadow chase each other. Everything is contained, so it feels as though it's turned up a notch there.)

The music thrums around you, the bass-line rattling through your chest. Light pulses around the room, shading everything in thick strokes of color.

This is why you've always liked parties. They have a life to them, something bigger than the cluster of bodies, the pin-wheeling lights, the plastic cups. It fills the room to the brim, heats it up, runs through your veins. Bigger and bigger and bigger.

They all meld together, parties. (There was the party you got locked in a bathroom. And the one where you met Clair. The final party with your high school friends.) That's how you define them: by the solid events, by the concrete things you can recall.

They are all washed in the same softness, the same flash of strobe lights. And it tugs you back, each memory seeping into the next. Back and back and back.

(There are nights when you dance and drink and grow dozy from brushing up against too much life. You like it, though, and are always hoping this time. This time. This time it'll bleed into the next day. This time something will happen, bigger and bigger and bigger than the last time. 

If you're completely honest, you know what you're looking for. And sometimes you kiss a few boys, hoping it'll be there. You never have that moment though. Where sparks glow between the two of you and your heart jumps in your chest, so you think maybe boys are the problem. And on another tipsy night, you gather up the courage to kiss a girl.

Her lips are so soft and full, but there's nothing there.

Nothing.

You can't understand it.

Her eyes are beautiful. You hadn't noticed because of the party lights washing over everything. You are so close to this girl, to her kaleidoscope eyes (although that might be the liquor or the lighting to blame), and you hadn't even realized how pretty they are. Or how uncomfortable you are.

The kiss, and then your faces so close you can see gold flecks in her eyes, and smell her perfume, and her boozy breath of your cheek and neck. It isn't hot and passionate. She's too, too close and her breath and smell and eyes are smothering.

"I'm..." your words stutter to a stop.

She blinks, doe-eyes dazed. Does she understand your confusion? You'd hoped... Well, it doesn't matter. No sparks jumped under your skin, and a hot sweep of confusion and frustration rolls through you.

You could tell there'd be nothing, even before you broke away from her. You'd been too busy thinking (Why are my eyes open? My hands...? She's taller— no, heels. I'll ask where she got them.)

You are passionless. A high school boyfriend couldn't inspire lust, and there was no desire in that kiss just now. You might as well have kissed a statue for all the pleasure you got from it. Tears prick at the corners of your eyes. Will you always be alone?)

Clair's eyes are like that, bright and beautiful.

You don't want to kiss her either, which still feels strange. Aren't you supposed to want to? There's something blooming in your chest that you've never had before, but still nothing.

Clair grabs you by the hand, dragging you out of your worries. "Dance with me."

You do. Your hips and arms and hair and eyes. Everything dances with her. Her freckles and grin and yellow hair. It's gorgeous, and it's the two of you, and that's all it will ever need to be. Clair can sense it, you think, because there's a moment between songs when she takes your hand again. She leads you back up the stairs and through the crush of bodies, and you sit on the front steps, shoulder to shoulder.

There's a moment where she squeezes your hand, and you know it's okay. You don't need the answers now, and everything shines from the beer and tequila shots and you're warm and you and Clair glitter like lightning bugs in the night.

(It happened. It was concrete; it was solid.)

It was real.