Save Your Tears

Her strawberry blond hair glistened under the old, cheap lights as her head shook back and forth, her cheeks a dark pink as her arms swung through the air to the rhythm of the music. Her spirit shone upon the room, her smile as bright as ever. Surrounded by friends who moved their bodies in time with hers, flying together through the crowd like feathers on a bird.

The red and yellow balloons that hung from the ceiling and floated from the wood flooring were our school’s colors. Every now and then, she’d bump into one, then grab it, yanking it from the floor it’s been taped to, and dance across the room like a honeybee buzzing from flower to flower, her arms wound tightly around the helium-filled dance partner.

It’d been fifteen years since our school won a homecoming game on homecoming night, so everyone was dancing, singing, and eating the night away. It was a ball for us, and we were royalty. She managed to make the night even better for everyone with just a smile and her wild soul.

Around midnight, her date, clearly angry, dragged her by her forearm into a corner, cut off from the party. He yelled, pointed at her, then the people she was dancing with. She screamed back, but didn’t shed a single tear as he walked away. She stayed in the corner, leaning against the mirrors on the wall, her arms across her chest in a laid-back, lighthearted way as he left.

The wall of mirrors that she leaned against don't do her justice. They were dirty and faded, the darkness that they presented as her is only the second noticeably wrong thing I'd seen all night.

After a few moments, her posse joined her. Her closest friend, Anabelle, leaned beside her, not looking at her, but out into the crowd. She knew that she only wanted to be left alone.

But I couldn’t do that. I had to see her smile again.

I walked over and yelled, “It’s time for yearbook photos, give me your best!”

“Not now!” She wiped away some smeared mascara from under her eye. “You had all night, and you want to do this now?” She snapped and turned her body. “No!” Just as she pulled away from the glass wall, I snapped the picture and she’d turned her head just enough that she was looking right at me.

She was lovely, but irritated yet still managed to have the tiniest smile present in the photo. She was naturally inclined to smile any time a picture was taken of her. It was a known fact. With a strip of hair that’d fallen from her pulled back half-done hair, lying right in the middle of one eye, she was still pretty, normal and herself.

After the flash of light, she gave me a full smile as she walked away and went back to the dance floor, her posse not far behind.

I stood around the outer edges of the room, maneuvering through the dwindling student body. It was late and most had curfews, but not her. She danced, ignoring the waning crowd, and forgot her worries as her body let the music flow through her. She was contagious. The group that was with her wouldn’t leave her side for the world. To be so close to her. To know her and feel her warmth as they did. Most would have done just about anything to be in their shoes.

I know I would have.

I sat down in an old rickety metal fold-up chair, squeaking as I readjusted and failed to get comfortable. My camera pressed against my eye as I scanned the small crowd of students and took more photos. The lighting from the cheap DJ’s booth was hitting the top of student’s heads perfectly, but I made a mental note to pay special attention to these photos the next day to make sure they’re as good as I thought they were.

When the clock stroke one, the DJ announced the school was closing for the night and the students were to leave. I saw through the long windows that covered one wall of the room that there were parents in cars out front, waiting for their children to flock to them. Others were dates bringing their cars around for their ladies. I sat back and waited for the students to leave. She was still there, standing back and waiting, too. Emmitt, her date, had probably been her ride. And he was long gone. The cars left and we were being asked if we had rides home.

She shrugged.

“I have a car,” I said weakly to Mr. Robinson, who was touching her exposed back. “I’m driving her home.”

She looked up at me, her eyes still twinkling from the dance-high that she was on. The right corner of her mouth curved up into a smile.

“Yeah, we’re leaving,” she said, walking over to me and grabbing my arm. She ushered me out into the cold late-November air. It bit at our bare skin as we broke into a run for my car. She followed on my heels. I pressed the button on the keychain and the doors unlocked. I’m

I threw myself in and she met up with me inside, our heads knocking together in the middle of the car.

“I’m sorry,” I said as I touched my head with one hand and reached out to hers with the other. It was a reflex. A very awkward one at that. “Are you okay?”

She smiled, “I’m fine. You?” She put her hand over mine where she’d hit her head. I pulled away.

“Yeah, I am.” I smiled back and laughed a beautiful sound, so full of life. I sat back, turning on the car, then buckled myself in. She put on her seatbelt, then reached over and turned on the radio station to current pop hits. Staring at her hand on my stereo, I asked, “Do you still live by the park?”

“Yeah, I can’t believe you remember that,” she said, sitting back in her seat.

“I don’t forget a lot,” I said, putting the car in drive and exiting the parking lot.

“I wish I could say the same,” she said, looking out the passenger window at the buildings passing by. “What happened to us?” she asked, her voice quiet.

I shook my head. “I don’t know. I guess we grew up.”

“We’re sixteen, that’s not grown up.” She leaned her head on the headrest, her mouth blowing out a sweet puff of air. “We were best friends.”

But we were more than that. We’d been each other’s confidants. And shoulders to cry on. When she’d kissed her first boyfriend I was there. A giant slice of decadent chocolate cake in one hand a pint of mint chocolate chip in the other. We’d cried together. Laughed together. Grew together. Then apart.

“Yeah, we were.” Is all I can manage to say. I’d never been one for drama. Or conversation. The silence between us was worse than anything so I turned up the music, hoping to make it better. Somehow, though, it only managed to make it worse.

When we reached her house, I parked the car along the side of the road. We sat silent for a moment, both of us staring at her old rickety home.

“Guess this is the end of the road.” I cracked a smile, looking at her. She turned away, wiping tears from her face. “Hey, what’s wrong?” I put my hand on her shoulder but she shook it off.

“Don’t. Nothing. I’m sorry. I’ll see you-”, the door swung open and she jumped out before I could hear the rest of her ‘goodbye.’ The door slammed shut and she ran around the front of the car, towards her front porch.

I climbed out and followed after her. “Hey, stop!” I said, reaching the bottom of the steps. She stood at the top, her hand on the crooked door’s rusted knob. “Look, the way that I remember it is that when we got to middle school, you got new friends and a new life. You became someone else. Someone I didn’t know anymore. And I became someone else, too.”

She turned to look at me. “It was my fault?” she asked, enunciating every word slowly, as if it was the most foreign thing she’d ever heard.

“That’s not what I mean.” I went up a step. “I mean that you were growing up faster than I was. Or maybe it was the other way around, I don’t know. But we weren’t at the same speed. Or on the same level even.” I went up another step.

“What about now? Where are we now?” She walked down a step, putting her a step above me, her face in line with mine.

“We grew up,” I said.

“Yeah, we did.”

She leaned forward and kissed me as I wrapped my arms around her. Kissing her was like the perfect sunny day, a beautiful sunset, and the sweetest treat, all rolled into one. I held onto her as tight as I could, not wanting her to every stop. Warmth spread throughout my body, regardless of the wind attempting to bite me down to my bones.

I don’t know how long we stayed like that. But it wasn’t anywhere close to long enough. When she pulled back, I stayed silent, but after a moment, I managed to say, “Grace, you can’t just kiss me and then go back to the way it was. We can’t do this and then ignore each other again. I won’t do that.”

I brushed back hair that had fallen onto her face as I stared into her eyes. They were warm, pulling me into her again. I kissed her soft lips once more, rubbing my hands on the sides of her face. After a few seconds, I let go and pulled back, looking into her eyes once again.

She smiled at me, running her fingers through my hair. “I don’t want that either. I promise I won’t do that to you.” She kissed me softly. When she pulled back, she leaned her forehead against mine, her lips an inch away from mine. “You don’t know how many times I’ve thought about doing that to you, Sam.”

I couldn’t help but smile at the thought of her thinking of me, too.