It was the middle of summer and 99 degrees out. A full binder sat in my lap. We drove down an uninhabited road, through the wood, to sit beside the intercoastal. I flicked my lighter against the letters and poems and names you wrote to me. It seemed funny to me to be sitting there in the intense heat, only making it worse with the fire, when I was doing this to make myself better. Sweat, and dirt, and awkward stares, and a hell of a lot of ash later, we drove home, an empty binder in my lap. I burned away some evidence, but not even the sun could burn away the memories.
2. Everyone was drunk or high or a combination of the two. I kissed everyone in the house ******* the mouth at least once. It was the all around taste of the summer; moonshine, menthol blend cigarettes, and inexpensive fast food. Modest Mouse sung from the living room and neon green stars floated along the ceiling, and we all couldn’t seem to stop trying to find someone. I sat beside you on the porch and as we both stared out at the trees and exhaled smoke, you told me you were planning on marrying me. Even though my lips had touched everyone else’s that night, yours were the only ones that mattered.
3. A small kitten used to come around the house at night, and I pretended the stray was mine. He was completely black with yellow eyes, and I gave him the name of Doug. I sat with him on the porch and laughed when he crawled up my pajama bottoms like the legs were ladders. I’ve always heard that black cats mean bad luck, but he always brought everyone together, and that never seemed too bad to me.
4. We used to write each other journal entries when our thoughts got too bad. There was no one else to talk to, and all we really wanted was to get the thoughts out of our heads, and to write them down and share was our method of doing so. No one else knew about the journals, only you and me. You ran into my house during a party one night and ripped through my room like a tropical storm, asking me if I’d read your latest entry, and you immediately tore out a page when I responded no. You were in the backyard with the small crumpled paper ablaze before I even understood. I stood behind you as you stared at the ground, waiting. “It was too much this time,” were your only words. There are some things in this world I’ll never know.
5. There were too many people at the party, and not enough that I cared for. Two streets over, there were kinder souls and less noise, so I found a ride over. I was too high to differentiate between the houses that were passing, so I sat back and let the same home pass me by forty-three times. You were the drunkest I’d ever seen you, and as our friends sat at the table and laughed, you laid your head in my lap, and for the first time, slurred that you loved me. A drunken sadness settled on your face when I didn’t respond right away. I almost said I loved you back. Almost.
6. It was our first time together in a while where none of us were inebriated. It was raining the equivalent of an ocean, and the sky lit up like an OPEN sign every few moments. I don’t remember any words. I don’t remember opening the door. I only remember the group of us, sprinting down the wet asphalt, the cul-de-sac as a destination, breaking through the trees as thunder collapsed through our ears, our screams barely audible, and dancing in soaked and dripping clothing. I’d never felt more alive than in that moment.
7. You were stumbling down the street towards my house. I couldn’t see straight, but you couldn’t think straight, so I followed you in an attempt to keep you alive. I stared at the moon that wouldn’t stop to let me catch up as I mindlessly tripped along behind you. The soundtrack to the scene only frogs, cicadas, your voice saying “help.” When I finally led you into my room and sat you down in the bathroom, I thought about how different this summer was from any season I’d experienced before. How different I was from any version of myself I’d survived through. You held your head in your hands. “I don’t know what I’m doing,” you whispered as you clenched and unclenched your fingers in your hair. I tucked you into bed before laying down in my own, only to stare at the same neon green stars that pierced the ceiling. I don’t know what I’m doing either.