In the last days of school, the first days of summer, we pile into a car. All these people I'm not close to suddenly become my best friends. I'm contented to go where they drive, my head hanging out the front seat window into the distinctly summer-tinted air. We pull up to the city gardens with a pizza, dancing to The Strokes and the beating of the world's heart, alive around us. I make everyone clover crowns. He is the King, his thoughtful brown eyes outshining his careful smile. I am the Queen. One and Another, the Prince and Princess he with his pleasant, measured voice and her trills of brilliant laughter. And the too-old senior tagged along for who knows what reason, is the Jester, loathe to wear the effeminate flowers above his ears. We climb things. We somersault. We throw loving insults up to the wind like kites. We hoot and holler at the blue blue sky and the koi fish in ponds, dancing along the stone borders. So close to falling into the algae.
We sing the summer in.
The Jester has never known true right from wrong, he is learning to live on his own, with the scars on his arms and face. He is not welcome at home anymore. The Prince is moving back across a world into the arms of a now unfamiliar life, nothing waits for him there but the promise of his next powdery high. The King's mother has three months to live, all we can do is wait. The Princess and I, the Queen of the wild rumpus, finally lay down to count clouds.
We have nothing left.