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“Hey!” she answers.
“Hey,” I say.
“Thank you again for today.”
“Yeah.”
I don’t want to do this. I don’t want to ruin it. But I have
to, don’t I?
I continue, “But about today?”
“Are you going to tell me that we can’t cut class every day?
That’s not like you.”
Not like me.
“Yeah,” I say, “but, you know, I don’t want you to think
every day is going to be like today. Because they’re not going
to be, alright? They can’t be.”
There’s a silence. She knows something’s wrong.
“I know that,” she says carefully. “But maybe things can
still be better. I know they can be.”
“I don’t know,” I tell her. “That’s all I wanted to say. I don’t
know. Today was something, but it’s not, like, everything.”
“I know that.”
“Okay.”
“Okay.”
I sigh.
There’s always a chance that, in some way, I will have
brushed off on Justin. There’s always a chance that his life will
in fact change— that he will change. But I have no way of knowing.
It’s rare that I get to see a body after I’ve left it. And even
then, it’s usually months or years later. If I recognize it at all.
I want Justin to be better to her. But I can’t have her expecting
it.
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