how many futures I’ve seen, felt the shape of them in my hands,
that never set foot on the ground.
-
Here we are, fingers laced in Massachusetts, the wind from the bay rustling through our sleeves. Here, I still love him. I never cut my hair. Maybe he got the help he needed. Maybe I have swallowed so many more words. In the hand soap aisle of the store, I watch a young girl swing her feet from a grocery cart. Her arms reach out to me, tiny fingers outstretched.
My mother apologizes. I roll the windows down and the breeze picks up the ends of the hair she’s stopped dying. I buy us matching sunglasses at the gas station and add a handful of Almond Joys before the cashier swipes my card. We’re heading back upstate, Shania Twain belting out the speakers.
In the outskirts of the desert, in the sweat of a summer evening, a backyard, a patio belonging to one of us. The Joshua trees stand watch. Two of my oldest friends and all of the heartaches we outlived. The moon low and flirtatious, my favorite song on the radio, the smell of oranges wafting up. A long table with two open bottles of wine, our plates tinging with the movement of forks and knives. We dance barefoot in the grass, let the sand catch on all of our clothes before calling it a night.
I’m alone. In one version of each story, I’m here alone. I’ve lived in this a little while. Every time I visit, the overcast thins, a broader stretch of blue sky peeks through. Sometimes I’m on the road, or I’ve built a home, elbow-deep in dirt and pulling vegetables in the rain; sometimes I haven’t left this room in weeks.
As a teenager, I worked at the bowling alley. Or maybe it was a cousin’s hardware store. I popped bubblegum and asked your shoe size. I read through my lunch breaks. By 26, I’m on my knees, sweat collecting on my hairline, drawing life out of a new mother with strong and careful hands. My days are too active for indecision.
-
We’re here. You and I. The house needs better siding and the bathroom tile is cracked, but we made it. Our muscles the satisfied sort of ache. Our hands reach for the other’s in the morning. There’s frost on the grass and the forecast expects heavy snow tomorrow. We spend the day stacking wood in the corner, making a game building upon every other rhyme, and at night, I do not let my worries curl beside me for warmth.
I’m not afraid of the hard work to get there, the current future I see. It still might not happen, I know this, but this is the one I could describe in greatest detail, as if it hangs against the wall and you and I are sitting plainly beneath it, looking up. As if it’s fluttering now between my palms; my hands just clasped around it. My hands are keeping their grip.
with love,
schuyler (sky-ler)
venmo: schuylerpeck