Friday night, and I’m thinking of a girl I want to be with but can’t.
I guess this is just what I do.
I don’t want to say that you can insert whatever name you want into that “girl” I’m thinking about, but then again, I’m not so sure.
I do something I don’t usually do when I’m bored. I go online. And that’s when I see it.
An email from Poe.
She told me she’d be in touch, but she also told me not to hold my breath.
She said that right after giving you a kiss on your cheek.
She said that after seeing the tears in my eyes.
Then she said something that I’ve tried to avoid thinking about but can’t.
“Don’t let this place change you, Chris. You’re too good for that.”
I sigh. Too good for that. I’m not too good for anything. I shouldn’t have let her go. I should’ve fought. I should’ve been in touch. I should’ve figured out some way to make her stay. Or to at least not end the way it did.
Part of me still finds it ludicrous that the school actually believed that the drugs they found in her locker belonged to her.
I see the email and seriously wonder about opening it.
I wonder if somebody is still reading the emails I get.
Everybody is watching. Everybody.
For a long time I just stare at the unopened message, wondering what it says and how she’s doing. She hasn’t called in the army or the marines or even the National Reserve. No FBI agents have shown up around town. No detectives or SWAT teams or Navy Seals have come to my rescue.
What would they be rescuing me from? Huh? A weirdo pastor?
I delete the email without reading it.
If I can’t read it, that means no one else can either.
“Sorry, Poe.”
I am sorry.
Sorry that I never knew she liked me in the first place. Sorry for what might have been.
Story of your silly, sad life, Chris.