Bipolarity in Love...Like...Crush???

Every day, we stand side by side, only feet apart. When I ruminate on the subject, I realize how humiliating the situation appears. For four years I have liked him, crushed on him, dreamt of him. Sometimes, he walks to his mom’s car and pauses for a moment, hesitates, and I swear he looks back, I swear it! Maybe, I can talk to him. Work up the courage to dare a flirtatious glance or come hither smile. He appreciated my “sparkling wit” before; I can charm him with my words. But…is he staring or am I over-analyzing and imagining things that my brain desperately needs to be true to function. The pragmatic side of me takes over, hushes my inner romantic with a fierce scolding, and I retreat, waiting for the car to pick me up. I wonder if I even truly like him, or just the idea of the musical bad boy who doesn’t care what anyone thinks. Oh the despair in my heart! Darling, I suffer from a severe case of indecisiveness.

More than the Banana Car

Our grimy, “antique” lemon yellow car never reaches sixty. We travel on back roads, side roads, losing ourselves in the journey and loving every moment. A cracked window, loosely hanging door, and ripped leather seats bound by duct tape epitomize our thrifty teenage years. Fuzzy black dice and Mardi gras necklaces hang from a mirror permanently smudged by make-up application. The radio can be a faint murmur, white noise in the background of our vicious arguments and heartfelt apologies or the music can blare out, rattling the windows and bursting our eardrums as we shriek along to All Time Low. My very soul lies embedded in that jalopy, a part of me forever missing.

Bubble-Gum Lips and Bruises

                  Syrupy sweet, her drawling, “Oh honey!” rotted through my teeth. Taking it upon herself, as an unqualified psychologist, to make me feel better, Mrs. Green began extolling the virtues of life. Bleach blonde curls bobbing, she pursed bubble-gum pink lips in judgment. “Why, you’ve got your momma and school, and why, almost everything!” In the window behind her, my supposed peers frolicked about, full of innocence and life. Nobody sullied them, their mothers protected them; this I knew, as all children do, good mothers protect you. Mrs. Green tried, but this woman, this Southern Belle, could not understand. She had never seen what I had seen, or been where I had been. A part of me knew she didn’t have answers or solutions. Her cornflower blue eyes shined with naïveté and hope, I refused to destroy her innocence. So I sat silent, in thrift store hand-me-downs, with a bruise on my belly and two more on my back, watching her diamonds gleam.

The Bride

I felt the cold white satin against my skin, a slithering mist around my body. With every movement, my legs, enclosed in a long white skirt, stiffened. My hands shook, the frosty air tickling my exposed wrists with tiny pinpricks of ice. At the musical cue, I stumbled forward; the heavy tiara and diamond pins digging deeper at my scalp with each jarring step. Virginal lilies filled my hands, thorns stabbing me through the stiff lace of his mother’s antique gloves. When the procession ended, the heavy weight of smug gazes fell on me. Under the thick netting, sweat beaded on my upper lip, a tangible sign of my role in this sacrilege. Buzzing bees filled my ears and stained glass wavered in front of me as the world tilted, like a rocking ship. A sharp elbow gored my back, jolting me into reality. Greasy hands grasped mine, and I swallowed, fighting the tight collar of pearls choking my neck. A lifetime of future restrictions bound in jewelry, the promise of restitution for my sacrifice. In that moment, the droning preacher murdered my freedom and I defined my character.