Cranes and Balloons

i.
We were sitting facing each other next to the brick school wall, and I fixed my eyes on her as she said, I'm losing patience with life, with school, with Him, with people in general. She was smiling, just barely, but it was there, gripping the sides of her lips like tiny child fingers. Maybe if I hadn't ignored it, let her words trickle out of the tired pores in my skin, I could have figured out that her smile was not merely exasperation. But it was a beautiful smile and I was distracted by it and the way her short, bark-brown hair looked in the wind, curling in wisps away from her face. I'm thinking about that smile now. Small teeth like her small hands and feet, lips with secrets sewn deep inside of them.

ii.
I remember the first time I met her remarkably well. We were at a birthday party. For some reason I remember exactly what I was wearing- traditional hippie garb: tie dye shirt, patched corduroy pants. I remember watching her from behind my hair. I remember wanting to go over and talk to her; she intrigued me in the way that nature does and I haven't found many people like that in the world. Instead I talked with the short religious boy about how he wrote letters to the pope and argued with him about abortion and gay rights, but I was never really paying attention to him. I'm not sure why I remember this so well. Part of me likes to think it's some sort of sign that I remember our first meeting so well. The other part knows that my memory is just fucked, and doesn't work very well anyway. Most of the time, the things I long to remember just trickle down my throat and hide somewhere inside my heart where I can feel them, pulsing slowly, but out of reach. Lost and laughing at my frustration.

iii.
I always read her notes at least three times. Usually more. Whenever I can't read just one word, I stare at it for ages, trying to decipher its occult meaning inside the drips of pen ink. Once in the dead of night I dreamed of cranes and balloons hovering over me while I remained grounded, wanting nothing more than to reach up and pluck them out of the air like soap bubbles, but they were just out of reach. I've never been able to interpret a dream more clearly than this one.

iv.
She said, I'm losing patience with life, with school, with Him, with people in general. I almost responded, but instead watched her draw and let my silence and hair turn me into something verging on invisible. The sound of bright crayon on paper sluiced over me like the wind. For a moment I felt tears forming puddles inside my head, ready and so willing to be set free, but that's really nothing new.
I breathed in the air, and wondered.