Forbes and Fifth

The Heartbeat

“Don’t you remember when our eyes were blue? We were in the winter of our lives.”

She looks at me and then at the mottled gray dashboard, her chipped, purple fingernails tapping against the steering wheel. The rain peppers the window, the small spots of moisture intensifying the colorless world outside. The words she just whispered are echoing inside me.

Don’t you remember when our eyes were blue?

The light turns green and she nudges the car back to life. We’re moving again. Our eyes were blue.

And we were in the winter of our lives.

I watch her as she looks out the windshield glass, the freckles on her cheeks standing out against her pale skin.

Finally, I respond.

“What’s winter or summer when it comes to life?” Her face grows still. It was a hollow joke and neither one of us is laughing.

The words write themselves on the windows of the car.

Summer.

She drapes her thin wrists over the steering wheel, the tips of her fingers brushing each other and she lean forward, her mouth releasing a gentle breath of air and her eyes closing for the merest second.

“Maybe.” She breathes.

Maybe. Maybe what?

Maybe if she doesn’t watch the road, we won’t be together anymore. Maybe we’ll hit a tree, a house, a stop sign, a person. Maybe because she’s not wearing her seatbelt, she’ll get thrown from the car, and because I am, I’ll stay put. Maybe we’ll flip over and the windows will shatter and our words? Maybe they’ll explode too.

Her eyes are open again.

“Maybe our summer hasn’t happened yet.” The words trickle through me. “Maybe we have to keep waiting.”

Keep waiting for summer.

This time it’s me who closes my eyes. I focus on the rain hitting the roof of the car, the tires turning against the wet street, the dampness of my palms, the smell of her perfume. Her voice; she’s saying my name.

When I turn to look at her once more, I don’t see her pretty profile or her drawn face, but her own eyes staring back into mine.

I try to find the blue in her eyes, back from when we were in the winter of our lives.

She says my name again.

There are moments when I sit in my room, against the wall and I think about things. I think about how the white noise in my head sounds like rain and how I can feel my heartbeat vibrating through my skin, through the tips of my fingers, through each hair on my head.

Sometimes, in the stillness, the rain and the throbbing of my heart, I think about how it pounds, so intently that the whole house must be shaking too, beating, moving so hard that the whole world is one heartbeat. And soon, everything’s just vibration, an extension of the rhythm that is me, rocking together as one complete thing.

That’s what the impact is like. A heartbeat so quick and rhythmic that it’s like I expect it.

Her voice is saying my name. Her eyes are looking at mine. I’m breathing in her perfume. The words are crawling around the inside of the car. Beneath her wrists, the steering wheel slides out of her control.

It’s a heartbeat, and I don’t even realize it because I’m drowning in her once blue eyes, summer, and the maybe she held on her tongue but we’re slipping into the next lane and there’s another car already there, looking for something to collide with. Me and her. Maybe we’re going to hit it. Maybe we’re going to crash. Maybe it’s just another heartbeat, echoing.

Well, the impact is a heartbeat but the sound is just as ear-splitting as it should be.

I blink, and the glass is gone, a million pieces of light winking at me as they fly through the air. Maybe, maybe I’m flying through the air too, but the rain is sprinkling my skin and the wind is whistling and all at once, I can’t breathe, I can’t breathe, and the only air I retain is her perfume, lingering in my lungs. I think she’s saying my name again and again, except she’s not just saying it, she’s screaming it. And our words? They’ve exploded. They’re bleeding into the wet asphalt along with the summer that never happened.

“Don’t you remember when our eyes were blue? We were in the winter of our lives.”

The sun is streaming through the dusty car windows and I’m blinded by the little flashes of light that spring around the inside of the car; droplets of sunshine that fall down the gray leather seats, brushing gently across my skin.

She’s wearing denim cut off shorts and her legs leave little spots of moisture on the seat. It’s the kind of day where you are drenched by the heat.

The light turns green and she pushes the gas pedal a little too hard. She’s always pushing things a little too hard. The car starts abruptly and makes an unattractive noise. The corner of her lip curls up slightly.

Finally, I respond.

It took me a while. Sometimes the sun is too bright and it’s hard to make words come out of my mouth.

“What’s winter or summer when it comes to life?” It was a hollow joke and neither one of us is laughing. The puddles of sunlight that dance around the inside of the car are doing it for us.

I know she’s not sure what to do with the words that I’ve handed to her.

Summer.

“Maybe our summer hasn’t happened yet.” She jerks the steering wheel sharply to the left to avoid knocking a young man off his bike. I try not to breathe too loudly. “Maybe we have to keep waiting.”

Keep waiting for summer.

But that is the joke, I think to myself as we turn down a side street filled with shade and I silently thank god for trees. Because I feel like we can’t ever escape summer. It’s just an endless cycle that keeps coming and going and there’s nothing that we can ever do to stop it.

We can escape it, sure, for short periods of time. But it will always just come around again.

Maybe, I think, the next time she grabs the steering wheel like that, she’ll push it just a fraction too far and we won’t be together anymore. Maybe it’s because she was too rough with it, no one’s fault but her own. Maybe because she’s not wearing her seatbelt, she’ll go flying from the front windshield, and because I am, I’ll stay put. Maybe glass will shatter and the road will burn and our words? Maybe they’ll explode too.

Good riddance, I think. Anything to escape this heat.

She says my name. I can feel the hot air of her breath even though she’s not facing me and she’s not looking at me. I can feel her tongue as she licks her dry lips and stretches her hands over the steering wheel.

I watch her as she watches the road.

I try to find the blue in her eyes back from when we were in the winter of our lives. Or summer. Whatever. It’s too damn hot. I have no idea what she’s talking about.

She placates me with a quick glance. Her eyes are fire. I feel them on me and I forget what blue or winter or cold is.

There are moments when I walk down the street and I pretend that I’m the only person in the world. The cars honk and growl at me as they drive by, but I just ignore them until they become one seamless hum. A reminder that there is an outside world besides the one inside my own head, but nothing more tangible than that.

Sometimes, I relish in the rough gust backlash the cars leave me with as they whistle by. Something about it feels dangerous, something about it feels right. The fact that there’s nothing between me and them except my own will to keep on walking.

That’s what the impact is like. Like the only thing between us is my own will power whether or not to be impacted.

I close my eyes and try to pretend I’m somewhere else. I think about a big icy glass of water, beads of condensation on the palm of my hand. I think about submerging myself in a freshwater lake. I think about the hot pavement underneath the wheels of our car. I think about friction and tire rubber and the little spots of moisture her thighs leave on the leather seats.

Her voice is sighing as she says my name and somewhere other than here there is snow falling in little flakes to the ground. The heat is sticking to the air on the inside of the car. Her eyes are carefully watching the road and her hand is pushing the steering wheel but it’s a little too far and she’s a little too much. It’s almost like she looked at me and couldn’t find the blue in my eyes back from when we were in the winter of our lives and decided she’d had enough. It’s almost like she looked at the opposite lane, sunlight glaring off the other cars’ windshields and decided that it was the place that she wanted to be.

If the impact is a choice that she made, then the sound is just as ear-splitting as it should be.

I blink a dot of sweat out of my eye and in that instant the glass is gone and the sun goes haywire, exploding into a million pieces of light that whistle around in the muggy air. I feel a warm breeze on my skin and part of me thinks thank god for small miracles, but the sun is still prickling me and all at once I’m suffocated by the heat and the dry air and I can’t breathe. I can’t breathe. The only moisture I retain are the little spots underneathher thighs as she drives the car, except she’s not driving anymore and there isn’t a car anymore, there’s only sunlight and sweat and the unbearable, agonizing heat.

And our words? They’re split and cracked, lying on the side of the road along with the summer that never ended.

“Don’t you remember when our eyes were blue? We were in the winter of our lives.”

She looks at me and then turns her head to the right and glances out the passenger side window, her hands clasped awkwardly in her lap like she doesn’t quite know what to do with them. She’s not used to riding shotgun; she wishes she had the solidarity of a steering wheel.

My own hands flex uncomfortably around the ridged edge. The words she just whispered are echoing inside of me.

Don’t you remember when our eyes were blue?

She almost never lets me drive, but today she whispered my name in that lilting, playful tone and threw the keys toward me before flouncing around to the other side of the car.

And we were in the winter of our lives.

She turns around again and I feel her looking at me as I stop short at a red light. Her gaze makes me uncomfortable. I want to turn and look at her too, stick my tongue out at her, smile, make a weird face, but I don’t. Instead I respond.

“What’s winter or summer when it comes to life?” It was a hollow joke, but she graces it with a slight chuckle which bounces around the inside of the car and then buries itself in the pre-existing silence. I know what she’s thinking.

Summer.

I drape my wrists over the steering wheel like I’ve seen her do a thousand times and wait for the light to turn green. Did it usually take this long? It seemed like we’d been sitting there for hours. Years. Centuries. I inhale slowly and try to compose myself. I can hear her breathing and I know that she’s still looking at me.

“Maybe…” She says, and the light turns green but I’m late to making the car roll forward because I’m thinking maybe, maybe what?

Maybe if I can’t straighten myself out, we won’t be together anymore. Maybe I’ll really mess this one up; maybe we’ll hit a house, a telephone pole, a stop sign, a person. Maybe because the driver’s seat belt is broken I’ll get thrown from the car, and because she’s fastened in tightly she’ll stay put. Maybe the car will go up in flames and maybe we’ll burn and our words? Maybe they’ll explode too.

She turns back to the window and I feel the muscles in my shoulders loosen slightly.

“Maybe our summer hasn’t happened yet.” Her voice trickles down my spine making me tense up again. “Maybe we have to keep waiting.”

Keeping waiting for summer.

This time I’m the one who risks a glance, sweeping her with my eyes and taking them off the road for a split second. I see her hands tightly clasped together in her lap, the little wisps of hair that escaped from her ponytail framing her face, her eyelashes brushing her cheek as she blinks at the window. She turns her face back to me and I can see my name on her lips even though she doesn’t say it.

I try to find that blue in her eyes, back from when we were in the winter of our lives.\ She still doesn’t say my name, just lets it linger there in the air.

Lately I’ve been falling into an all-encompassing sleep each night that swallows me and spits me out in the morning, stricken and confused. I fall onto the mattress and lose myself in this strange void. The other night I woke up in my clothes—I’d never taken them off. The night before I didn’t even move my laptop off my bed before sinking into it. I was lucky that I didn’t knock it onto the floor while I was asleep. But then again, I guess it’s not luck. This whole thing, it’s not luck. It’s not chance or fate or destiny. It’s not a coincidence either or a rare occurrence. It just is.

I woke up this morning from a dreamless pit of sleep, got up, put on my clothes, and then this afternoon a black Volkswagen drove headfirst into a 1979 Ford pickup truck. Earlier today my history teacher talked about the events of June 6th, 1944 and later, JFK hospital will get a call about two teenagers that were involved in a collision, no alcohol or intoxication involved, no engine malfunction. It wasn’t the road conditions or darkness or fog. It just was.

Tomorrow, everyone will be silent and people will talk to each other on the phone, their voices tangling together as they try to find the right words. And the next day everyone will go to school and work and get on with their lives. Everyone except for us. And as each day passes, the air won’t be as tight as it was. Waves will trip over each other on their way to reach the sand and snow will form in clouds and get ready to fall.

That’s what the impact is like. It just is. One second she’s saying my name. The next second she’s not saying anything. One second our eyes were blue. The next second I can’t even remember what colors are, or seasons or rain or sunlight because I blink and the glass is gone and the sound is just as ear-splitting as it should be.

The windshield of the car her father bought for her 17th birthday is now separated into a thousand pieces of light and is whistling through the air. I feel the breath in my nose and I hear her saying my name, but she’s not saying it, she’s really not, and I feel the heat and the rain and her fingernails against my skin and the dampness in the palms of my hands and suddenly I hit the ground again and that impact is unlike anything I’ve ever expected. It’s not a heartbeat, or a decision. It just happens. And it hits me. And the breath I’ve been trying to contain rushes out of me.

And our words? They’ve exploded too. They’ve felt the impact too. But by the time the other cars pull over and someone dials 911, they’ll be gone, crushed into the asphalt. No one will ever know the words that caused me to lose control of that damn car. No one will ever know the reason.

Do you remember when our eyes were blue?

We were in the winter of our lives.

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Volume 13, Fall 2018