Every thought, good and bad, every ache, every longing, every adventure.
Hemingway once said, “All you have to do is write one true sentence. Write the truest sentence that you know.” So I don’t think about Mr. Russo telling me I don’t feel deeply enough, and I don’t think about whether or not it’s going to be any good. I open the blank green notebook—the color of spartina—and start to write.
You were my first. Not just sex, although that was part of it, but the first to look past everything else into me.
Some of the names and places have been changed, but the story is true. It’s all here because one day this will be the past, and I don’t want to forget what I went through, what I thought, what I felt, who I was. I don’t want to forget you.
But most of all, I don’t want to forget me.
DAY 35
I ride my bicycle down Main Road, under the green, green canopy of trees. I feel the sun on my face and the wind in my hair. The day is bright. I am bright.
I roll to a stop and I can see his house from where I am. I want to sit on his front step and wait for him to come back and take me on adventures. Take me treasure hunting. Take me for a walk on the beach under the moon. Kiss me in the rain in a cemetery by a whispering wall.
I don’t think, I just hit play, and suddenly this song is blasting in my ears—his favorite song, the one that will always belong to him, and to the two of us dancing through the ruins, under the fog. And he is there, smile half-cocked, staring down at me like I’m a miracle. You, I hear him say, are spectacular, Claudine Llewelyn Henry.
Him. Me.
Me. Him.
Us. Intertwined. Hands on my face, in my hair, trailing down my back, his fingers—soft as a cloud—on my skin, where no boy had gone before. But it’s more than this. It’s muddy feet and locked basements and blood moons and all the things we said to each other when no one else was listening.
I think of all the reasons I love him.
Like the jolt of his touch. Which is a kind of lightning. An electric current. Not enough to kill you, but enough to leave you wired and hungry and alive.
Like the fact that he smells like tomorrow, if tomorrow had a smell.
Like a shirt you’ve worn in just enough.
A sunset over a cornfield, the kind that turns everything gold and warm.
Sheets just out of the dryer.
Fresh snow.
He is all of these things and home.
The song ends and the quiet is filled with the steady, shimmering hum of cicadas, as if the air itself is singing. The sun beats down, heavy on my skin. The ferry will be here in an hour and I need to get back to the house. But for a moment I am rooted to this sandy path, staring past the horses, tails flickering, that graze in the grass, and the great sweeping arms of the live oaks, dripping with Spanish moss. At the blue rocking chairs and the various bones and skulls—bleached a hard, bright white—gathered in one corner of the porch. His house is quiet, no signs of life. His truck is parked out front, dusty from our last beach trip.
I wave away a bug. Touch the back of my neck where my hair has grown out a little. It’s still short. I think I like it this way. The freckles on my face and shoulders have multiplied since the beginning of summer, but I don’t mind them as much as I used to. I feel taller. Older. Good and right in my own skin. But still like myself. Claude Before and After.
Here we laughed. Here we fought. Here we loved and dreamed. Here is where the fire started. Here is where the first brick fell. Here is where the floor disappeared. Here is where I built a new one underneath my feet.
And here is where I began.
The last thing he said to me: I’ve got a few more things to do and then I’ll come find you. I tell myself if I stand here long enough, he might appear. And then I almost see him, walking toward me down the path. Bare feet. Shirt untucked. Face lit up at the sight of me. Ready for our next adventure.