Many Million Dreams Ago • Ch. 5 of 10
The Chapter’s Song:
The years slowly rolled by—, one after another. I couldn't bare to think of all that I’d done so I tried putting all the negativities out of my mind. Good friends would come over during those in-between chapters of my life.
“Don’t go to the dark side,” they’d say to me whenever seeing me intently staring off into the distance, not focused on anything in-particular. I’d try to snap back into the moment, to not let what was keeping me from enjoying life take hold and drag me down once more. My mom would come home from work and see me still laying in bed on my days off.
“Let’s go see a movie tonight,” she’d suggest. That, or we’d stay home and watch our favorite TV shows one after another. I quickly realized we were in this mess together, shoulder-to-shoulder. Of all the people that’d come in and out of my life—, she alone stayed with me through every single mistake, misstep, and mischievous moment of my last twenty-some years. Soon after telling her that I should move to a different setting in search of a more balanced lifestyle, she agreed and started helping me in my hunt for a new place to live.
I’d been looking for apartments one city over and found some nice places to try and make a new life in. Finally picking the right spot, I began wondering what type of people I’d meet, who I’d become friends with, and what kind of new experiences I’d have. Would they hold my history against me or take me as I am? Would they realize that I wasn’t truly the person who I looked like on paper? I wanted to start fresh—, to have a clean slate to work with, a new canvas to try and paint a different, more-appealing picture onto. Before actually moving though, I needed to find another job closer to my new home. I applied to every store in the strip-mall across the street from my apartment until getting hired.
I packed up all of my belongings into boxes and my mom and I made nearly a dozen trips back and forth from my old city to the next. I was finally feeling an exhilaration about life again—, like I’d made my way from one person to an entirely new human being in the span of three short years. I also knew I had an enormous responsibility in needing to make my mother proud of me. I had done just the opposite for so much time that things needed to drastically change.
The new job was exciting. The people were nice. The atmosphere was pleasant. I’d made friends with all the managers and they genuinely liked me. Of course, they only knew the new me but that was enough for them to invite me out to dinners and pool halls and clubs. Little by little, I was re-finding myself again. I’d begun taking the bandages off of all my old faults and realized they’d been healing well over time. I spoke in positive ways and about a bright future again. I knew that slowly, I’d return to the person I’d been before ever tragically falling in love.
On a random day like most others, I was straightening up displays on the side of the store when the double doors swung open up front. I saw her coming both quickly and in slow-motion. Sunshine was beaming out right behind her as she walked down the center aisle that made making out her facial features nearly impossible. Even then, she was covered by a thick veil of deep shade.
“Hello—,” I got out, not knowing who she was.
“Hey,” she swiftly said, and nothing else. Walking away and towards the backroom, I realized she too was an employee and made sure to keep my composure from there on out.
She looked like the girl I’d dreamed of ever since growing up; tattoos, piercings, and a fierce spirit to top it off. I could tell she was the type to never take anyone’s bad attitude or negative energy and always kept her heart sheltered. Maybe from former experiences or less-than-perfect memories. Either way, I understood and clicked with it. After everything I’d gone through in the last half-decade, I needed someone new to shake things up with. Someone who wasn’t easily put off by a tainted story. Someone who knew something about sprawling shadows and how they could affect a person’s life.
I soon invited her over my place one sunny afternoon. Walking up the steps to my second-floor apartment, I could already feel the sensual tension between us. I wanted to take her hand in mine and play with her fingertips—, to slowly draw imaginary figures on her flower-stamped skin by outlining the indelible inked-designs. I was ready to talk to her about anything—, except of course, what eventually begun our conversation;
“So do you do drugs?,” she asked outright. I half-smiled at the question—, not really expecting it but respecting her for it all the same.
“Why do you ask that?,” I cautiously followed-up with.
“I don’t know—, I guess I’m just curious.”
“I’ve done some before but not anymore,” I admitted, “I’m not against anyone wanting to try them though, it’s their own life and their own decision, you know?”
“So if there was a line of coke here right now, would you let me do it?” I knew the answer even before I spoke.
“No—,” I calmly said, “I wouldn’t want to see you like that.” A slew of unhappy memories made their way back into my mind. I hoped she knew that I cared for her too much, that it wasn’t me trying to decide things for her, and that it came from a place of protectiveness. She quietly smiled back.
We started sharing a notebook where we’d write down our deeper thoughts. Things we couldn’t talk about while at work. Our dreams, our ideals, our definitions of love. We’d bring it with us every shift we had and place it in our designated locker for the other to find. Back and forth this went until the day came that I’d finally get the answer to my question of the last few weeks. I couldn’t wait to get back into the store and find the green journal. Once in the break-room, I flipped to the right page and started reading. It was pure flirtation. Ideas of a romance that hadn’t even begun yet. I knew what I had to do. Luckily, we were both working that day. I walked out onto the sales floor and went directly over to her. Gently taking her hand in my own, I placed it palm-up and ran my index finger over it to draw out an I—, a heart—, and a U. She couldn’t bare hiding the grin growing on her face. She looked back at me with wide open eyes.
“Whew—,” she said, letting out a long exhale. “Back to the real world.” That was it—, I knew things would be different from that day forward.
We finally decided to go skateboarding a short while later. Up and down the hill we went, letting the wheels run themselves over hot asphalt while we rode with the wind in our hair. The pop-punk music blared out from inside my Mercury Cougar and about an hour or so passed by when the sun began to set.
“Cigarette?,” she asked. I nodded in agreement and lit up two Marlboro Smooths while I sat on the car’s trunk. It was getting windier by the minute. She nestled up closer to me. We started playing with each other’s fingers, running them over each other’s hands and finally, she began wandering too far upward for comfort. I shook my head and tried to maneuver away from her, but she got even closer. “It’s okay—,” she softly said. New hands slowly climbing up scarred arms; breathing getting heavy, heart racing from anxiety, and then—, acceptance. A soft kiss. A new Lover—, The Girl with the Epic Tattoos—, is finally here.
Back at my place, we kept getting closer as our lips stayed locked. We kissed on the living-room floor as minute after minute passed by. Eventually, her clothes began coming off one piece at a time. Tattoo-covered arms and back, barbell piercings, and jet-black hair that nearly flowed down to her waist—, it was all so picturesque. We moved up to the couch and it was there that all the visions of intense love came crashing back in a tidal-wave of feeling. Soon afterwards, I began explaining how I didn’t want to come on too strong, that we should just take things slowly.
“No,” she willfully said. “I want you to smother me.” That was all she had to say. A fire ignited inside myself and I thought back to what it truly meant to do that to someone else and how it felt to have it done back in return. I wondered if she really knew what she was asking for. Either way, I took her words to heart and started acting accordingly—, more sleepovers, more notes, more everything. We couldn’t get enough of each other and for that, I credited my past missteps as merely ill-timed attempts at romantic gestures. This was a new day—, a new life. I could barely remember what had come before.
Things escalated to scorching new levels of ecstasy for both of us. We kept things pretty new and interesting on a regular basis; leather stiletto boots, backseat sessions in the parked car outside, and making out in the maintenance closet at work. On what seemed to be another normal night for us, we were again in the parking lot out front and fogging up the windows with our heavy breathing. I needed air so I slightly opened up the back door though didn’t plan on the inside light being so bright, illuminating everything within.
“Sorry—,” I said, trying to shut the door. “Leave it,” she suggested.
“What if someone walks by?” She said nothing, smiled, and just resumed onward with the routine.
It didn’t matter how many mistakes either of us had made—, we’d found that we were very in tune with one another. She was a different sort of sexy—, our movements were a different type of love-making. I began wondering if everything that’d happened to the two of us didn’t directly lead us into each other’s lives. Maybe fate was still alive and well after all.
We decided to go out to a nearby bar with some co-workers one night. The atmosphere reminded me of older times but I could tell she wasn’t that comfortable. We sat side-by-side as she took out a pen. She brought the drink menu closer to us and wrote O.O.M.E. in the corner. I stared at it for a while before feeling a smile taking shape. I looked at her and mouthed the words silently; Out...Of...My...Element. She smiled back and nodded.
“I’m pretty tired tonight,” I began to say to the entire group, planning our escape home and back into each other’s arms. “I think I should get going.”
“Okay—,” she followed up. “Then that’s it for me too.” We were good with each other like that—, knowing what we’d both feel without having to explain too much. We related to one another through a type of shared-introversion.
That autumn, she started school again and was taking nursing classes three days a week. I made sure to wake up early in the mornings and iron out her white dress clothes so that I could place the patches on them in their appropriate spots.
“All set,” I’d say to myself, laying out the lab coat with pride on the ironing board before trying to make her breakfast in bed. At night, I’d flip through her college books and begin recording the assigned chapters so she could follow along as she listened through headphones later on. Sooner or later, we’d have to break apart and wait for another day to come around before seeing each other again. “You know what it’s like, leaving you?,” I’d ask. “It’s like there are two separate worlds—, yours and mine—, and when we’re both asleep and dreaming, we meet on this bridge we’ve created that connects us together.”
“That’s perfect,” she replied. We held onto each other as tightly as possible—, physically and emotionally. We’d both been through our own battles with broken relationships and we knew very well to treasure the good times we were having together.
The honeymoon stage was well on its way with us. In-between reading aloud our favorite books or stories to each other, we’d play our favorite movies, songs, and shows. The only heaviness we’d feel would be when dusk would come around and she’d have to sometimes leave to go back home.
“See you on our bridge tonight,” she’d say with a smile. With that, she’d be through the front door and headed down the stairs outside my apartment only to return less than twenty-four hours later. Things had turned around and I was finally feeling the warmth of love on my shoulders once more.