Palm Trees

The boulder was divided. There was red headed Mitch, Jackie and most of the other girls, Derek, and I on one side and everyone else on the other. Mark and his friends, their girls if they had them, and even Blondie. I suppose each side needed someone with weed or they wouldn't have bothered coming. Derek and Blondie rolled joints, but as Derek flicked his lighter open Blondie glanced over.

"Can I borrow a light?" Blondie reached out for it.

Derek lit the joint. He looked around the group for approval.

"Dude, can I use it?" Blondie persisted.

I nodded and Derek tossed it to him. "Doesn't have much oil left in it."

"Thanks," Blondie grumbled.

Derek took a hit off his joint and passed it to Hailey.

The tension began to mellow with our minds. We vaguely recognized we were in two circles.

"How is he?" Red headed Mitch asked.

"He's ok," I lied. He's ok. He's ok because when people ask that's what you're supposed to say.

Mitch started to laugh. He leant forward. "Did you see Mark's face?"

Jackie smiled. "It's swollen to hell."

I laughed half-heartedly, "Yeah I saw."

"Serves him right. Jackass," Derek muttered.

"Just forget about it," I said and changed the subject. "What are you going to do for your birthday Derek?"

"Sal's coming down to take me to a club." His eyes lit up. "It's gonna be sick."

"Sounds fun," I said.

"Dude you got to take me," Mitch pleaded.

"Sorry, Sal said it was just me and him." Derek was in his glory, high and all the attention was on him and his bloated ego.

"Have fun," Jackie said twirling the joint in her fingers.

"How old are you gonna be now?" One of the other girls spoke up.

"Seventeen," Derek said.

The conversation went on. The two different circles became mismatched as some came over to sit by someone else or went to get rolling paper from Blondie, never completely merging.

"I'm going to head home. Night guys," I said.

A chorus of 'night Dana' met me as I stood up. No one offered to come with me so I began my trek.

I never was one to gaze up at the stars, one to reach for them, but that night I looked up. I was craning my neck to spot the constellations Theo had told me about. The story of Icarus came to mind. He was so in love with flying and being in the sun. He loved it so much he went straight for it. The sun is a star after all. When I was sure no one was around and I was far enough away from the power lines I reached out. Maybe I could grab a little one and fly right to the sun.

“Get out!” a shrill shriek echoed in the dark. “Get out!”

“Where do you want me to go?!” a man echoed back.

Another brewing divorce it seemed.

The shrieking continued, “Get out!” Then a loud bang rang out as a door slammed shut.

I flinched at the sound of it. The whole neighborhood heard that one. There were some residual responses of other residents asking for the fight participants to be quiet, not too politely either.

When I turned down my street I saw the boy sitting in my yard. He was looking at his hands which pulled at the brown grass.

God damn it Theo.

I trudged over to him. “Need a cigarette Theodore?”

He looked up, his bottom lip between his teeth contemplating it before he replied, “Theo.”

“Sure, come on.” I said and pulled him up.

“I don’t want to smoke anything.” He dusted himself off. “Just talk with me.”

"Alright." He offered me his arm and I linked mine with his. We walked around the house into the woods.

"Least it's a nice night to be kicked out in," he said. He too craned his neck to keep track of the stars. “You know the Native Americans had a myth that explained the stars. All the night animals of the forest wanted more light to see by.”

“Yeah?”

“Yeah, they went to the Great Spirit who told them to gather the glowing pebbles in the river and put their portraits in the sky. The coyote was late but heard from the raven about what was to be done, so he wanted his portrait to be the biggest. He gathered as many rocks as he could all the way up to the mountain where he was to make his portrait. But when he got there, the other animals had already used so much of the sky.”

“He ruined their portraits didn’t he?”

“He did. His own as well, in his quest for a big enough spot he tripped and all his glowing pebbles scattered into the sky. There’s more to the story, but that’s how the stars got there. I used to look for glowing pebbles in the river behind my first house, but I wanted to keep mine if I ever found it,” he said. He gazed back at his house with a wistful, empty look.

"What happened?"

"I wouldn't pray before bed," he said.

"She kicked you out because you wouldn't pray?"

"Well that and then it escalated. She isn't the brightest woman so I pissed her off."

"Yeah, the whole neighborhood heard that."

"She wanted me to pray for my mom. That God would forgive her sins." He shook his head. "I don't believe in it."

"Me either."

"What kind of author would leave so many loose ends?" he asked. "Who would end such a promising story with utter crap?"

"Someone, but not God."

"No one."

"You don't believe in anything?"

"I don't. This," he motioned all around us, "is an authorless book. Which can be why it's such crap at points and truly miraculous at others. At the end of it all it's an unsatisfying ending, no resolution."

"I think there's something out there when you die. Spirits or something. But the higher powers, no."

"I think it's a comfort for cowards. To not know is too terrifying so there must be someone waiting for you. No one knows, so we all scramble to do something to be remembered for. Something to add to this book. They have to be the first to do this, be the best at that, wage a war on them to create conflict, be the main character."

"Never really thought too much about it."

“I’m always thinking about it,” he said. “If I could just let other people know, the pressure isn’t on. It’s not your job to make a mark in this clusterfuck of past, present, and future. If you want to, do it for you. Do it because you have the need, not the world. No God, spirit, or other world is going to reject you, congratulate you, one way or the other. The world’s going to go on whether you’re in it or not. This world force feeds you this crap about how you have to be remembered, I’m not so sure that’s the whole story.”

“I want to be remembered,” I said.

“That’s not what I’m saying. Everyone is remembered by someone. You don’t need to do something remarkable for that.”

“You miss a point Theo. People want to be remembered forever so their lives mean something.”

“No I don’t miss that point. I choose to ignore it. It’s irrational, nothing can be remembered forever. The world happens too fast for there to be a forever. Isn’t living now enough? It means you breathed this air, you heard people laugh, you’ve seen the stars, you’ve experienced something that made you so happy that your emotions get so confused that you cry. There’s no pressure to make your life mean something. Life has no meaning, maybe because it is its own.”

“Well what about you?” I asked. “Don’t you ever tell yourself the pressure isn’t all on you? I’ve watched you have a panic attack over a missing piece of paper.”

He paused. “It’s different.”

“Is that a coward’s excuse?”

“There’s a difference between responsibility and pressure,” he said. “I have a responsibility. I’m not under pressure. Without that responsibility I could die now and not regret a thing. I just have to get into college. I need to get a good job. I’m going to help my mom.”

We fell silent as we reached the lake. In our meandering we had reached it by pure chance. Theo laid down on the damp shore while the large pebbles in the sand stuck into his back. I joined him, not wanting to miss out on the potential stargazing. But Theo wasn’t there to stargaze. His eyes were shut.

“Dana? What am I going to do?”

“You’ll be fine Theo.”

“I just need to get into college. Full ride...” he trailed off.

“Theo?”

“Yeah?”

“Promise me, that when you get out of here, you take me,” I said. “Even if we aren’t… whatever our weird relationship is called… take me out of here with you.”

“If I get out of here, I’ll take you anywhere, but I can't guarantee it'll be better. Now you promise me."

"If I manage to make it out of here before you, I'll take you."

"Well all right. By the way, our weird relationship is called a couple."

“Shut up. If you have it in you tonight, wanna tell me a fable?”

He began with a sigh, “I have just the one.”

“A lonely fir-tree standeth,

On a height where north winds blow;

It sleepeth, with whitened garment,

Enshrouded by ice and snow.

It dreameth of a Palm-tree,

That far in the Eastern land

Lonely and silent mourneth

On its burning shelf of sand.”

He finished and looked to me. “You and I dream of palm trees too often.”

The pebbles sticking into us were too uncomfortable to lay on for much longer. He helped me up and dusted himself off. Another link of our arms to hold us together as we walked, and we were off. We went our separate ways after reaching the neighborhood. I could only assume he was able to sneak back inside his house since he wasn't at my window.  

Dreaming of palm trees. The meaning was not lost on me. We all want what we can't have and it isn't much better. We can be frozen or burned and not be much happier for either.