Truth Doesn't Make a Noise

Sitting on the grass was always weird for me. It was comfortable and it made feel kind of free, and I liked that. Yet I hated the smell and the dreadful feeling I got of having bugs walking all over me until the next day. “Yeah, here’s okay” she said, choosing a spot where there was both sunlight and shade. We were still commenting on how crazy How I Met Your Mother had gotten lately. I used my jacket as a carpet on the hopes of not getting too many bugs after lying there for a while. Remember it’s worthy, I told myself. Hopes up.

“A has issues” she put in. “I know, he calls us and makes like a big deal out of it, we come, he says hi and then he bails” I replied. She nodded with her all-familiar-to-me puzzled smile. I smiled back. Little did she know about our set-up. “Anyway…” she began “We should get together more often” Oh yeah. “All of us, I mean. It’s been, what? Like a month?” All of us, of course. “Yeah, everyone’s been busy with mid-terms and whatnot” I said, trying to kill that topic. I succeeded.

“Oh fuck, look at the sky” A normal person would have been confused by that utterance. The sky was cloudless and its blue was truly intense. Was she pissed or amazed? I, for one, knew she was both and none. “I know. It’s awesome” When I was with her my wittiness shut down completely. “Flawless, it’s flawless. I was so damn sleepy this morning I forgot to bring my camera” This didn’t happen very often, but I was somewhat glad it did. Ugh, her photographs, her paintings, her dancing and drums skills, her quasi parfait French. Pretty annoying, right? It’s kinda why I was there.

“Listen” my voiced apparently raised because she swiftly looked down at me. “I’ve been meaning to talk to you” Now I sounded not so confident. Like myself again. “Really? What’s up?” This was supposed to be rehearsed. “Uhm,” mistake “remember a couple of weeks ago you were going through some stuff?” Now she did. “Oh, is that it? Don’t worry about it, it was nothing” she said, clearly not feeling comfortable talking about herself.

“No, no” I said. Could I be any more scared? “it’s just that I was going through the same, so I thought I’d share it with you” Now she looked confused. Yeah, how did I know we were going through the same stuff if she hadn’t told me anything? Right. We were here based upon sheer assumptions. Creepy stalker. Sloppy stalker.

“You know if you looked up ‘inner issues’ on a Psychology for Dummies my name would probably appear somewhere along that entry, right?” was the best I could come up with. Shut up, shut up already. She shook off her head and the gentle smile that slightly came out. “Carry on” she prompted, her eyes shooting suspicion. “It’s quite simple, actually” I was doing it. “I…” if I didn’t mumble, it hadn’t been so like me “I, I like you” There. Like vomit. I winced, I smiled, I beamed, I wondered. My heart was racing, how original. My thoughts spun in circles, I was ASDFKLHJing. I was relieved. And then came what I was so relentlessly looking forward to, her response:

“Oh”

Wait, what? “Oh”? Seriously?

Awkward silence. Awkward we were and awkward we could be. If only I could punch that silence by listing the things we had in common. How at home I felt when I was alone with her. How I completed her and, as I wanted it to be, she could complete me. How I was willing to soothe her loneliness and self-loathing. How I’d love to compliment and appreciate and praise her every work of art. I really believed she could fly and I believed and hoped she could make me fly with her. But I freaked her out by telling her “I like you”. Fucking great. It was a good thing I kept my “corny” drawer safely locked.

People laughed at me when I subtly suggested the idea of telling her everything. They called me a psycho. Maybe I was. They all said we were far too fucked-up to ever function. Deep inside I knew everyone, to some degree, had a crush on her, girls included. I mean, how could they not, though? They joked about us being like Brangelina but instead of sexiness, we’d be icons of madness and narcissism. And that was exactly the point. That was the reason I was being suicidal. I was no longer that insecure guy who never got the girl because he was too afraid to even tell her. Besides, everyone kind of helped me read –or misread- her signs, so that’s why I was taking a leap. I had the feeling something good would come out of it.

“Wait, where is this coming from?” She didn’t seem upset or too surprised. Please don’t play that hard-to-get card on me, not now, I thought. “I like you like you” I repeated. “Can’t you really tell where this is coming from?” Ouch. She looked embarrassed, like she had obliviously stepped on a baby. Like she did harm and didn’t mean it at all. She said a couple more things I simply blocked out.

I got it.

She lit a cigarette, took three deep drags off of it and quickly put it out as she kept looking at the sky. It occurred to me that the sky might have changed for her and I felt weird because I didn’t mean for it to happen but I had to do it for me. I looked up at the sky and I saw it differently, too.

I know she wished I hadn’t told her that. I knew she cared about me a lot. She knew we had fun in a way that nobody really could top. And she would miss that. So would I. But I felt relieved. Even though I’m not a baby I think I had been stepped on. Not right there, anyway. But long ago, with that first awesome moment which had only been special for me. But she got off me and I liked it. BecauseI made her. She messed up her long black hair, smiled awkwardly and then she left and told me we would see each other around.

I felt the urge to stand up and go. My jacket had done a very poor job, I guess. I already sensed bugs all over me. And this time they were also in my gut and in my head. I was aware that fucking feeling wouldn’t go away so fast. But I smiled at the thought of them being gone soon. For good. 
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Así como este año hay una entrada en portugués también tenía que haber una en inglés. Gracias a mi amigo @itsyeison