Summer Skin
Squeaky
swings and tall grass
The longest shadows ever cast
They had met in the park and only by accident.
It wasn't a place they went not to remember Marissa but to escape her.
It was the in-between place, where there was neither their memories of Marissa to bump into nor the place where other people grieved over her.
It was just somewhere to escape her and somehow they had managed to bump into each other there.
He had a cigarette in his hand and stood leaning up against the pole of a swing, an empty one. He was completely oblivious to the world around him, stuck in his own thoughts and Ryan was thankful that this time they weren't memories.
Summer had a bracelet in her hand. Pushing the beans around between her fingers, also deep in thought.
She had tapped her finger on his shoulder and he spun around more then a little jumpy.
She smiled at him and he tried to smile back.
Both of their smiles needed to make sense.
I don't
recall a single care
Just greenery and humid air
And then, after that moment, the rest of the summer seemed to fly by. The first six weeks after Marissa's death was not as long as they had imagined it would be.
They never told anyone of their little exchanges and of course never planned to.
Somehow they were never uncomfortable in public together with their friends and family around, they never felt attracted conventionally to each other but the time they had together helped.
It relieved all the tension he built up trying not to punch something and it relieved all her tension from trying not to cry everyday all day.
He never told Seth and she only whispered her please for forgiveness to Marissa.
They met at the park and went for walks just talking by themselves or at a motel, sex, just by themselves.
There was no foreplay, just straight at it, clothes off, tension building sex.
On the
night you left I came over
And we peeled the freckles from our
shoulders
Our brand new coats so flushed and pink
And I knew
your heart I couldn't win
Then, the end of summer came and the last night before Summer left and summer ended they talked after climax.
She told him that she had to leave and he told her he would have never begged her to stay. That was Seth's job.
She asked if it meant anything more to him and he said a perfect no.
She smiled and said that was good, she loved Seth.
Cause the seasons change was a conduit
That was the end of the affair with Summer.
And we left our love in our summer skin
Both of them.
