I was going to include this in Heartbeat Come Undone, but it waxed more NJBC than first intended. Damn you, Liverpudlian legends, for reminding me that four is better than two and certainly better than one. Title and lyrics both from songs by The Beatles, 'Lucy In The Sky With Diamonds' and 'With A Little Help from My Friends' respectively.
Enjoy.
Tangerine Trees & Marmalade Skies
I get by with a little help from my friends
They lay here aged eleven, breasts budding and voices breaking and giggly from champagne.
I get high with a little help from my friends
They lie here aged twenty one, and the star that they make - heads together, legs tucked up or curled under or straight out in front - hasn't changed, only the way they look at it. Blair lay beside Nate so they could hold hands, Chuck on his other side with the two dark heads together and Serena accusing them of plotting telepathically. Her golden hair mingled with Nate's, the scent rising all around them; summertime. Serena's hair has always smelt like summertime.
Now, Blair occasionally smacks her erstwhile one-and-only when his stoned, pretty mouth doesn't hang with his stoned, pretty brain and his big blue eyes make too much of nothing. Her opposite's fingers overlap their boundaries and stroke her throat, but she doesn't bristle or struggle or shriek perv! like the Holly Golightly of yore. The halo of brown around her head mixes with Serena's, a step away from black and gold which prompts Nate to churn out a few lines of a corny song about fish and stars that makes Chuck roll his eyes.
They've been through too much not to respect days like this: betrayal lies sex deceit love heartbreak heartache heart attack, all rolled up in the petty things that life still throws at them like essays and share prices.
Do you need anybody
The dreamers high on the hill in that summer - when nighttime still seemed to crackle with the promise of every footstep - were drowned in the sea by conceited thirteen and fifteen and nineteen year olds, fucking each other and skinny dipping and licking salt and tequila off each other (because, to be honest, everyone has done each other by now, or at least thought about it).
I need somebody to love
They are who they were when, 'when' being who knows. Life is screwed up, like blue skies and rain clouds, and maybe they weren't supposed to fall in love or out of it or be human, just remain the carbon copies of picture books they were the last time they lay on this hill, staring up at the same sky with different thoughts as to its purpose.
Could it be anybody
Nate.
Serena.
Girls.
Boys.
I want somebody to love
Chuck.
Sea.
Blair.
Sky.
Maybe the game changes, but the players are still the same.
Fin.