And now everything seemed okay, lost in the speckled blue of his eyes. I liked the look of my hand next to his. Liked the way his teeth were crooked and touched his bottom lip. Closed my eyes and saw Rick on the other end of his gun, felt Toby clutching me and shaking. I guess Sean had saved me, but Sean had been neatly swallowed up by Wasaga Beach. Wouldn't it be nice if we all had a Wasaga Beach to go to?
Pine needles crunching under our sneakers, and I followed him through the darkness to his van, my hand in his. I watched his long strides and licked my lips, tasting my lipstick. The conversations and the laughter of the others was growing fainter, coming in and out like a distant radio station, the signal weak.
I could smell pot and Jay took out a fat little joint from his pocket.
"Want a hit, Emma?" He only ever called me Emma when we were alone, and my name sounded more intimate than any endearment the way he said it. I looked at the joint, looked at him as he lit it with a practiced hand, and I nodded, the pungent odor already in my nose.
I inhaled, coughed like crazy while he laughed. Kissed him as time slowed down. My taste buds had never been so sharp. I could anticipate every move before he made it. I could see the music in the air. I knew for a fact that I wasn't the girl everyone was used to me being. Beyond a fact, beyond a shadow of a shadow.
He kissed me, long and slow, and the unreality of it all was driving me mad. Jay. Who could have ever thought? He laughed, his mouth open and I could count his teeth, and I laughed, too.
"Want to go eat?" he said, and I nodded, suddenly more hungry than I had ever been, the thought of the experience of eating seemed alive with endless tantalizing possibilities. We stepped from the van, and I thought I could see every leaf moving in its own separate arc. So I hadn't died in the school that day, it was so I could experience this moment, and the next, and the next.
We got in his car and somehow he drove when I could barely handle sitting there, the music visible and crowding me in the small front seat, the lyrics taking on new and unseen resonances. He turned to me and smiled for one long moment, and I felt again the whisper of the bullet as it grazed my cheek.
The Mexican restaurant was super bright, the fluorescent lights overhead overwhelming and we squinted against them. I couldn't help staring at the straight perfectly black hair of the Mexican men behind the counter, and by the smell of the food alone it was as though I could taste it. I watched Jay laugh, watched the way his head tilted back and his eyes strayed to the side.
Quesadillas, guacamole, burridos, tacos, the Spanish names all similar to the French I always heard when I went to Montreal. I dipped the hard corn chips in the salsa, felt every spice explode on my tongue, felt the rich nutrients entering directly into my blood stream.
Back in the car, the road and the air going by so smoothly, nothing to impede them. The lights of the other cars floating in space, and somehow Jay knew what to do. I didn't. I just let it go by me. He put his hand on my knee and I could feel it against my skin, and from there the sensation went everywhere.
"I could drive you home," he said, and I read different meanings into the offer, it split into layers of dark and light. So many meanings I couldn't keep them all straight, and I shook my head in the confusion.
"No," I whispered, "no,"
So we drove on, past my small neighborhood and all the small expectations of me, and out into the beyond, beyond the ravine and all that it contained. People were still there, still in the same spots, and I realized that hardly any time had passed at all.