Bury Me(23)

He shrugs easily, like it’s no big deal the people who work here talk about me behind my back.

“So you knew from workplace gossip?” I scoff.

“Initially, yes. But I asked you a few weeks ago if it was true and you told me so yourself. Something about an accident when you were little. Five, I think. You didn’t tell me much, just that you’ve been petrified of water ever since.”

My arms drop to my sides while I mull this over. Something seems familiar about what he’s telling me. I don’t know if it’s because some part of me remembers it, or because I remember telling him. I just know, deep down inside, that there was something that happened in water when I was little. I don’t know why it feels right, it just does. It also leaves me with more questions. Why can I see myself swimming? Why, when I close my eyes, can I almost feel the water sluicing against my skin, feel my muscles burn as I do laps, know exactly what it feels like to pull my arms through the water and exactly what it looks like to open my eyes when I’m under there? How do I just instinctively know what all of this feels like and looks like if I it’s not true? It’s the same kind of thing with my stupid braided hair and all of the ugly dresses in my closet. I just know when it’s not right, when it feels alien.

“Why did you look at me like you hated me that day you dropped off flowers for my father?” I ask next. Clearly if I we had personal conversations before the accident, he must not have hated me that much.

He looks away from me, but I see his cheeks redden and I know it’s from embarrassment and not because he’s crafting a lie.

“What do you want me to tell you, Ravenna?” he whispers as he stares down at his feet and kicks a stray rock away with the toe of his work boot.

“I want you to tell me the truth!” I shout at him, throwing my hands up in exasperation. “My parents have done nothing but lie to me these last few days and I’m sick and tired of it. I guess I just assumed that you were different. I figured that someone who would save a girl from drowning herself might actually be a good guy.”

He runs a hand nervously through his hair and puffs out a huge breath of air through his lips. I’m immediately hit with a memory of kissing him. It was dark outside and we were on the front porch. There was lightning off in the distance and the night was hot and muggy. His lips were soft and like nothing I’d ever felt before. I remember doing it because I knew it was wrong and that excited me. I was angry. So angry. Filled with so much hatred that I wasn’t sure if I wanted to hit him or kiss him. I went with the kiss and instead of it making me feel better, it only made me madder because I liked it so much. I didn’t want to like it. I did it to prove a point and it all backfired. I remember slamming the door in his face, laughing at the shock on it.

“Jesus,” he mutters, interrupting my thoughts and pulling my eyes away from his lips. “Okay, fine. You want to know the truth? The truth is, I’ve had kind of a thing for you for two years and you’ve never given me the time of day that entire time. That is, up until two weeks ago. All of a sudden, you started seeking me out when I was working. I should have known something was off, but I was too damn happy that you were finally talking to me. You were so different from the girl I’d been watching from afar for two years. Different from the rumors I’d heard and the things I’d seen with my own eyes.”

“Different how?” I whisper, unsure if I want him to answer since I’m starting to realize that I might have been a really awful person before all of this happened.

“I don’t know, just different. Your hair was always perfectly done and your dresses were always perfectly pressed. You walked around with your nose up in the air like you were better than everyone,” he informs me.

“Well, that explains why you had a crush on me. I sound like a wonderful person,” I reply sarcastically.

“Ravenna, I’m a guy. And you are very, very beautiful. My crush was only skin deep, believe me.”

That makes me feel so much better.

“Until two weeks ago,” he continues. “Then you were just…completely different than what I thought. You wore your hair down whenever you came to see me and you always had on jeans and a t-shirt, like right now. For the first time, I didn’t feel like I was a complete loser not worthy of your time. It was definitely weird that you started doing this out of the blue, but I wasn’t about to question it. I liked spending time with you. I guess I was pissed that day I dropped off the flowers because, all of a sudden, you were back to being the snobby girl with the perfect hair and the perfect clothes. And you clearly wanted nothing to do with me all over again.”