Presley and I lay
on the floor with
our legs stretched up on the beam
“I’m dead.” Presley says
“At least you did your flight series” I say.
“You’ll get it.”
“No I won’t”
Presley sits up
and twists her mouth
“You can do it on the floor” she says.
I know.
“It’s all in your head.”
I know that too.
“You’ll get it.”
She uses her foot to
tickle my side
I roll onto my stomach.
“Do you want to get it?”
I can’t see her face
but I don’t really want to.
I answer slowly
“Maybe what I do already
will be enough.”
“And if it isn’t?” she asks.
Maybe that wouldn’t be the worst
thing in the world.
Is having your whole life laid
out before you with every
possible side road
mapped and planned
and realizing that the
map that you helped
make is no longer what you want
but you don’t really know
what it is you want
so you stay quiet
and keep following the map
simply because you
don’t have any better ideas.
I need a better idea.
If what you do becomes
who you are then
does that mean
that is who you were to begin with
or would you have been
someone different if
you chose to do
something else?
WRUDN?
FLPN
I close the phone.
Ben knows he can call me later
after I get home
after I’m finished
torturing my body
He wants to visit,
on his way back home this weekend
and I don’t know what to say.
I hang from the stall bar
lifting my legs
over
and
over
Too bad I can’t make my heart stronger the same way.
I consider asking Mel,
who has picked me up from
the gym to
attend the float committee
meeting she signed me up for
without even asking.
She says that she won’t let me
miss out on my senior year
even if she has to tie me up with a rope
and throw me in her trunk.
It’s just easier to go with her.
She is talking about some guy
in her physics class who may or may
not ask her out.
“What do you think of TJ?” she asks.
“Who?”
“TJ, duh. He’s totally cute and if you
tried talking to him he might get up
the nerve to ask you out.”
I shrug. “Not my type.”
Mel laughs at this. “How do you
even know what your type is unless
you actually communicate with a
male besides your dad and your coach?”
She has a point.
“Will you try talking to him tonight?”
She pushes out her bottom lip
and lets her chin quiver. “For me?”
“Tonight?”
“Yep! I signed him up too!”
I should have known.