

LipsI had my brother change the password on my laptop for me this morning to keep me from compulsively checking my email. I also gave him my cell phone to hide. This was after I purposely left it at work to prevent me from flipping the thing open every five minutes, hoping for a new text, and watching my thumb dance around the keys, debating on whether or not to initiate a chain of texts that I know will never be linked by hers.Lips
Anyway, I left the conniving machine at my desk at work so I would stop looking for imaginary messages, only to drive back to retrieve it in a manic, sleep deprived daze in the middle of the night. I hav


Ophelia Believes6The day Laila got her license awoke a new era for the two of us. After pacing back and forth over my porch for a good hour, the sight of her gripping the steering wheel of her rusty little buick made me want to leap as my heart did. We couldn't have made more perfect plans-a tribute Beatles band was playing just a few towns over, and she was taking us to the show in celebration. Thank God nothing ever goes as planned. Laila's love for animals, coupled with her utter disregard for people did not sway as she pulled onto the road. She complacently hummed a Monkees tune as she maniacally swerved to avoid fluttering leaves that could have eaOphelia Believes6


Ophelia Believes5Laila's aunt's apartment never changed, save the state of the people it inhabited. When the off white light switch, tainted by Gina's year's of chain smoking, was flicked, a dim glow of what was probably a twenty year old light bulb revealed a very plain room. A ruffled corduroy couch adorned in cigarette burns stood caddy cornered to the right, opposite a historic bookshelf that was home to Laila's records, the ghosts of her heartache. The living room smelled the way your pee does after you've had a third cup of coffee, which only strengthened as you ventured to the left into what was known to them as their kitchen. In all the years I'd knowOphelia Believes5


Ophelia Believes 4Not that this is about me, but it might help to better understand Laila. Our families had quite a few parallels; I knew about as much about my parents as a blind guy could know about a tricycle. My Uncle Rory, who had spent 18 years thus far looking after me, had only ever told me that my Mom and Dad weren't married. I had exactly two pictures of them, spread quite apart in years. In one, they're about 18 or 19, sitting outside of a brick building, looking happier than I'd ever seen anyone in my life. I don't know where my dark hair came from, because they both just about blinded me with their bright blonde heads.Ophelia Believes 4