Kaleb V2

The dog park across the street was always full with the overflow of students from the cherry juul soaked middle school, concealed with an array of waxy picnic tables and brittle plasma board desks. The park was always home to our waxy eyed group, always too busy exploring the purple haze. Past the dog park was a quaint mini mall occupied by the crackpots and skaters from the upper school. We retreated to the small complex of stores to escape the post-school aggression which seemed to always manifest itself in primitive physical altercations at the Laulani villas sector of the park. We did this so often we became regulars to the McDonalds and Walgreens workers. We began a routine, we got slushies from McDonalds, partly because it was close and also cheaper than the nom nom just down the way. Then we all splurged on a large french fry to share, with the person holding the lowest test score paying for the majority of the total cost. When we returned to the park, we sat in the shade of a large tree and played with the homeless woman's old shopping cart.

In December of eighth grade we had a bit of a social hiccup, we had issues with some of our group members and at some point we found the star nosed critters they secretly planted in the mole hill they insisted we were forming. The group had fractured and we were blindsided. With just a trio of a lanky yet wideset charismatic boy with a bowl cut named Lance, and a small short haired, stoic girl named Kate.

In a desperate attempt to cling onto what I had lost, we kept with that routine we had established. After our last period we had met in front of the administration office in preparation to cling onto whatever social structure we had left. With wounds still fresh, we started to the cross walk in the sea of sweaty blobs of green, blue, and black uniforms, we looked around in the horrid, seemingly artificial sunlight avoiding eye contact so as not to lose sight of the event.

Once we had reached the fast food joint, past the smokers, past the obnoxious skating kids, we got in line and it immediately brought us back. In the eatery we finally struck up a conversation, cracking shallow lighthearted jokes, till we had finally addressed the elephant in our room “We are ok right?” Kate uttered hesitantly “like we made the right decision guys?”

“Maybe?” I interjected “I mean are all still here I guess”

“It just wasn’t worth it to stay.” Lance said as the thinly cut potatoes were dropped into the fryer oil, “I couldn’t put up with it,” said Kate “I don’t know, we were so tight knit it's like the end of an era”

“That’s not inherently bad?” I mentioned “it's gonna be ok, it just might take a while.” We left the restaurant with a better sense of what was to come and the large french fries. During the walk back, the bright white barren sky had become fluffy with round plump clouds, backlit with pastel scarlets and peach with a monochromatic lavender undertone to it all. We all looked at each other spotlit by the cars red behinds, swapping stories talking about how much we needed each other. It wasn’t nice, it wasn’t fulfilling, it didn’t inflate us, it just felt normal, and that semblance of normalcy is what we all needed.

We were so busy conversing, reaffirming our care for one another that we barely touched the food. When we got to the park we leaned up against the tree with an array of different shoes resting on the lower compartment of the shopping cart. We sat there still, content, sustaining ourselves in each other's quiet company as we slowly picked at the stale potatoes. We had spent the day with each other, as the scarlet tone slowly bled out of the sky, we pulled on the yellowed grass while glaring towards the street lights. It felt so long but so short, and we knew as the tree's shadows began to fracture that our day was ending. We said our farewells and walked home.

Walking away was quite hard, but knowing that it was so hard was the first confirmation that I did something right.