held on tightly, anyone

[basilica]

She wonders what it means that her heart beats sideways, as if trying to slip through the narrow space between her ribs. Like it’s pulling in his direction, drawn as if by magnets. She is so terribly young, oblivious, grateful to have a friend. She thinks to ask if he’ll still be her friend when they go their separate ways, when their respective parents come to fetch them and there is nowhere else for them to walk together. But she doesn’t, catches the question between her teeth instead.

And she allows herself to be distracted by the idea of his friend. How she doesn’t like strangers but she’s not afraid of them either. She nods like she understands, though she’s not certain she does. She knows that she is wary of strangers because sometimes they look at you and call you beautiful and then tell you that you shouldn’t have come. Sometimes strangers are your father and you love them but don’t know how to tell them.

She thinks about his question a long time, averting her gaze to the ground as they walk. She feels suddenly careful, like she should pick both her steps and her words carefully. But she has no inclination to protect her heart. She does not know yet how terrifying vulnerability can be, so when she looks up at him again, her gaze is plain and honest.

“Sometimes,” she confesses on a whisper. Her remark had been almost light-hearted when she’d said it initially. Merely trying to relate, understand, sympathize. She is quieter now, though, when she has to confront the truth in it.

“Sometimes I get scared that not everyone is nice.” She admits this to the ground and then rolls her shoulders in a kind of shrug. And then she conjures up a slanted grin, glancing at him out of the corner of her eye. “Don’t tell my mom.” Murmurs it like some kind of private joke and then exhales a breath of bell-song laughter.

heaven's gate had such
eloquent graffiti

basilica