Broken Glass, Broken Hearts part 91

Sure enough, as I had warned Tyler, the summer of wooing began, and he and I were dragged to various places to be onlookers as Selena tried to win over Ed. "Drawe," she would call him, and in an either ironic or tacky way, she would draw out this last name of his all the time, while laughing at something that he had said, which was usually not really all that funny. I could tell her would cave some time, she was convincing when she wanted to be, but he was stronger than most of her interests, and he seemed like he wanted quite a while of wooing before he would take it upon himself to ask her out. Which meant, a whole lot of trips to lakes, movies, malls, and concerts for Tyler and I. Which neither of us really minded, since it was basically what we would have been doing anyway, and these were the people that we probably would have been doing it with anyway. Shane and Emily came back in late June, a few weeks after we got out of school, and they sometimes joined us on these excursions, sometimes didn't. They seemed to go on a lot of one day trips, driving six hours to a place where they could ski and then coming back at, like, three AM, or driving eight hours to some beach. Their parents were like that- always wanted to spend time with them, and thought of creative ways to make sure that this happened. Tyler and I joined them on a couple of these, but mostly they just seemed like too much driving for so short a trip.

When I walked into my house, I found my mom dancing around the living

room. The CB remix of I'm Good, I'm Gone by Lykke Li was blasting out of the

living room speakers, and my mom was singing loudly along as she threw

herself around the living room. I laughed, "Hey, mom," I said. She jumped

about eight feet and quickly stopped dancing, grabbing the remote and pressing

pause. "Um," she said, "H-h-hi, Tyler." I shook my head with a chuckle and

walked around her, to my bedroom. About a minute later, the music started

playing again.

I picked up Angela and Selena from Selena's house and we drove down to

the park, where Ed was already sitting on a picnic bench, staring over the play

structure with his headphones in. I walked up behind him and shook his

shoulders, and he jumped. He laughed and pulled out his headphones, "Hey,

guys."

I laughed hysterically as Tyler pushed me on the swings, and Selena and

Ed climbed to the top of the slide, riding down together like eight year olds. I

hung backwards as I swung into Tyler, and he laughed as I slammed into his

stomach. I stayed hanging backwards like that as the swing slowed down,

closing my eyes and feeling my hair move like the water of the ocean. When I

finally came to a relative stop, Tyler knelt down on his knees and smiled

goofily at me as my upside down face hung in front of his. He scrunched up his

nose for a moment and then, in a split-second decision, leaned forward and

kissed me. He pulled away quickly and pushed me again, and I was laughing

again so soon that I barely had time to really register what had just happened,

but the feeling of his lips stung on mine like one of those sour candies you eat

when you're little just for the thrill.

© 2010