Have you ever smelled something, like a certain brand of sunscreen that just brings you back to that great summer at the beach with your four best friends. The summer you discovered boys in swimsuits. You saw how their tanned, muscled bodies glistened with sweat under the hot August sun. Then that reminds you of the summer after you graduated from high school. You're on the same beach, but with new, different friends. Everyone's wild and crazy, of course. It's time to let your hair down. You see possibly the same sweaty boys, but they've grown. You seem to notice and appreciate more about them. The way their muscles ripple under their skin. The little trail of hair from their belly buttons to the elastic band in their shorts make you smile with curiosity. The those thoughts get you thinking about your first true love and how he broke your heart just a week before Christmas and you had to fight the crowds and lines to return the expensive V-necked sweater you had bought him as a Christmas gift. The those feelings bring you to the present and you think about the person you love now. How every time he looks at you, your heart jumps, it really truly jumps. And how every time he touches you, you ache so terribly to hold him close to you and never, ever let go. How every time he opens his mouth to say something, you listen so attentively to every word that escapes his lips, that you'll never forget them. But he doesn't belong to you. Then you just smile at yourself and ask your friend to rub more sunscreen on your back..........
written December 1998 |
