I found a shoebox full of mixtapes you made for me over the summer. There were song titles written all over them in blue and purple sharpie, and the tapes with cases usually had childish stickers all over them. Mostly cartoon characters and smiling flowers. On each, there was a strip of masking tape across the front that told me the themes or emotions or special occasions associated with the music held inside the delicate rectangle of plastic.
That was only months ago, but I can’t help but treat the moments like they are memories from my early childhood: precious foggy images and pieces of conversation. Except these memories constantly throb in my mind, and I spend my time laying in bed trying to relive them through dreams. I have another despondent attempt at finding meaning to it: music made up your soul, and you were giving that to me. Or something. Maybe you just thought it was fun.
Summer ended quickly, all the pretty colors blurred with tears in August. The dry weather hardened your skin and itched in your eyelids.. Then I come to the conclusion that I really like to cry. And scream. And drag my fists through the air until I collapse under the weight of growing older. It’s like a bonding experience, really, sitting on your bedroom floor with some safety pins and a razorblade. Examining, evaluating, making suggestions. Like love, but with deformed hearts and bloodied shoulders.
After we hid the evidence, I would hold you close enough that our hipbones kissed and our eyes aligned. And I would breathe, shuddering when you touched my neck.
In early September your voice became more fragile and your eyes went from hazel to a muddy brown. Your freckles faded along with the sunlight and you stopped asking me if I had eaten today. The suicide note was written in black ink on lined paper. It was simple and free of the desperate monologue one would imagine.
You wouldn’t have liked the funeral. The music was boring and predictable. It wasn’t raining, like you said it should, just like It did in that one music video. Your aunt insisted on taking a group photo. “everybody, smile!”
“Lying is art, for me.” you said, mid-June. “Like how writing is for you. Creating situations that never happened, places that don’t exist.”
“And everybody believes you” I said, pseudo-calmly. My fingernails dug into my thighs.
“That’s the best part.”
I think every time I lie, I feel closer to you. I make up fake identities and talk to strangers about how it was like to grow up in Romania. I dye my hair a new color every few months. Sometimes wear one green contact in my left eye, it tells others that I was born interesting. It’s better this way.
I run my fingernails across the sides of the shoebox, slowly, for the familiar chill down my spine. Consider listening to “I’m a Fucking Mermaid”, containing songs about the ocean. Consider taking a nap.
Summer’s gone, now.
