Four.

My parents always used to take me everywhere when I was younger, you’d think that would be a
good thing but most of our trips ended up traumatizing me for years. I do remember this one trip, they
took me to meet this woman who my father used to know quite well (by the look in my mother’s eyes
he probably had quite a history with her) and met a boy which features I was only used to seeing on
fictional books.

Ten. I saw him fall on his knees as he tried too hard to grab a hold of the dirty baseball and all I could
do was laugh. His jeans had ripped and his cheeks were covered in dirt, I ran over eventually of course
and held a hand out to him only to have it slapped away. I laughed again.

Fifth-teen. He was crying, Jesus Christ the guy was crying, and everything about that gave me chills. I
didn’t care on how odd his third eye looked when tears ran down from it or how small orbs started
appearing around us (probably penetrating the thinner walls), no, I cared that he was in pain. And there
was nothing I could really do to stop it. First time he ever broke my heart.

Eight-teen. His eyes were flickering as he talked, all three of them, the light emitting from the night
lamp next to us making the pale blue of his pupils seem almost white. I’m pretty sure he was rambling
about something he thought he knew more about than I did, which was a real longshot unless it had to
do with his skating career- but I didn’t care, it was nice hearing him talk with such confidence. I
watched him from my spot on the bed as he moved his left hand around to match his words and I
carelessly reached over to grab his right, playing with his pale fingers. Now aware that my attention was
elsewhere, he leaned in- placing a chaste kiss over my lips, the gesture was enough to make the corners
of my mouth curl up into a smile and I closed my eyes, waiting for more.