Making Sense

“I tried to tell you before I left

That I was screaming under my breath:

You are the only thing that makes sense

Just ignore all this present tense.”

- It's Beginning To Get To Me by Snow Patrol

--

I’m sitting here trying to read in an attempt to crush the urge to grab my bag and run the hell off this bus. Gulping down the panic and the guilt every couple of seconds, I look up and around at the town I’m skipping out on. Except right now, I’m staring at my girlfriend who was supposed to get an earlier bus. My mouth goes dry and I lose all words. My mind blanks with the shock and the disbelief and an odd twinge of hope.

She wasn’t supposed to see this, me, leaving. No one is ever supposed to see me leave - that would mean a certain word I’ve always had trouble saying would have to be said, and I don’t have enough experience with that word to tell her just how much she means to me (and I’ve clearly spent too long in this place because even my thoughts ramble.) In this crazy mental institute of a town, she’s the only thing that makes sense to me. Ever since I took that first step inside her room and saw the books. God, all those books…and I’m losing my nerve and I still haven’t said a goddamn word to her.

“Hey.”

And apparently I can’t even choke out a greeting so she’s forced to do it first. Okay, here goes.

“Hey.”

She gestures, “Can I sit?”

“Uh, sure, sit. I thought you took an earlier bus.” Christ, why am I talking so much? And blurting that out? She can see that duffle bag next to you and then you say that? Jesus, if you hadn’t already screwed this up Mariano…

“My first class got cancelled today.” she explains smoothly, clearly trying to ignore the growing panic at the bag and the awkwardness that I know she’s feeling. She’s always been a relatively open book to me and I know that right now she has no idea what’s going on but I’m pretty damn sure she’s blaming herself anyway.

Right, time to respond.

“Oh. So what's been going on?”

“Nothing much. Fran died.” How can she be so calm while carrying on this increasingly inane and evasive conversation? I know that if she asked what I was doing right now, I’d tell her. I also know I wouldn’t go through with it. That’s why I’m half-hoping, half-praying she will. Bring the whole leaving thing up that is.

“I heard.” A second passes and my heart leaps at the possibility of an opportunity to stop the charade by way of a guilty confession on my part or hers. Preferably hers.

“I went to her funeral yesterday.” My heart sinks as I realises she’s waiting for it to come from me and I know there’s no way I can tell her how I'm feeling about this without a prompt from her. I’d never get the words out. I can barely get these words out.

“Luke went, too.”

“I saw him there.” Still so calm, continuing like she can’t see the bag even though it’s practically staring her in the face. I have no idea how she’s not falling apart. I know I am.

“Yeah?”

“He was in the back.”

A beat passes and my heart constricts and my hands start shaking.

I want so much to say something eloquent, something that signals that I need her to ask, to stop me from doing what I really don’t want to do. All I can get out is:

“I can't go to the prom. I couldn't get tickets.”

And all she can say is:

“Oh.”

“Sorry.” I say, and I mean every last syllable of it. For everything I know this will put her through. And it’s this thought that jars me and my fight instinct kicks in. I’m going to give this all up, her up, for what? The indignity of going through a class that won’t matter in the end? I realise the complete idiocy of the situation and I’m just about to blurt it all out when the bus shudders to an unhealthy stop.

“This is my stop.”

“Okay.” Just as I’m thinking, to hell with the running, just tell her, she interrupts:

“So, you'll call me?”

The words are almost out, about the swan and Wal-Mart and Summer School and her making sense. And then I look at her, really look at her and wish I wasn’t the monumental screw up that I am, that I could ignore the crap I’ve put her through already, so that for once in my pathetically petty life I could be worth a damn.

“Yeah, I'll call you.”

I know I don’t deserve her but I’ve already deluded myself this far, why should I stop now? I’d pictured anger or sadness or (though I’m ashamed to admit it) pleading; so it doesn’t quite register that none of that has happened. I don’t realise the wrong words are out until she’s moving away from me, and all of a sudden I’m screaming under my breath everything I’ve ever wanted to tell her: “I lied! I’m not graduating! I cut down! I love you! Keep me here! Make me stay!” But she’s gone, and I’m going and she never asked me to stay.

She always did make imperfect sense