The Sun's Great Descent

The only thing I can manage to do in this moment is look at the sky, at the sun, at that over-encompassing plaster of color, and grand, imposing ball of light that makes its steady descent to the great below. It’s the only thing I can manage as the smell of nicotine curdles in the air, swells from Jalen’s lips, then back to mine, settles in that fabric of the car seats with a familiarity that I’m starting to mourn growing used to.

“We can’t keep doing this, Eli,” is how Jalen starts this conversation, low, with a timbre that’s light and gentle. “We can’t keep avoiding whatever this is.”

“There’s nothing to avoid.” The words come out automatically, almost like the blare of an alarm, a designated chime of a clock. “There’s nothing to talk about,” is what comes out next as I continue to stare at the pinks and oranges that swirl hazardously in the sky. It’s pretty, despite everything, the world is so damn pretty despite it all.

“There’s always something to talk about, always with you, always with me. We know there’s something going on here, don’t we?”

The oranges and pinks are beginning to darken, ripen into something calmer, almost like a peach laid out in the summer heat, crumpled and runny. It makes me laugh something abrupt, something almost hysterical.

“Nothing’s going on.”

“If that’s true, you can look at me and say that.”

His voice is trembling with a tinge of hurt, but I won’t let down because the sky is the prettiest it’s ever been. It would be a shame not to look, not to gaze at its mingling colors and big ball of light that’s starting to dim in its great shine.

My breath comes out shakily, watery, but it goes unacknowledged.

“There’s nothing more to say.”

“You know that’s not true, Eli.”

“There’s nothing more to say.”

“Can you please just look at me? Look at me and say that.”

But the sky is so beautiful, and the sky is beginning to darken, and the moon is beginning to take the space the sun once occupied. It would be a shame to miss such a sight, wouldn’t it? Would be a damn shame.

“Please,” Jalen begs, voice churning into something dreadful. “Please, please, please. If you look at me and say all of this is nothing, then I’ll leave. I’ll leave and forget we ever had this conversation.”

“You won’t. We both know you won’t.”

This is all I can manage. I swear this is all I can manage.

“All you have to do is look at me, look me straight in the eyes and tell me there’s nothing going on here.”

My hand begins its antics, starts to twitch, ready to wring any kind of fabric that it can manage to twist. It starts at my pants leg, then to the softness of my hoodie, then to the thinness of my shirt. Jalen notices, I can tell, takes my hand in his and squeezes a grip I wish wasn’t so warm, that I wish didn’t remind me of that descending ball of light in the sky ahead.

He swirls his thumb around each of my knuckles, travels his fingers down my wrist, then back up my palm. He’s trying his hardest, I know, to get me to cave, to look in his eyes and admit something that I’ve tried my hardest to ignore despite it all.

“We kissed, didn’t we? In this same spot, in these same car seats. Are you saying that meant nothing to you?”

Something heavy swirls in my gullet at the fact he mentioned it, at the fact the memory lay so heavy in his mind.

“I’m not saying anything.”

And Jalen laughs a pretty, sorrowful thing, despite it all.

“Well, I can work with that. I damn sure can work with that.”

And a laugh escapes me too because Jalen’s always been like that, stubborn, a force of reckoning, a boy who speaks his thoughts and doesn’t let them just fade into the air. He makes them stay, he makes you sit with them and settle with them like that same all-knowing stench of nicotine.

He gives my hand a small squeeze before speaking up again.

“You remember that night, I know. When we got drunk and decided to wait out the intoxication, at that moment, I couldn’t help myself with all the liquor dancing in my stomach. It laid the truth bare, though, and you know it did because I couldn’t help but stare at you and think you were the prettiest boy I’d ever seen. And I couldn’t help how much I wanted to kiss you, and I did.”

“Just stop, Jalen.”

“But why? If it’s nothing, you shouldn’t care so much. If it was nothing, you would’ve left a long time ago. You’re still here after everything. You’re still letting me hold your hand after everything. You’re still sitting in the same car we kissed in, still not looking at me.”

“There’s no point, Jalen. No point rehashing old memories that mean nothing to me.”

And I foolishly, automatically turn back to him, see his lovely face and lovely eyes, and regret it instantly, but it’s already too late, so I keep spewing words that serve nothing to me.

“Jalen, it means nothing.” An abrupt bark of laughter escapes my lips. “We were drunk and stupid. It was a mistake that shouldn’t have happened. And despite all the liquor, I remember that night—”

“You kissed me back.”

“I know,” I yelled out, frustrated, because I fucking knew that, I knew that better than anyone. “I know, and I wish I never did.”

“We both know that’s a lie.”

I look back out to the sky, and laugh, laugh at how it’s darkened completely, laugh at how persistent Jalen is and how that’s always stirred something warm within me. The sun is gone, and the moon takes its place as only a fraction of its size, but it glows just as brightly, just as brilliantly as its counterpart.

“I love you, Eli.”

And love is such a strong word, isn’t it? A vibrant word that could never go unnoticed, despite the other great words you could surround it with. It’s just as vibrant as the sunsets, as the stars, as the clouds that roam the sky and scatter their remnants on the earth below.

I feel him press his lips onto my knuckles, down my palm, and down my wrist. He says “I love you” like a mantra after each press of his lips against my skin. It sends shivers up my spine like my body is warning me.

But I can’t find it in myself to stop it as he travels up my arms, to my neck, to my cheek. He presses his fingers against my chin, turns my head, and I know it’s over as he presses his lips against mine and smiles despite it all.

It’s as warm as the sun.