(no subject)

what do you do when time doesn't let you forget
every so often a girl from my childhood appears in my dreams

but it is not just the memory of her which disturbs me
I mean it makes sense that I would remember her

it is the details of the memory which get me
the smell of her hair while she sat on my lap
when we were both eleven years old
the softness of her lips at fourteen
and
the taste of her tears at sixteen

in a strange way
she was sort of my first love
but not
I suppose it all started that day when I was eleven

we had known each other for a few years before that
but I have no specific memories until that point

it was a miserable winter day pouring outside
as was the custom in our orthodox Jewish community
on Saturday afternoons we would meet after lunch
to study Talmud for a couple of hours then go to a friends house to play

I had stayed behind at the rabbis house
to finish a discussion which was interesting me
afterwards I walked quite some distance to where my friends were
or were supposed to be
only to find out they had gone to another house
back the other direction from where I had started
so I walked back
by the time I met up with them
I was soaked through and through
my Burberry trench coat weighed a hundred pounds
and everyone was already absorbed in a game of sorry
my friends mother hung my coat in the bathroom to dry
and I sat back in a chair and watched the game
glad to be inside and ever so slowly drying off

she was at the house, visiting my friends sister
she came out from the kitchen and sat on my lap
and we talked

up to that point I was feeling rather left out
a soaking wet pariah not very included
I realized then it wasn't my friends intention
just a separation my mind drew
after a long walk in the pouring rain
that still had me shivering

I never understood nor asked to be honest
why she came and sat on my lap
despite the fact that I was soaking wet
but she did
and when the rain let up
I walked her home

she kissed me on the cheek
and that was the beginning

but of what
even today I don't really know what

we were never really friends
our social circles did not interact that much

for the next couple of years
our interactions were pretty much limited
to an awkwardly comfortable walk home
it became something of a ritual with us
about once a month
as that seemed to be the frequency
in which our circles interacted

I enjoyed those walks
and the kiss on the cheek
that always ended them
but never thought too much about it

we were of the age
where even that would be looked down upon
as being too familiar
by the community as a whole

then I switched schools and went to a secular school
then the next year I switched again
entirely by coincidence she left the Jewish school
and we found ourselves again in the same school
but this time the social circle was much smaller

of course we were both striking out from the community
into the great wide world of gentiles
while we often would sit of the back steps
sneaking cigarettes
and talking about how different this world was
we pretty much didn't interact at school

she was in the good girl crowd and I was in the bad boy crowd
whatever it was that we had seemed to come from that old world
but remain separate from both

ours was an intimate but infrequent friendship
we were both always looking in other directions
when we were fourteen, her family hosted a fundraiser
at their house, and of course, as the scion of the family
I got dragged along quite unwillingly
but upon arrival she rescued me and we slipped away upstairs to her room
talked a bit I helped her with some of her homework
and one thing leading to another
we ended up stealing kisses hidden under her bed

again time passes I cant really explain it
why I never pursued it further nor why she did not either

it was something always unspoken between us
I guess in a way we were both escape valves for the other
and left it at that

then she moved to DC and from there who knows
I lost track of her then though occasionally I hear news of her older brother
but I can still recall our goodbye as if I am still standing there
kissing the tears off her cheeks