10. Claire
10
CLAIRE
C laire’s diary, July 2, 2015.
I found this diary sitting on my bookshelf. I’d completely forgotten about it. I re-read some of the entries. Pages after pages of Belleflower Queen preparation. Sketches of what I think my festival poster should look like. Diagrams of how I plan to wave to the crowd when I ride the float.
I laugh at it now, but have I changed much?
Years later, I’m still chasing the same dream.
I’m not going to make this my “Belleflower Queen” museum piece anymore. I don’t think museums like that even exist.
Now, I just want to use this as a space to write down my thoughts.
And my sins.
Maybe this will be my confessional. Where I can write things no one else ever has to know about.
Like the river and the boys I’ve met there.
It’s funny. You hit puberty and suddenly things like Sooters and different sides of the railroad tracks don’t seem so important anymore.
This summer, I’ve spent nearly every day at the Old Road Bridge. We’ve become a pack: The Promise Sisters and the Sooter Boys (and Loren. Constantly scowling in the distance).
Ransom’s friends are: Craig, Rafael, and Jude. They’re a rowdy bunch, but I find something charming in their foul humor and boyish roughhousing. They add an interesting dynamic to our crew. We stop recycling the same conversations about Belleflower Queens, school, and dressage. The boys want to talk about their trucks, or hypotheticals that usually involve hitting the lottery, or horse training. Jude and Mary-Kate have fiery debates over the renovations on Main Street and the shiny, new changes to Belleflower.
Elsbeth and Rafael are a secret pair. They think we don’t notice when they vanish and spend their time necking by the river.
I spent a lot of my time with Ransom. We sit side by side, watching the river. Sometimes we talk. His grandparents have a constant buzz of old movies playing at their house, so he has a lot of opinions about Clint Eastwood. He picks up odd jobs where he can—stable hand at a couple neighborhood ranches, janitor at a local tavern, and kitchen work at the Equestrian Club. He tells me stories about dinner service that have me laughing until my sides hurt.
Sometimes, we just spend long hours sitting in silence, listening to the stream gurgle and the birds sing and the occasional, sudden burst of our friends’ laughter.
Sometimes, Ransom braids my hair. He hasn’t lost his touch. In fact, he carries a scrunchie around in his pocket at all times, just in case I need it.
I don’t know what we are. Friends? More than that?
Sometimes, when the sun catches on his bare skin or when his fingers are twisted in my hair or when he laughs one of those deep, Ransom laughs…my thoughts drift to places they shouldn’t.
I know they shouldn’t.
I’m a good girl. I know better.
I found a loose board in my bookshelf. I’m going to start hiding this diary in there, just in case.
This is just for me.