Sylvie Negotiations
I was a kid with serious eyebrows
and a deadbeat dad, so it’s probably
not a surprise that I didn’t kiss anyone
for the first time for a long time.
It was complicated. My house was always
such chaos—some weird bearded bartender
that my mom was dating on the couch, or
the leaking take-out containers
crowding each other in the fridge—I didn’t
want people to look at me at school and see
that. I didn’t want to bring anyone home.
Also it wasn’t like there was a line
forming to kiss me, let’s be clear (I can’t stress
the big serious eyebrows enough)
and so I resolutely ignored any hints
from any boys in my orbit until Cal
took me out for ice cream for the third time
that July and straight-up asked
if he could do it. Kiss me. I’d sort of known
it was coming, already weighed out the pros
and cons. Pro: his friend David
was dating my friend Alice May and
now I could stop third-wheeling
their movie nights. Pro: he was cute,
pro: he liked me enough to say
something. Con: he’d probably end up meeting
my mom; con: did I only allow myself to want things
when they were presented to me
on a sensible silver platter? I said
yes. He kissed me. And once I had a boyfriend
I stopped thinking about whether I needed to have
a boyfriend. I liked that too. Would Knox still like me
if he knew what happened with Cal? Would he
think me heartless, think me a murderer, would he even
let me drive him in this van?
I put a pillow
between us, laughing it off, and then it’s two a.m.
and clear that it was me or Knox or the pillow
but not all three, and he’s trying to sleep
with his knees against the wall but I can tell
from his breathing that he’s not sleeping
and what if I turned over? What if I pretended
I was caught in a dream? What if he let me
slip into his arms and said, Sylvie,
do you think that I could kiss you?