Things That Don't Matter

I’m somewhat reluctant to call this story “The End” because in case you hadn’t noticed, the stories about these two have all been out of order and I’ll probably revisit them again somewhere in the earlier stages of their relationship, and who knows, maybe they’ll meet again someday… I personally really like this one, it’s probably my favorite out of everything I’ve written so far. You’ll have to excuse grammatical errors for a few days because it’s 1 am and I don’t feel like revising it right now.

The End

The night was clear and warm, however the occasional breeze contained a hint of the coming chilliness of fall. The sky was awash with stars, bright and burning in the vast expanse of nothingness. The August moon hung low in the sky. The two of them sat on the bench atop the hill that overlooked the town. They sat next to each other, he had one arm around her shoulders, and his other hand placed on her thigh. She rested her head against him, they both looked out, across their town, across the hills to the night sky. They sat in silence, each lost in their own thoughts, content just to sit and enjoy the comfort of their embrace.

He couldn’t find the words to describe what he was feeling, it was unlike anything he’d experienced before. Everything was going to change, it was scary. That was it, scary. But there was excitement too, change held opportunities, yet it meant giving up the security of the status quo. He couldn’t believe it really, his stuff was all packed, tomorrow he would drive off to college, another state, new people, new life. She too left the next day, yet her education would take her across the country, thousands of miles instead of hundreds. It would be pointless for them to try to keep their relationship alive, and they both knew it. The distance was too great, and besides, who wants to be tied down in college? They hadn’t spoken about it yet, there’d been a moment, back in the winter when they told each other about their acceptance letters when they’d looked at each other and known, but not said anything, just congratulated each other and gone on. They’d spent the summer as if nothing was going to be any different, like they would be going back to high school for another year. Yet here it was, their last night together, the situation confronted them and refused to go away or be ignored.

“So, how are we going to do this?” he asked, and with that question resigned them to their fate.

“I… I don’t know,” she replied, she too had been pondering this issue. The entire evening they’d spent together had felt somehow forced and uneasy, the both of them thinking so this is it.

“Well, I guess we have two options. We can be adult about this and just agree to go our separate ways,” he said.

“Uh huh.”

“Or, we could try to have a little fun with this.”

“How so?”

“I always thought it would be fun to have one of those messy breakups. Like if we were at a point where we couldn’t stand each other, and just wanted out, rather than having this forced upon us. What do you think?”

“Okay, well, let’s try it out. Here’s a simple one: I don’t think this is working.”

“What? Am I not good enough for you?”

“No, it’s not you, it’s me.”

“Yeah right, whenever someone says that they really mean ‘It’s all you’.”

“Not true at all.”

“What is it then, what about you makes you not want to be with me?”

“I… it’s just that…”

“Well fine then, I don’t want to be with you either, we’re through,” he said, ending their first breakup.

“Ha, that wasn’t bad.”

“Yeah, it was okay, want to try another?”

“Sure, I have a good one: I’m seeing someone else”

He mocked a gasp, “No, how could you!?”

“I… I don’t know, it just sort of happened.”

“How could it just ‘happen’? I thought we had something.”

“We do, or we did.”

“Have you slept with him?”

“Well…”

“You have!?”

“Fine, I have! And he was better at it than you.”

“You whore! It’s over between us,” he said, thus ending their second breakup. They sat in silence again for another minute.

“I don’t know, I guess I don’t really want us to be mad at each other, because really, I don’t want this to be the end for us, but there’s no way it can’t be,” he said.

“Yeah, I know.”

“That’s one of the things I loved about us, we always understood each other, as much as it’s possible for members of the opposite sex to understand each other.”

“I loved that you always listened to what I had to say, or at least acted like you did.”

“Hmm, what’s that? I was zoned out there for a moment,” he said and smiled at her. “I loved that we had fun with each other.”

“Yeah, I loved that too, although I can’t say that it was always fun.”

“No, it certainly was not,” he said, and silence enveloped them as they reflected back over the time they’d spent together.

“Remember the first time we came here?” she asked. “Right after our first date, and we just sat here on this bench and talked the night away.”

“Yeah I remember it, my mom was pretty damn mad at me when I showed up at the house the next morning.”

“Yeah, mine too, I remember we couldn’t have a second date for a month because they were so mad at us. I think they still believe we had sex that night.”

“Yeah, probably. Doesn’t make much of a difference now though does it?”

“No I guess it doesn’t,” she said and they smiled at each other, and then kissed.

“That was another thing I loved about us,” he said after they had pulled away from each other. Things were quiet again for a minute, then he asked, “So do you want to keep in touch?”

“Yeah I don’t see why not. It’d be nice to still be able to talk to you, we’re both about to be thrown out into a world of strangers, having someone you know you can talk to, even if they can’t physically be there, is a comfort.”

“Yeah, I was thinking the same. It’s scary isn’t it, we’re about to leave behind almost everything that anchors us to who we are, our friends, our families, all of it.”

“Everyone does it at some point.”

“Yeah, and look at how messed up everything is.”

“Good point.”

They sat and looked out over the hills, out to everything that faced them in the all too near future. He looked at his watch, it was late and they both had to be up early to travel the next day.

“We should probably go,” he said.

“Yeah, I guess we should.”

“We brought your car didn’t we?”

“Yeah, you want a ride home?”

“No thanks actually, I was thinking I’d walk, it’s not that far.”

They sat for another minute.

“I guess this is goodbye then,” he said.

“Yeah, I guess it is.”

“So I’ll call you, or email or something, tomorrow or the day after, depending on how things go.”

“Sure,”

“Well, goodbye,” he said, and they kissed. They held it for a while, their last kiss, before he stood up and walked off down the road that led into town.

He folded his arms across his chest as he walked down the hill, it was suddenly very cold.