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We walk out of the water together, her hugging her middle from the cold wind, and I am practically speed-walking to my jeans. We lay out in the sun for a while until we dry, the sand sticking to our bodies, and I dig my phone out of the sand where it fell out of my back pocket.
I get the camera out and take a picture of her right as she turns her head toward me. She’s smiling, her eyes crinkling in the corners slightly with the sun shining upon them, making them look a pale green.
“Why are you taking pictures of me?”
“Because that’s what I do,” I reply with a grin. “I take pictures, remember?”
“Oh.”
Realization crashes around her, and I can tell she’s remembering all of the secrets I handed over that she greedily kept. She doesn’t know how to feel about it anymore, and it hurts.
“We should go—” See? Guilty.
“What do you like to do other than dance now, Camilla?” She lifts her head up from the sand and stares at me, her features looking almost…outraged. “I just want to know what I’ve missed out on.”
“Why?” Camilla narrows her eyes at me suspiciously.
“Because I’ve missed you.” I shrug nonchalantly even though I’m anything but. There are no lies in that statement, and it bothers me. “Or maybe I’m out to get you.”
“Definitely the last part.” She rolls her eyes and relaxes back into the sand. “Ballet has been my whole life. I guess poetry is cool.”
“I know that, remember?” I smile, recalling myself. “Is Sylvia Plath still your favorite?”
“How do you remember?”
Now is my turn to get up and look at her. “I remember everything,” I reply. “But is that code for something?” I look into her mesmerizing chameleon eyes. “Isn’t she tragic?”
“All poets are.” She smiles.
“And are you a poet now?”
“No.”
I can tell it’s a lie. She looks like the kind of person who would write poetry. In fact, now I want to know if it’s in her laptop or a notebook. “Do you know her poems by heart? Can you recite one to me?”
Camilla closes her eyes briefly, squinting them shut until her eyes scrunch in the corners. She blows out a deep breath and looks right at me.
“There is this white wall, above which the sky creates itself-
Infinite, green, utterly untouchable.
Angels swim in it, and the stars, in indifference also.
They are my medium.
The sun dissolves on this wall, bleeding its lights.
A grey wall now, clawed and bloody.
Is there no way out of the mind?
Steps at my back spiral into a well.
There are no trees or birds in this world,
There is only sourness.”
I open my mouth to say something, then shut it. “Isn’t that about?—”
