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FORTY-TWO
THEN, FALL, TWO YEARS AGO
“Cheers to senior year!” Maddie cheers as the four of us clink our little glasses together and we drink the concoction she made up for us.
My throat immediately burns and then feels cold before it starts burning again. I swallow it down and then choke, “Oh my God, Madeline Hart, what the hell was that?” Elliot and Hayden also start coughing and sputtering. I can tell Maddie is trying really hard not to react or show that her poison is affecting her also.
She let out a tiny cough, “I’m sorry—” cough, “I tried to make a,” cough, “drink that would be sweet and also a little sour. Since it’s a bittersweet feeling to be starting our senior year,” she explains, then starts coughing and clearing her throat.
“Oh my God, Madeline, you’re trying to kill us all,” Hayden says dramatically while making hacking noises and Maddie rolls her eyes.
“It is not that bad.” She looks to Elliot for help. He clears his throat and opens his mouth to say something, but starts coughing again. “Okay, okay,” Maddie says, “I’ll never make the drinks again.”
I laugh. We’re sitting in our little backyard patio outside our apartment. It’s not much. Just a slab of concrete and a decent sized patch of grass with two short fences on either side to separate apartments. We have a small outdoor table and chairs on the concrete, and our portable fire pit beside it—which is now housing our little campfire. Maddie and I strung up lights our first year here and they’ve held up well because they are still hanging above us.
It is pretty hard to believe that this will be our last year here. In May we’ll move out, move on to wherever that is going to be. I’ve applied to several marketing firms, big and small, and am hoping to land any kind of starting position in one.
Hayden is hoping his degree in sound engineering will help him find his place within the music world somewhere. He wants to help discover artists and help create songs for others to do the same thing certain songs have done for him—give him hope. Joy. Songs that make people believe in something. He’s applied for internships with music producers in New York City, Jersey City, a few other nearby cities and he’s even reached out to local radio stations, just hoping to get his foot in the door somehow. I have no doubt he is pursuing the perfect career and life for himself.
“S’more, baby?” Hayden asks me and I look at him with a smile on my face. We’re sitting on the ground around the firepit with blankets and pillows, now passing around sticks and marshmallows.
“Yes. Nice and burnt please.” I flutter my eyes at him. He makes a disgusted face.
“Psychopath,” he jokes.
It only takes one minute into roasting marshmallows for Madeline to catch hers on fire and freak out, trying to wave it around. Hayden and Elliot jump up yelling at her to stop waving it around.
“I’m sorry, I’m sorry,” she says, “I panicked.”
“You really are trying to kill us,” Hayden says and we all laugh.
Maddie rolls her eyes, “You’re hilarious. Thank you for exploiting my innocent mistakes and using them to humiliate me.”
“You’re doing that to yourself, my dude,” Hayden says with a mouth full of marshmallow. Elliot chuckles which earns him a playful nudge in the gut from Maddie.
“I’m so glad I took as many credits as I could last year, because this year is going to be a breeze,” Hayden says, motioning with his hand in a wave-like movement to emphasize his point.
“Yes, same,” Maddie agrees.
“No school talk yet, we have,” I check my phone before continuing, “like ten hours until we start classes and will be talking about school all year.”
They chuckle but agree. “What were your summer cherries and pits?” Maddie asks.
We look at her confused. Hayden finally says, “What the hell are you talking about?” I smack his arm at the same time Elliot reaches over to do the same. Hayden laughs and continues, “I’m serious! What does that mean?”
“Your cherries and pits,” Maddie says with a mouthful of marshmallow.
“You want us to talk about our cherries?” Hayden raises an eyebrow. “And our pits?”
Elliot smacks his arm again and I just laugh.
Maddie swallows her marshmallow and clears her throat, “Your highs and lows!”
“Why couldn’t you just say that?” I laugh.
“Because I thought it was a cuter way to word it,” she defends, and even in the dark with her face only lit up by the campfire, I can see her cheeks flush. “What were the highs and lows of your summer, you dirty minded heathens?”
I throw my head back in a laugh. Maddie dives towards me and I dodge out of her way with another laugh. “Okay, okay, amor.”
