“I guess when I say it out loud, it sounds pretty silly,” I said.
“How about tonight we keep each other from doing something we know is stupid?”
“Deal,” I whispered.
I would try so hard to keep that promise. But talk about jumping out of the frying pan into the fire. I couldn’t be around her and not want to do something stupid. Being around Roxy defaulted my brain to factory settings. Protect. Love. Hold.
“I have an idea,” she said against my chest.
Ten minutes later, we pulled up to an elementary school.
“I’m pretty open-minded, but if I listed ten places I’d expected to go tonight, I wouldn’t have even come close,” I said.
“Trust me.”
We walked through a large parking lot where a couple of buses were parked. It had grown dark but a few surrounding streetlights shone on the playground where we headed.
“If you wanted a playground, all you have to do is visit Outside the Box … it’s basically this but adult sized.”
“Well, this is just a little closer, don’t you think? Also, it’s mostly cement, so the mosquitoes aren’t as bad.”
“Mozzies. Evil bastards.” I swatted at my neck just thinking about them.
“Swing or spin?” she asked.
“Let’s start with the swings.”
That way if she felt like sharing, we wouldn’t be facing each other. I found that Skip was more likely to open up that way.
“As teenagers we would come here, Gretchen and I, when things were shitty or we were bored. She’d stay with me when my parents forgot to pick me up.” Her voice cracked. “I smoked my first cigarette over there when I was eleven.” She pointed to a tunnel on the jungle gym. “We hid in there and thought we were so cool.”
“When I was eleven, my dad was taking me on camping trips,” I said not sure why. “Do you miss Gretchen?” I asked hoping to keep her as the topic of conversation.
She looked sad and distant. “Yeah. I’m remembering some of the things she did to distract me when my parents forgot about me.”
“She’s a good friend?”
“She is.” Roxy slowed her swing and drifted back and forth. “I pushed her away when I should have just talked to her.”
“It’s a defense mechanism.”
“I’m a walking defense mechanism.”
“Can you call her?” I asked.
“I almost did. Still working through things.”
“Is that what’s got you down tonight?” I slowed my swing to move in tandem with her.
“No. I just talked to my parents and that always sets me off.”
“I understand,” I said honestly.
“I’m sorry. You just lost your dad. I shouldn’t complain.”
“You can be frustrated with your parents even though mine are dead. Want to talk about it?”
She glanced over at me. “There’s not much to say. They don’t know me. They never have. They liked me best when I brought booze from the bar and partied with them. Now, we’re mostly strangers.”
