Page 24 of A Fine Line
Crew stood, groaning and reaching for his back as he reached his full height- he seriously needed to get that worked out.
“We need to go fix our registration,” he sighed a bit and played with a drawer handle that wasn’t screwed on tightly enough next to him. “Probably go meet that Craig guy or whatever to let him know the plan to do it as a team.”
I hummed. “Will they let us?”
“It’s the same as you working for me.”
“No, no. You would work for me.”
Crews face was turning hot and I loved watching the tinge of pink rush to the top. “If anyone is going to be wearing the pants in this, it’s me.”
My arms crossed and I tracked his eye movement falling directly to my chest. His cheeks turned even more pink.
“It’s going to be incredibly difficult to take you seriously if you plan on wearing these Hawaiian shirts every day.”
“What’s wrong with my shirts?” He looked down at it, searching. “This one has toucans on it.”
“If you need me to even answer that then this is never going to work out.”
“Whatever.” The blush was crawling down to his neck. “I’ll call the chamber of commerce and ask about switching. You work on a dessert, I’ll work on an entree. We can pick a day to meet weekly leading up to it so we can make sure we are on the same page.”
I hummed. “Wow, you really thought things through.”
“I need this.”
“So do I.” I countered.
“I need it more.”
“Alright, I see where this is going so I’m leaving now.” I hopped out of the truck and walked to my own when he called out. “Monday mornings. That’s the best for me.”
I threw a thumbs up over my shoulder in response, because my face was burning. This was either the best or the worst decision either of us has ever made.
Ihad a secret.
Two, technically. The diagnosis and all my mental health bull shit being the forefront one. But there was this other one too that sat in the back of my head, festering and growing and taking over until sometimes it’s all I could think about.
I loved outside. I loved a large, empty field with tall weeds and buzzing bees and the smell of honey suckles in bloom. I loved the way my bare feet felt against dried grass, even when a bug would crawl across it and tickle the life out of me. I loved the air, filling in my lungs and making everything settle in around me. How the noises dulled to a hum. How the constant thrumming in my head came to a stop. I loved all of it.
I loved it so much, that I had my own place to enjoy it. A place that no one else knew about. A place where my phone had no signal, I had no contact to the outside world, and where I had every right to be one hundred percent me. No outside noise, beyond bugs making their little bug noises and birds chirping. No busy streets or bill boards or people stepping on your toes cause you’re walking at the correct time the crosswalk told you to. Just…bliss.
So, when my family made jokes that I’d disappeared again. Gone who knows where, ‘off to Neverland’ they’d say, I’d be right here. In Tyler State Park, far beyond the usually empty parking lot and off the trail through a couple woods to this here field.
Where the grass was never cut and the stars always shined brightest at night. Where full, overwhelming thoughts became empty ones and anxiety melted into something more: freedom.
It was my place, only mine. And I was untouchable here.
The tall grass poked through the holes of the knit blanket I kept in my car, tickling the backs of my knees and my elbows they dug into the ground. My chin was tilted up to the sky, watching clouds shape into everything and nothing and the reminiscence that airplanes were passing one another up there.
Funniest part was the first time I landed upon this place was back in high school. A group of people that I was very loosely friends with came here during my senior year. They claimed it was a great place to smoke weed and think and I truthfully only had interest in one of those things, hoping it would take away the other. But, as it always did, my mind wandered and soon enough, so did I. I stumbled off the path, got a little lost, and found myself here.
My signal was lost, my phone in SOS mode and so I had no choice but to sit it out. I laid there in the grass for hours, and when no one came to find me, I slipped out on my own. Took me a while, but eventually I figured it out and hiked back down to the parking lot, where I reached four bars of signal. The real funny thing was, the car we shared was gone, and I had no missed notifications on my phone. No family texts, no pothead friends asking where I was, even the girl I was seeing at the time was radio silent when I had been gone for the entire afternoon. Vanished, poof, just like that.
I could’ve broke down, realized that was probably a rut I needed to dig myself out of. Instead, I climbed in further with asmile on my face and. shovel in my hand. I could slip away here, into someone else entirely. This was my field, my spot. And as often as I got overstimulated by the city and its lack of sleep: I came here for peace.
I glanced down at my phone, still in SOS mode, showing the time as 3:40 pm, forty minutes past the time I said I’d stay. Slowly, I stood, folded up my blanket and settled it over my shoulders to carry the short hike down to my car.
With each step I took closer to the parking lot, the more my phone buzzed in my back pocket. Weather notifications and Ring doorbell drop offs, I knew.