It was much too early in the morning to be looking out the window. But it was much too early to do a lot of things, like watching a baseball game or slinging mud at your neighbor. The point is that the light pink of the sky was already swirling with yellow and I was annoyed.


Turning I caught my sharp nose on a corner of the wall and swore. I maneuvered carefully down the hall and into the sardine kitchen that looked like someone mashed all the appliances together and dusted their hands. It was a nice kind of mashed up though, with purple and streamers that hung permanently from the broken ceiling fan and an air conditioner that would click on frequently.


Dad sat at the table reading the paper. "London," he nods in acknowledgement.


I don't return it, instead I perch on the edge of the table and raise my eyebrows at him.


He looks up and raises them too.


Eyebrows still raised I tapped the color picture of a woman holding a floral dress on the cover of the paper, "What happened to the good stuff?" The good stuff was referring to the action packed breaking news like bombings in other countries or some sort of scandal, not a What to Wear column which really just gave you the wrong idea about him.


He sighs and shifts the tiny reading glasses. It's a sigh that says teenagers never understand anything, when we really understand more than you know. I dropped my eyebrows.


"I'm tired of all the news lately," his voice is coarse and rough like he was drinking sand not coffee.


I didn't understand because 1. I loved to read the paper, and 2. how could you not know what is going on? With the absurd idea muddling with my brain cells, I shove my feet into plastic yellow sandals and push open the screen door.


He stands up halfway, "London!" I turn. "Be careful." Careful of what? I wanted to ask. Parents say things like that, be careful or watch out and a lot of the times they were out of context. Why did I have to be careful when I was going out to sit on the porch?


I slip out the door and flop down on the plastic porch swing. Boiling Texas heat was already seeping into my pores and causing sweat to trickle down my back. You would think I would be used to it, the whole heat thing, but even after living here my whole life I shuttled from one air conditioned place to the next in the summer. With boredom rattling at my brain, I pushed the chair so that it twisted around the metal chains that held it to the ceiling.


I close my eyes and open my mouth, "October 3rd. Debt crisis. Amanda Knox verdict. Attack in Afghanistan." The words flow easily, but strangely enough the memories don't. As far back as I can remember I could just know what happened on everyday of history, major events that would lodge themselves into my memory.

I lean back against the swing so that I stare up at the chipping porch covering. As I sit I hum and twist my fingers together in my lap. The heavy sounds of breathing and footsteps startle me from meditation. Joshua Grey waves at me frantically, his light pale hair flies in the flurry.

Without thinking I dash and hug him. Arms around arms. Head against shoulder. Shoulder against shoulder. I blink and he holds me at arm's length, "How's life Sailor?" Joshua called everyone sailor whether they liked it or not. He says that he picked it up when he went boating, but both him and I know that boating was really just going on a Disney cruise.


I shrug, "Life is fine, just the same as when you left a week ago."


"You didn't do anything stupid?" His eyes glisten.


I wish that I had done something exciting to have a funny story about, but I don't. I shake my head and place my fingers on his that are resting on my shoulders lightly, "Nothing at all really."


He frowns, "Are you alright?"


I want to say no that everything is certainly not right, but for no absolute reason. I had no reason to be sad, I just was. It was close to the same predicament with Dad, if I said something he would worry or possibly bombard me all day about my one word answer


So I say, "'Course I'm alright. So, how was The Jewish Camp for Troubled Teens aka Death Summer Camp, a place where dreams go to die," I mimic his voice and he chuckles. Joshua swings am arm around my neck and drags me over to the shade of the willow tree where he precedes to sit down, efficiently dragging me with him.


"Awful as always. Not that I expected better though with the whole bonding thing-ies and retreats," with the malice that he described bonding you would think he was talking about World War III. "Oh and don't forget the group therapy sessions with Mr. Tracy, those were just dandy."


The problem with Joshua's parents was that they ignored him for so long that he went off into the deep end a couple years ago. When they finally noticed it was drugs that made him act like he wasn't Joshua.


"No drugs though, right? They are right about that Joshua," I say quietly pulling up shards of bright green from the lawn.


He laid down and placed his hands behind his head, "I know about drugs, Sailor, and what the can do, trust me, I've seen the damage. I've seen more than I wish I had, but that's life for you. Seeing crap you don't want to see and living with it."


I throw the grass on his chest and begin to construct a pile, "I suppose that is part of it, but there is always the good part to even out the bad part."


"Sometimes I think that there is no good part, that we're all just going to die in the end. We live to die. To fall into the deep abyss that is life after death. Life after life," his voice is clear.


I take his hand, "That is morbid Joshua Grey, and I'll be the first one to admit it."


"Maybe so," he answers.


And I repeat, "Maybe so."


Joshua sits up and squeezes my fingers, "Want to take a ride on the bike?" The so called "bike" was a rusty black moped leaning against the trees like it was too tired to hold itself up anymore.


I stand up and offer him my other hand so that he can jerk himself up. "Will it hold us?" I ask because it is perfectly mandatory to question the use of some-one's moped before commencing driving.

He leads me over and throws his leg over the side, "Don't worry about it."


I bit my lip and got in behind him, "That is a terrible thing to say to someone. Like I won't worry now because you told me not to worry." I sigh and wrap my arms firmly around his middle.


He chuckles then shoves the keys in the ignition. We drive, but not too quickly. At a pace I could have beat by walking, so I don't feel too scared until we hit actual pavement. The bike rattles as he drives too dangerously and too fast. He laughs as he drives. It is a pure sound of feeling light and weightless - flying, I want to say. But I've never flown so I couldn't tell you.


I begin to laugh too as he drives that stupid moped down the street and I think that both of us are intoxicated by life. Joshua pulls the bike to the curb in the middle of a family style neighborhood complete with picket fences. Just like that, life starts to crush us again and we both drop the laughs stuck in our throats.


"What are we doing here?" I ask because one must always ask.


Joshua doesn't answer again which makes me uneasy and he just takes me to the front door. An older woman answers the door and ushers us inside into the cold air wavering from the vents in the walls. Her skin is soft and hangs limply against the bones of her face.


She turns to me and smiles, "Hello dear, you must be Joshua's friend that he told me about," she pats Joshua's arm and glances back at me. "He told me that you would help me with my problem." Before I can answer she is moving down the hall faster than she should be able to move.


I shoot Joshua a look, "What's happening?" I hiss.


He winks, "Just live for once in your life London." He takes my elbows and pushes me down the floral hall into a living room that A. has too many dolls B. lots of strange photos on the walls C. and writing carved into the dainty coffee table stacked with books.


The woman pours me a glass of iced tea that looks more sugar than tea and sits back in her wicker chair, "Please, you have to tell me if this is a lost cause before I ask you."


I take a sip of the tea and sit down across from her on a lime green couch, "It would be very helpful if I actually knew the problem that I have to help you with."


She frowns with the corners of her drawn on mouth sagging down, "Joshua didn't tell you, did he? Joshua!" He dips his head with a sorry ma'am forming on his lips until she interrupts his apology, "Shush up so I can talk to London, is it?"


I smile, "Yes, it's London."


Joshua tugs on a piece of my hair, "Do you think you can remember a date?"


My eyes narrow, he's challenging me to see if I can to prove that I cannot. "I can try."


It must be good enough for her because she bends forward at the waist and places her hands against her forehead, "In April 19...50s, I think, something happened to my people, something very monumental. Something that is hurting my head that I can't remember."


I look at Joshua, this is too easy. Was it a test? Was this some sort of setup? Slowly I say, "Adolf..." she watches me silently, "Adolf Hitler committed suicide on April 30th 1954 in Berlin."


Her eyes widen and she clutches her own glass of tea, "Of course! How could I have forgotten something as important as that? I was a little girl and I was in a camp...it was dark...cold..." Her eyes glaze over in remembrance as I nervously tap my fingers against the couch.


She beings to ask me too many questions. How? By gunshot. Where? How do you know this? I went to school. How can you remember dates like that? I'm very special. Are you making this up? Why would I? You're being sarcastic. Really? I am?


Joshua scoots me out before the woman can chain me up and make me admit that I was lying. But I wasn't. Everything I said was true and she even remembered it, butt hat was the problem with people. You told them what they wanted to know, but then they didn't believe it.


We ride on the bike silently. There is no freeing laughter or the weightless feeling of flying. There is tension coursing through the air, heavier than I wish it was. He comes to my house, a small bungalow surrounded by brown grass scorched by the heat.


He gets off of the bike and faces me. "Thanks," he says.


"Why did you take me there?" I had to know so that I wouldn't hate him. You couldn't hate your only friend, it was sort of a law of the land, but at the moment I did. I didn't like to be cast out as different. I didn't like being criticized.


He holds his bike so that it doesn't fall, "She was upset about not being able to remember and you know everything about every date so I thought..."


"Why not take freak girl to see mean grandma? You could have searched it on the internet, you know."


"Yeah," he finishes lamely. "Are you mad? I know you don't like people knowing about your talent, but it's a gift and you could help people. Real people. You have to stop being so depressed. Stop watching Dr. Phil and start coming with me to volunteer at the elderly home."


I didn't want to go to the elderly home. I wanted to curl up under the tree and to let the summer heat soak into my skin. I felt bad that he didn't understand and I wish that he would. The problem was that no one really understood. Ann Frank's father said that when he found her diary that he never knew this Ann Frank, he knew anther girl. He said that parents really never knew their children. I had thought at the time that it was so sad, to never know your child. Now I see that it wasn't really what he meant. He meant that there are two of us. There is the girl underneath the surface and the girl beneath that other girl. And that girl, that one is you.


He watches me, "London?"


I snap up, "It's alright," the girl he sees says. "You had good intentions in mind."


He sighs, "See you tomorrow?"


"Sure," he turns to go and when he is halfway down the road I scream, "Joshua!"


He stops and looks at me.


"Some people spend top much time preparing for the next life and not living this one," I say as loud as I can in his general direction. I wait for him to realize my epiphany, for him to scream, and to say that was exactly what he had needed to hear before we got on the moped. But nothing is the way you want it to be.


He stares blankly at me, "What?"


Saying it again would loose the magic so I tell him to forget it. I go inside where my dad is still reading the paper except he moved onto the movie ads. He doesn't glance up until I make a lot of pointless noise in the kitchen.


"London?" He asks loudly like I could be some sort of burglar who went into his kitchen for a snack.


I stop what I'm doing and set the tea kettle on the stove. "Yeah Dad, it's me."


"Are you alright?" I hear him set down the newspaper and slurp coffee that is probably much too cold now. I want to say that I had a not-really-a-fight-fight with Joshua. That I feel sad. That I feel lonely. That I wish mom was here. That I wish everyone would stop asking me if I was alright.


I settle for, "Want some warm coffee?"


He chuckles and from the kitchen I see him raise the white mug, "You know me too well, London."


Except I don't, no, not really.


I make him the coffee.