#cbns

My old sketch of my favorite cuties 💚💙

(Thank you for humanizing and inspiring these people:

https://www.deviantart.com/123soleil

https://www.deviantart.com/dark-swordfish

Preemptive post because I'm excite.

"Ah that was YEARS ago! Gnasty Gnorc was his name and I dealt with him and his goons all that time ago. There's no need to worry about that happening ever again."

Spyro smiled, beaming with pride, remembering his great victory against the Gnorc army.

He shows up at my backdoor mid-morning with a smirk and a joint, says, “Been a while, huh?”. I’ve moved towns twice since the last time I saw his face but he found me. I let him in because I've known him the majority of my life and he remains the most hilarious person I know. He isn't disgusted that taco bell and getting high are nightly rituals here, he calls it inspiration for my "harsh, aching prose"; I don’t judge when I learn he always gets drunk before playing on stage because after all these years he has yet to defeat his stage fright.

I am still three months older and unimpressed with his physique, but now I’ve devoted myself to literature professionally and miscarried an Italian child and learned how to love each day for what it is. He’s grown taller than me and his hair is longer than mine, he makes money for music now and his gaze is much softer than it ever appeared in school. We drink wine from real wine glasses because I say so (even though I know he prefers whiskey) and play a violent game of scrabble and he tells he's going to university for a fancy degree in the fall. When the second bottle is empty, I tell him we’re playing truth or dare. He chooses dare, says he isn't taking a chance because he remembers how nosy I am and I’ve got that look in my eye. I dare him to tell me whether or not he had a crush on me in school. His laughter comes from somewhere deep within him and something twitches involuntarily in me. “I take that as a yes?” It’s a rhetorical question because his face has made a split second transition from pale pink to burgundy. “You could say that.” He doesn’t look me in the face but he’s smiling to the floor. “Your turn asshole, truth or dare?” There’s a challenge in his tone, a voice deeper than I remember.

“Truth. Because I’m the brave one.” I am warm, comfortable, loose, so I wink at him and pull the cork from a third bottle, nearly spilling it all over me. “Is it true you’ve thought of what it’d be like to kiss me?” I gape at his bravery. My mind rolls back to high school, where all my conventionally pretty, wild, vivacious girlfriends giggled at every word he said while I wondered how anyone could be attracted to him. My best friend, the class clown and party boy from a wealthy family even though everybody thought he was poor because he never took anyone to his house but me and liked to be seen as edgy. “One day, I almost thought about it.” His eyes seem to teeter more on the blue side than green tonight and I try to keep from cackling at his anticipation. “On the day you showed me the library at your grandparents’. I was so full of lust for those dusty old books and antiques, and you just happened to look charming in the afternoon light.” He grabs the bottle and swallows audibly. I don’t move away when he sits it on the table and leans into me. He laters says he's been infatuated with me for a decade and it's never threatened to fade; his fascination ages well, he says, like wine. I wonder why I never knew.

Our favorite theater is the one on the edge of town and that is where we go on the humid Friday night of our third date. It’s monsterous and new, staffed by the kids we sat in grade school with who have yet to muster the courage to fly from the nest. He makes note of this idleness and chuckes smugly as we enter. I loathe his pompous expression but he is very gentlemanly toward me. He holds doors and walks on the side nearest the road of the sidewalk. But here, his hand finds its way to my lower back as we walk through the lobby of couples seated on benches. There are many nods toward him that go unacknowledged, a few hesitant handshakes from the ones I recognize. I try not to notice how childlike and pale the boys’ hands look in comparison with his as they greet one another. When we get to the box office, Timothy from seventh grade algebra peers out at us. He is still chipper and undeveloped. “How’s it going, bud?” My date’s Mississippi-tainted voice seems deep and rich as he hands him his credit card. His other hand slips around the curve of my hip and lands on my back pocket as I grin to Timothy. “It’s good, uh, enjoy your show.” My date winks when he assures him that we will.

He is touching me throughout the entire movie, a still hand. He does not try to kiss me. Does not try to slither his grasp somewhere hidden. Over my fingers, dancing over the inside of my wrist. He only looks at me from the side, his face blushing crimson when I turn to covertly notice. But I am not stealthy when I burn him with closed lips and a fiery stare as he leaves three times to work.

It is late when the the film is over. At the exit stands another boy from middle school, Pete. He remains the chubby, acne ridden kid I remember but I smile broadly. I ask him how he is. There is excitement riding his voice when he tells me he is well, going to his dream college in the fall. “Needed a rest period, first, huh?” My date is flashing his brilliant white teeth, brings his mouth to the top of my head. “In any case, I’m glad to hear it. Do good things.” There is sarcasm in his words and I send Pete a silent apology. I try to act oblivious to the fact that my date is leaving the theater with nine hundred dollars more than he came with. I try to pretend that I don’t know what’s going on, that I don’t know why he has visibly shrank, that I can’t smell his anxiety. He tells us to have a good night and I tell him to have a better one, acting ignorant that his eyes are only on my date.

Tall and wealthy and feeling all-powerful, he wraps his chiselled arm around my waist. I feel the muscles of his biceps flex against my back as his fingertips dig into my skin. I shudder at the bruises that will be smeared under my shirt by morning.