Excerpt: So Hard To See

Sophia and I met for the first time in the third grade. We were both cast in the play our grade was performing for Halloween. She was the ghost haunting a group of children trick-or-treating. I was a jack-o-lantern. I've never been much of an actress.

Chris Jones, the meanest boy in our grade, knocked me over like a turtle on its back while we were backstage at the dress rehearsal. Sophia helped me up, smoothed out the back of my costume, and kicked his butt. Literally. Her foot met his ass so hard he fell flat on his face. She got an in-school suspension for the rest of the day, and I brought her my chocolate pudding from my lunch as a sort of thank you gift.

(Chris asked me out five years later, but that's neither here nor there.)

By fourth grade, Sophia and I were inseparable. By the time we moved from the elementary campus to the junior high campus of our combined school for seventh grade, we hardly had any other friends aside from each other. It wasn't that we were social outcasts, at least not yet. We got along with almost everybody, but we rarely spent much time with anyone aside from each other.

The transition to junior high was a Major Thing for us. After Sophia turned twelve that spring of sixth grade, it was practically all she could talk about. Her parents, somewhat more indulgent than mine, were already letting her buy makeup to try out. After school, she would invite me over and spread eyeshadow and blush in broad strokes across my face, and I would duly wash it off before I got home. I started saving up my lunch money instead of eating, though, and I accumulated my own stash of makeup under Sophia's expert guidance, which I kept carefully hidden from my parents in my backpack and applied in the school bathrooms right before class. It never looked as right on me as it did on Sophia; she was (and is) strawberry blonde, angel-faced and adorably freckled, while I'm what is generally described as "mousy," with my limp brown hair and bad complexion. Still, it was a rush of rebellion, the beginning of something more.

Too much, maybe.

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I get back to the grocery store at 3:30, figuring I'll hang around and wait. Ignoring the "NO LOITERING" sign on the building, I plop myself down on a bench and watch the cars passing by, blaring music from rap to mariachi.

I'm so lost in my thoughts that I jump when Sophia taps me on the back. She slides onto the bench next to me and hugs me again with one arm, resting her head on my shoulder.

"I've missed you so much, you know."

I can't even begin to reply to that. There's so much to say, but the words just back up and bottleneck in my throat.

*You were everything to me. You were the only one I trusted.

Why couldn't you come rescue me somehow?*

I don't even get a chance to try to start before she whips out a pack of cigarettes and a lighter. "God, I haven't smoked in six hours. I'm dying. You want one?" She holds the pack towards me, nodding her head in its direction.

I shrug. "Sure. Why the hell not?"

I haven't smoked in four years. I fumble with the lighter for about thirty seconds before finally getting the cigarette to light properly instead of just give off a weak wisp of smoke. I inhale deeply and break into a coughing fit that leaves me dangerously light-headed. I lean against Sophia until the dizziness fades, and ask her the question I've been meaning to since I saw her walking by a week ago. "Don't you think it's weird that we've run into each other like this after all this time? It seems like such an impossible coincidence. The city's huge."

Sophia throws her head back in laughter. "'Lise, you know how the suburbs are. You run into people all the time. Turns out, it's the same way here. I can't tell you how many people from high school I've seen since I moved out here."

She realizes her misstep and shuts up. We sit in silence for a while, contemplating the cherries at the ends of our cigarettes.

I take a stab at small talk to break the unbearable quiet. "So, uh, what brings you out here?" I can't help giggling nervously.

She shrugs. "Better than Palatine. Anyway, my parents were driving me nuts with their fighting. I'm betting they'll be divorced by the end of the year."

"Wow. I'm really sorry, Sophie." Her parents seemed blissfully happy around the time I stopped visiting, but I guess a few years can make all the difference.

"Don't be," she snorts, seeming a bit too amused by my expression of sympathy. "It's been obvious for a while. It's better that they're not at each other's throats all the time. At least they waited until I finished high school, but it's going to suck for Julian." Sophia's brother is six years younger than she is. I wince at the thought of what he's going to be up against.

Sophia turns to face me, suddenly dead serious. "You know, you're lucky. Your parents never fight."

"They don't get the chance," I remind her. "They only have to see each other a few times a year."

"Well, yeah, exactly. Seems like the perfect setup."

I smile, a bit ruefully, and change the subject. "Are you going to school?"

"Nah. I'll probably start at UIC in a year or two, but I want to get some money saved first. And, you know, live." She drops her cigarette butt on the sidewalk and crushes it with the heel of her sneakers. (My own cigarette is only halfway smoked.) "How about you?"

"Yeah, I'm starting at Malcolm X next month."

"What're you studying? English, I bet, right?"

"I'm not really sure, to be honest."

"Well, I guess it's something to do." She stands up and stretches a bit. I spot the tattoo again. "Where are you living now, anyway?"

"Pretty near here. You want to come see?"

She grins.

On our way back to Nina's, I get around to asking her about the tattoo. "When did you get it? And where?"

"I was sixteen and drunk. That should explain everything you need to know."

"Sophia!"

She breaks out into a chorus of laughter.