Page 13 of When We Were Younger

"I can?" I ask, reaching out and twirling a lock of his floppy hair around my pointer finger.

"Yeah, you can. Braid my hair, please?" he asks. His voice sounds sincere, not teasing like it had been earlierwhen I'd asked. It's almost as if he wants me to braid his hair and he’s not just letting me to appease me. He turns his back to me, tilting his head back slightly. I finger brush his hair before separating it into messy sections, braiding lock after lock, then brushing through them before repeating the process.

We talk as I work, discussing the upcoming school year and whether we think eighth grade will be a lot harder than seventh. At some point, Stephen lays down, falling asleep with his head nestling down onto my shins as I continue to tie tiny braids in his hair. I watch his chest rise and fall in the moonlight for much longer than I should, and before I know it, the moon is high in the sky.

I reluctantly shake him awake, and he walks me all the way back to my window, never letting go of my hand even after we've made it through the trees.

I slip through my window and into bed, and even though it's late, I can't sleep. Not when there's a barrage of butterflies waging a war in my stomach. I can't quite put my finger on what it was, but something changed tonight. I can feel it in my bones.

The next day, when my mom leaves for work and I head next door to meet up with my friends, Stephen is wearing his glasses. And there is a single braid tied into a lock of hair on the side of his head.

8

STEPHEN

The chair in Dad's office is lowering.

I can feel it moving beneath me.

It's not happening quickly.

I don't know if he's even noticed it, but I have. I've been sitting here for ten minutes, and I am at least three centimeters closer to the ground than I was when I first sat down. There's something wrong with the hydraulic lift, I'm sure of it. Not surprising, since this chair has been here for as long as I can remember, and it has a Dad-shaped imprint in the seat, but still. I can almost guarantee that if I sit here any longer, my knees will be up to my chest.

I pick up my phone to dictate a reminder to myself–order Dad a new chair because he'll never do it on his own.When the screen lights up and there are no notifications to be seen, my stomach sinks.

I did not spend my weekend alone in my apartment with my dog and a deluge of Chinese takeout. I did notspend my weekend staring at my phone. I did not revert to the pathetic, lovesick, teenage boy of my past. I did not spend my weekend gripping this stupid rectangle in one hand, greasy Crab Rangoon in the other, willing Dorothea Lynn Hart to text me.

Except I totally did. All weekend. I barely even showered. I just watched my phone, nearly shitting myself each time the screen lit up, then sinking into a depressed oblivion every time it turned out to be an email from some store I once bought a shirt from and not a text from the girl I once thought would be mine forever.

Part of me wants to believe that Friday night was some kind of fever dream. That maybe it was a mirage, a twisted figment of my imagination, a brutal hallucination concocted by my subconscious after too many years alone. But it wasn't. I know it wasn't, because on Saturday night I used the nameless, faceless social media account that I keep in my back pocket for special occasions–like nights when I'm particularly lonely, drunk, horny, or some lethal combination of all three–to sleuth out the situation and prove to myself that I'm not losing my mind.

Sure enough, right there on @MissDottieLynn's Instagram story was a shot of the McKenna's Lake with an 'out of office' GIF posted earlier that morning. And over on @KiraMcKillerFit's page, a photo of Dorothea lying belly up on the hardwood floor of the McKenna's kitchen with two dogs licking her face sits right on top of the grid with the caption 'The bitch is back!!’.

In the photo, she's wearing a pair of spandex black shorts that hit her mid-thigh and a pink t-shirt that's ridden up to just below her bellybutton, showing off a peek of smooth, tanned skin.

My mind flashes back to the photo, and the memories come flooding back to me. I'm assaulted by one from a summer day when we were thirteen. The day that my mind and my body synced up like the snap of fingers and she suddenly wasn't just my friend or the girl who lives next door anymore.

It was a particularly hot August day. I'd spent most of the afternoon tossing a football around with Dean and wanted to cool off. Dorothea and I decided to take a swim down in the creek. It had been a confusing summer, to say the least. I sprouted up a few inches, my voice was starting to sound different, and it seemed like every time she was around, my cheeks felt warm. I was suddenly so worried that everything I said to her would sound stupid.

Lucky for me, she was always ready to do most of the talking. We walked through the trees, across the open field and down a hill to the creek, where the water was high and rushing from the rain a few days prior. As soon as we hit the muddy shores, Dottie whipped off her t-shirt and shorts, revealing a two-piece bathing suit I hadn't seen before.

My mouth went dry, and I turned my back so fast I practically gave myself whiplash. She jumped into the water and called for me to join her, but I had to sit on the edge with my knees to my chest until the evidenceof these newfound feelings towards her subsided and it felt like I could breathe again.

We were both still kids, but that was the day that, to teenage me, Dorothea Lynn Hart became a woman.

That night I laid in bed and thought about my best friend and her lips and what it might feel like if I kissed her, and I knew right then and there that everything had changed.

"You're fucking pathetic, dude," I mutter to myself as I set the phone aside, opting to write myself a 'new chair' reminder on a Post-it instead. I drag a hand through my hair and pick up the iPad sitting in front of me. I scroll through our management software, double-checking the site preparation checklist for the new strip mall Hudson Family Constructions is starting on next week.

Of course, I know it's all good to go. I'm the manager on the project–I'm the manager on most projects these days–but it can't hurt to check for a fifth time that all our i's are dotted, and t's are crossed. Especially if it keeps my mind off a certain blonde who seems keen on continuing her nine-year streak of ignoring my existence.

"If you stare any harder at that screen, you're going to burn a couple holes in it," Dad says from the doorway. I look up to see him leaning against the doorframe, arms crossed against his chest, yellow hard hat hanging from his belt loop. Even though this is his office, he walks in and takes the visitor's seat opposite of me, propping his feet up on to his desk with a groan.

He’s well into his late fifties, but he still insists on visiting job sites and getting his hands dirty pretty much daily. I don't know if it's his stubbornness or an instance that he's not getting older, but as much as he complains about wanting to slow down, he doesn't seem keen on doing so. It doesn't matter that I'm here and willing to take over for him, the business is his third baby, and I guess he's not ready to give it up just yet.

"I'm just-"

"Quadruple checking everything for the strip mall, I know. You wouldn't be you if you didn't, kid." He throws his hands behind his head and leans back into them, stretching and yawning.

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