The Third Floor

It smells like heartbreak, I say, but she only gives me a disturbed look through her watery eyes and running mascara. She never understood my logic. It does. The air smells like fallen rain, and there’s a chill on the breeze I don’t remember from before. It even looks like heartbreak. Look at the thick clouds overhead, how they don’t let any light through them. The way the dark looks so much darker than before, like we just turned off all the lights and our eyes aren’t adjusted yet. Or the way the streetlights look all fuzzed out, like we’ve been crying.

You are crying, she says, and I reach a hand up to my wet cheek.

That’s from the rain.

It’s not raining.

But it was.

She shakes her head as she looks at her feet, her bangs hiding her eyes from me. I’m so sorry, she whispers.

I think of saying, What for?, but I have a strange knot in my stomach that tells me I already know. My mind isn’t willing to release that information to the public yet. The air really is colder; my hands are shaking it’s so cold. I feel a drop hit my face and run down my cheek. It is raining, I mutter.

What? She sniffs, and her voice is clogged like she’s got a cold.

I don’t answer, I can see the hopelessness in her eyes. I think I’m catching her cold. My nose is runny, and my eyes are itchy and swollen. There’s gunk in my throat. That hopelessness is contagious, too. I can feel the night sinking through my jacket and I shiver. It’s so strange, but as I try to fall into her eyes again, it’s like looking at a stranger. It’s not the same.

She shudders and turns her back to me, looking down at the ground so I can only see the very back of her head. I hear another sigh, and watch her roll her shoulders. I think I should go home now, she whispers.

Ok, well, I’ll see you around, I guess. The goodbye seems so short without a chorus of ‘No, I love YOU’ tucked in between every word. I’ll probably see you tomorrow at school, huh?

I’ll walk on the third floor.

Whoa, wait, I take a few steps after her as she drifts to the other side of the empty street, toward her house. There’s an odd lump in my throat. My own neighborhood suddenly seems very unfriendly, and even though I can't see anyone watching from their dark windows, I feel a twinge of stage fright. Wait, I call again, and she finally stops, safely on the other sidewalk. She waits. What do you mean, you’ll ‘walk on the third floor’?

Even though she’s standing so far away, I can see her bite her lip. Her eyebrows arch in either confusion or concern, but I can’t tell the difference. I just assumed… She looks at the ground. She’s rephrasing what she was going to say. It’s something bad, isn’t it? I just assumed you wouldn’t want to see me tomorrow. You know… because…well… Her head moves from side to side as she tries to show me she’s not going to finish the sentence. I’m supposed to know what she’s going to say, but I don’t. My mind hasn’t caught up that much, yet.

So are we dividing up the school now? We can’t even walk on the same floor anymore? What if I want to walk on the third floor? She stares at me, lips parted just enough to look a little like a dead fish. The thought makes me want to laugh, and the desire is so strong I have to start walking back toward my house before I lose it. Halfway up my driveway, I hear her storm door slam, and all of a sudden, I whirl around. I’m alone. There’s no one here. It’s not the same kind of alone that I feel after I’ve walked her home. It’s worse, it’s colder. It’s a kind of Twilight Zone lonely, like all the people in the world have mysteriously disappeared, and I’m the last man on Earth. The crickets and tree peepers sound so soft it seems unnatural. I start analyzing what’s normal. Are they always this quiet? Does every guy feel like they’ve eaten a brick after something like this? But all my logic is jumbled up, so instead, I decide I’d better just go to bed, even though it’s only eight o’clock. Maybe I’ll wake up and be able to think straight. Maybe in the morning, the thought of the third floor won’t seem so strange.