Twenty-Three: A Big Deal

Jet and I both laughed along with Johnny Carson's audience, hours after we threw our caps in the air away with high school. We cuddled in his tiny bed half past midnight, comforting ourselves with Mr. Carson's interview humor as the first hours of the morning came.

I blinked at him as he stared ahead at the cathode ray tube. His horribly bleached hair was a mess, straw-like against his shoulders. The last month and four weeks came flooding back to me. The courtship, the first date, the first kiss, and the day we were first together. This boy had shown me how beautiful punk rock was, how a vagabond life treats a person well, how two completely different people are alike. Jet had taken my last quarter of high school and showed me the world. I was doing just fine with Brad, but Jet swept me off my feet and showed me how to live.

His gaze was removed from the TV when a tear fell from my eye onto his arm.

"Why are you crying?" He wanted to know.

"I let myself get close to you," I answered.

Jet kissed my temple. "I enjoyed every second of it."

"Hope so," I whispered.

"What should I say?" He wondered. "Should I tell you that you should stay? That you mean the world to me, and I'll never find another who appreciates me as much as you do?"

I shook my head at him. "It doesn't mean that much to me to mean that much to you."

The boy reached out and grasped onto my cheek. "You're crazy if you believe that you don't mean a lot to me."

"Am I?"

"If you didn't mean anything, Kaitlin," he spoke, "I'd have saved all the thought into the flowers, the letter and all the time we've been together since spring. If this didn't mean a lot to me, you wouldn't be here in my bed right now."

More tears poured down my face at that. Something in his voice told me that he was being truthful.

"Then I don't think I can lose you," I croaked. "I don't think I'm strong enough."

"It's going to be the best thing in the world when you leave me behind tomorrow," he assured. "You'll see it in the fall. But you already know that, don't you?"

"I know," I confirmed.

Jet used the pads of his thumbs to clear the tears from my eyes. "So stop your crying."

I choked on a breath as it came out. I hid my face into his shirt and breathed deeply to regain my composure. "Sorry."

"Promise me one thing," he smoothed down my hair.

"Anything," I whispered.

He looked at me with serious eyes. "No tears at the airport tomorrow."

I clicked my tongue. "That's an awful lot to ask me."

Jet smiled. "You said anything."

"I'll do my best." I wanted to eat my words.

We turned out the light and stayed in the dark for the next several hours of the morning. We didn't sleep. Even when we didn't speak, we locked eyes and were lost in each other for a time. Jet and I talked about everything we'd already said before, things we'd never thought to talk about until that moment, and absolutely nothing at all.

He reminded me exactly what punk rock was all about to him. Not the fashion or the music or the scene points, all of those things were secondary. Everyone who claimed punk rock had their own ideologies and definitions of exactly what punk rock was about, but to Jet at least, it was living as you wanted, for the moment, for who you really were, and to just make yourself content with what you'd given yourself.

Jet was more than content, he said. He had a place to stay where he could be himself. He had good friends, he had good music, he had me. Jet was pleased with what life had bestowed upon him and there wasn't a thing more in the world that he wanted. When I left he would go back to friends and live punk music on the sunset strip, staying out too long and sticking needles into his veins.

My boyfriend wasn't heading in directions that I was. He wasn't thinking a good education, a career, or a long-term plan. He definitely wasn't thinking of the destruction he would eventually fall to if he kept up the way he was. Jet had absolutely nothing to strive for. In me he confided that he hoped someday he would. That he'd want to go to college before it was too late, he's set goals for himself, he'd be more than just a punk rock kid lost in the crowd. For his sake, I hoped that he would too.

"Do you think we'll meet again someday?" I questioned. "Somewhere down the road?"

Jet shrugged. "It's possible."

I mused, "What do you think we'll be like in ten years?"

"I know that you'll be successful with a career, a big deal husband, a couple of kids…" He smiled at me. "A house in Topanga Canyon where you wake up to beautiful valley trees each sunrise."

I grinned and moved closer to him, intertwining our fingers. "How do you know he'll be 'a big deal'? How can you be so sure he's nothing like you?"

"Because," Jet began, "You're a big deal. You wouldn't settle for anything less than that."

Pink light streamed onto my face as he said it. The sun was beginning to rise. It was telling me to savor my last moments with Jet. My time in the Pacific Palisades was up.

"I sincerely hope you're right," I proclaimed. "And I hope that you amount to something big after all."

He leaned forward and pressed his lips onto mine, unlocking our fingertips and resting his hand on the small of my back. My eyes shut tight and my hand gripped onto his shoulder. I moved my toes against his calf as I was breathing him in. We were trying to force everything we felt for each other into that kiss. Everything good I felt about him, everything bad I felt about him, everything I'd left unsaid, I wanted to make him know with that kiss. I wanted all my passion for him out of me and back into his body where it belonged, for someone else to appreciate, for someone else to understand, for someone else to take and love.

Our eyes met again when the sun was in its place, overlooking the Southland in the sky. They disconnected only to blink. We were still and solitary. Silence enraptured us. The apartment looked bare in the light, and it could not have been more perfect.

Finally Jet trailed his fingers on my arm and kissed the top of my head. "It's 7:30. We should get ready."

I offered him a half smile and nodded, sitting up as he held my shirt out to me.

While he made breakfast, I showered, pushing out all my thoughts from my mind except for getting my hair washed with his generic shampoo. I stepped out into the main room to be greeted by pancakes, a little burnt, but with enough syrup to hide the bitterness.

I gathered all my things and closed my bag before sliding it onto my shoulder. Scanning the sleeping area a final time, I noticed nothing else that belonged to me. Jet called me, at the door with his keys in hand, a backpack draped over his shoulder. I walked the short distance to him on the faded brown carpet. He took hold of my hand and walked out the door, willing me to follow.

"Wait," I stopped halfway through the threshold.

My free hand on the door handle, I took a final look at Jet's apartment. My eyes scanned the kitchen, disheveled with our sticky pancake plates, the folding chairs abandoned against the wall. Rudy's bed, hardly ever attended to; Jet's bed area with mismatched sheets and records lined up against the window beside the turntable; a picture of Jet and I shot candidly, laughing at something in the art room.

He would remember me.

I smiled at the empty room with a deep breath and pulled the door shut behind me. Cupping the back of his head, I gave Jet a short kiss before we walked hand in hand down the hallway towards the exit.

---

Johnny Carson hosted The Tonight Show for a loooooong ass time.

He leaned forward and pressed his lips onto mine, unlocking our fingertips and resting his hand on the small of my back. My eyes shut tight and my hand gripped onto his shoulder. I moved my toes against his calf as I was breathing him in. We were trying to force everything we felt for each other into that kiss. Everything good I felt about him, everything bad I felt about him, everything I'd left unsaid, I wanted to make him know with that kiss. I wanted all my passion for him out of me and back into his body where it belonged, for someone else to appreciate, for someone else to understand, for someone else to take and love.
You know, once in a while I'll write a paragraph and be all aw and ew at the same time. That had to be the best paragraph in the whole story, was it not?

Review if you agree/disagree. That means you review no matter what you think...aha

Thanks to everyone who left a review for the last chapter! You have no idea how much I appreciate you. I smile each time I get an e-mail alert telling me that I have a new review. Thank you for making me smile.

rachel- Haha, you're right the California Emancipation laws were a little over the top because, well, I am pretty over the top. I just wanted everyone to know that Jet living the way he was would have been possible. Glad you're enjoying this, thanks for the review.