There was something familiar about the feeling against her skin. Her bare back, chafed raw against the plastic slide. Blonde curls shot out in every direction, her hair turned to friz, shocking the boy with a static “Pop!” every time he’d kiss her neck.
Her mother would be worried sick. The girl arranged the pillows on her bed in the shape of a body. His father never worried. The boy knew his dad was passed out, sprawled out, strung out on the couch.
The girl made sounds for the boy. The boy thought he might be God.
The girl was Juliet Morris. She was nearly sixteen and liked the sound of that number. Juliet always wanted to be older, to look older. She was a “late bloomer.”
She hated when her mom called her a late bloomer, as if she was a docile seed no one cared to water; as if she was on the brink of herself, a fraction of a person. All Juliet wanted was to feel whole. She was starving for someone to fill in the missing parts of herself.
She liked boys a whole lot, especially the ones that wanted close to nothing to do with her. Especially boys like Ty.
Ty Horowitz was a senior at Ridgeview High. In the third grade, he asked a girl to be his wife. Ty grew up being called soft. He had a girlfriend through elementary school named Lily. He serenaded Lily at cafeteria talent shows and wrote her love letters in waxy pink crayon. He proposed with a strawberry ring pop on the same playground he lay half-naked, tonight.
Lily moved to Minnesota. Ty would never see her again. Around that same time, his mom found his dad’s second cell phone, packed her bags, and left for a motel. It didn’t take long for his mother to stop calling and his father to start drinking.
Ty liked girls a whole lot, but only enough to touch. Beneath layers of protein powder, Ty felt small and ignored. His sense of self was flimsy as dust, brushed towards anything that would attach itself to him. He liked to feel big and beautiful or nothing at all. Ty lost his softness, gained his temper, got real strong, and worked his way up the ranks of Pop Warner Football. He became the only freshman on the high school’s Offensive line. Ty liked hearing the shape of his name leaving many, many mouths, chanting it from the sidelines, whispering it in his ear.
Girls like it rough and nasty. Ty knew this for a fact. Like Milla Montgomery, who went starry-eyed as he pinned her down beneath the bleachers. Like Charlotte White, whose face formed a twisted smile as he choked her in his truck. Like Katie Ferrell, who asked him to slap her in the face in the bed after prom.
(Ty doesn’t know anything at all)
Juliet Morris crawled outside of her window at exactly 2:32 A.M. that night. She saw the boy’s infamous truck approach her house. She couldn’t believe Ty Horowitz could peer right into her bedroom if he wanted to. He could see the polished trimming around her window. The garden she helped her mom grow. The rosebush she watered, the thorns that scraped her.
Only a week prior did the unlikely pair converse (Snapchat). Juliet sat behind Ty in Calculus. They never spoke, but she felt his eyes size her up when she’d stand. She started dressing for him, so the moments he’d see her would count. The days he didn’t notice were the worst of the week.
First, the boy snapped a photo of half of his face, a collarbone sneaking out of the frame. The girl walked all around her house, iPhone in hand, searching for the ideal light. Beneath a golden lamp in her basement, she pursed her lipglossed lips. She retook the photo a dozen times.
“hey,” the girl typed across the screen.
“sup,” the boy’s words covered his tan face.
She reapplied her gloss. Her heart was burning with a newfound thrill. She reached under her shirt with one hand to act as her own push up bra. She was starving for whatever came next.
“bored,” the girl pressed send.
He was in a torn apart bathroom made of shaving cream residue, yellow popcorn walls, and white overhead light. He moved his camera lower, showing half of his stomach, just enough to frame the lines of his abs and his sharp jaw.
“samee.”
She melted into a puddle on the bathroom floor. Golden light surrounded her, she choked on a little squeal.
For a week, they showed each other their bodies until he forgot her name.
Juliet crawled through her window and tip-toed through the garden. She gave him a wave in the headlights. She was numb with nerves and tingled all over. She felt dirty, but she knew it was supposed to feel that way.
(Juliet doesn’t know anything at all)
The girl and the boy didn’t know where to go. Juliet and her doe eyed stare asked questions about his pets, his favorite subject in school, his zodiac sign, his goals, his sport. Ty turned up the music. Rap beats pulsed through the dark, empty suburban roads.
Monkey bars suddenly filled the scene. A miniature basketball court. Four-square. Innocent names in second-day chalk. Ty pulled into the parking lot of Ridgeview Elementary, where the boy once proposed with a ring pop, played ball for the first time. Where the girl tried to gossip but it didn’t feel right, so she’d take to the swing set until she felt like a bird.
Ty slammed the car door shut. Let’s explore. Let’s adventure, he said. He grabbed Juliet’s hand. This was her favorite part. The unlikely pair laid down in the middle of the miniature basketball court. She grasped for more conversation. His favorite color. His favorite star. His middle name. His first impression of her.
He said his first impression of her was that she was shy.
“I’m not shy,” the girl looked away.
“Prove it,” the boy rolled on top of her.
The girl felt cold and distant, but she knew it was supposed to feel that way.
(Juliet doesn’t know anything at all)
The boy felt drunk and powerful, but he knew he was supposed to feel that way.
(Ty doesn’t know anything at all)
The girl let the boy press his weight against her. She froze, then saw herself through his eyes. Who is Ty Horowitz? Who is Juliet Morris? She observed her reflection, fragile and still. She’s not shy, she’s electric. Yeah, she’s a real, whole woman.
The girl rolled over the boy and straddled him in a single motion. She felt something come to life beneath her. She didn’t know who all of this was for. She didn’t know who was benefitting, who was winning, who was who.
Who is Ty Horowitz? Who is Juliet Morris?
They moved to a yellow slide where she stretched open and free. She saw the curve of her youth in the blacks of his eyes. There was something familiar about the feeling. Her bare back, chafed raw against the plastic slide. Plastic sighs, plastic sounds, plastic touch.
The girl made sounds for the boy. The boy thought he might be God.