The water reflected the sky, bright and burning, rippling the clouds in each crash of the soft waves. We were infinite, just as we always were when we were together. The moments around us couldn’t penetrate this tick of time we shared. It wasn’t special, it wasn’t different. It wasn’t anything we didn’t already do, but the smoke filled the car and drifted through the windows as the breeze rolled in, and at 17 years old, there was no future. Just this moment, our moment. The past that hurt us and the future that waited for us to get our shit together didn’t matter. Was it even real?
Eventually, as the music faded and our cigarette was smoked, we laughed and cried until the car took us without a second thought. We didn’t make it far; the wheels under our bodies barely even warmed as they meandered down the road less than a mile. One mile was all it took for our future, that didn’t even exist before, to crumble.
Berries and cherries danced behind us. They reflected off the side mirrors and tickled the beaded jewelry hanging from the rearview mirror. Our stomachs? Dropped into our assholes. Our bodies? Frozen. This moment of time hovered; Stress and anticipation beading in sweat down our faces.
The car jolted to a stop, throwing us against our seatbelts.
“Baylie!” I cried, astonished at her lack of driving skills. Surely, the officer noticed the uncommon slam on the brakes.
We scurried like rodents to hide any indication of incrimination. Empty cigarette packs shoved under the seat, marijuana locked in a box inside a box, sunglasses over our eyes to hide the red, veiny evidence of a past smoke session. Baylie’s hands shook as she dug for her license and registration. It felt out of body, like this tick of time landed on a broken hand.
Baylie rolled down her window as the cop approached. His face was serious, and the chilled wind whipped past him, rustling Baylie’s hair and sending chills across my arms. His expression told us we weren’t in the clear. I’m sure he could smell the marijuana wafting off of us like the smoke that curled from our lips just earlier.
The officer asked his questions, already knowing our guilt. Baylie obliged. Words passed between them, but all I could hear was her voice, steady and terrified, each syllable overly enunciated, as if clarity alone might prove us innocent.
In another broken hand of time, our bodies were outside the vehicle. My ears rang in the crisp air as the sun disappeared into the tree-lined horizon, just like our dignity, as cars slowed to watch two teenage girls meet real-world consequences for the first time. I clung to Baylie, frozen just as I was, while the canine searched her tan Toyota and the Sheriff arrived on scene. Cops surrounded us, bullying us with their words. It felt like an episode of Scared Straight. But in that moment, I felt nothing. Any other teenage girl might have been terrified but I felt nothing as my life shifted from innocent to small-town criminal.
They found the weed. They found the empty packs of cigarettes shoved into the crevices of the car. They found scent beads and huddled together, convinced we had discovered some nefarious new drug. It was almost comical when they brought the evidence to us, flashing the pink and red beads inside a Ziploc bag, only for us to explain they had been left by the previous owner and were just for scent. Good work, officers.
When our angry parents arrived and the cops let us off with a warning and a call to the school, we were separated almost forcefully from each other. I knew our lives had just shifted — that the people we were before the berries and cherries glinted off the rearview mirror were gone, and the people we were now did not yet know each other.
I wish I’d known then that this moment would someday make us laugh. That it would change us, but change us in a way that pushed us closer together. Like the universe was securing our friendship until the end of time. And it’s funny to me, that time seemed still in the moments we felt invincible, yet now, the more vulnerable we become, the faster time rushes past us.
When the sun sets, bold and beautiful, and the chill in the air wraps around my body as the wind dances through my car window, I hold my breath and freeze, just for one tick of time. And every time I see berries and cherries change the trajectory of someone else’s life, I get to relive a moment that changed mine.
Spit and Spine 