The Girl On The Half Shell
I chance another look at him and I wonder what he’s thinking. He glances at me from the corner of his eyes.
    I bite my lip and study his face. “Do you know what?” I ask. “We’re doing my favorite thing. Lying in the sand, talking through the night, and waiting for the sunrise. Everything wonderful in life is free, but most people never get that.”
    His eyes fix on me intensely and too hard to meet for any length of time. OK, what stupid thing did I say now? He looks a touch irritated and a touch troubled again.
    I turn my head and stare at the moon. “Sorry to get all serious on you,” I whisper. “I have a habit of doing that. My friends get really annoyed with it. Do you want to hear something stupid?”
    A pause. Then laughter again, soft and textured. “Sure.”
    I sit up and point at the ocean. “Jack hates the oil derricks. Don’t even mention the Santa Barbara oil spill in 1969. He will go all Greenpeace on you. But I love the oil derricks. When I was a little girl and we’d drive home from Los Angeles along Highway 101, I couldn’t wait until we reached the coast so I could see them. They looked like pirate ships to me. It made me so happy to see them. It meant I was almost home. It still makes me happy to see their lights at night. It is the favorite part of my drive home from Los Angeles. The oil derricks that Jack hates. Isn’t that stupid?”
    I am laughing when I look over to smile at him. I quiet and freeze. He is crying, not overtly, but there is moisture on his face and a shimmer in his eyes. I don’t know how to handle this, especially since I haven’t a clue what’s going on with him. His expression changes and he looks embarrassed.
    “That is not a stupid story at all.”
    I smile because there is no way to force the words through the lump in my throat. My hand moves toward him. I can’t stop it. I begin to touch his tears away. His eyes flash, and I am embarrassed and totally confused by what prompted me to do that. I lie back into the sand beside him.
    He says nothing and I’m quiet as I silently debate with myself whether to ask. I stare at the fog, not brave enough to look at him. “I know this is rude of me to ask, but what happened? What happened to make you so sad? And that’s what you are. Underneath everything. Very sad.”
    His eyes are harsh as he studies me and I tense, wishing I could slap my mouth and take back that question. I can feel those black eyes combing the taut lines of my face and when I peek at him from the corner of my eye, his expression softens and is no longer hostile.
    “I lost someone important to me,” he says quietly. “It’s been just over a year.”
    “I’m sorry. I thought it was something like that. Were you very close?”
    That question Alan ignores. He seems surprised by his honesty and uncomfortable in it. I don’t press, but I still feel the need to say something.
    “I’ve lost my mom and my brother. I’m not going to say anything cliché like ‘time heals all wounds.’ I used to hate it when people said crap like that. Do you know it’s been ten years since my brother died and people still say crap like that to me? It is worse when they think I can just snap out of it. This wretched girl said to me tonight ‘Don’t you think you need to move beyond your brother?’ How would she know? She’s never lost anyone. I think we heal when we heal and that’s the end of it. Cut yourself some slack. Be sad until you’re not. It’s allowed.”
    Quiet again. Crap, maybe that was the wrong thing to say.
    “You’re not like any eighteen year old girl I’ve ever met.” His face, even smiling, is so intense, half in shadow and half touched in moonlight. “Do you always talk this way?”
    There is something in his voice that I can’t quite read. It makes me tense. “Unfortunately. People always say I need to lighten up. I think I’m worse than usual tonight because you started with that whole theatrical thing.”
    He gazes down at

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