The Words We Keep

I don’t tell anyone about the poem. But it’s there—a real piece of me.

The only person I would tell is Micah, but he’s been absent for three days with no word from the 100-acre-wood. Not that I’ve been checking my phone like a certifiable addict or anything.

Friedman and Gifford do their usual pep rally about our “poetic dance through the human mind” when we meet for collaboration in the art room at the end of the week. Micah walks in ten minutes into their song and dance, slings his backpack onto the bar stool next to me, and sits two seats away without so much as a glance in my direction.

He hates you.

“Art connects us,” Friedman says. “Every time we put our story out there, even a small, seemingly insignificant piece, we are that much closer to seeing that it’s not a bunch of little stories. It’s one big story. The human story.”

As always, he tells us to “Go, create!” His slingshot canvas is gone, and in its place, a pile of junk. Odds and ends from around the school—ancient DVR players, chairs with missing legs, and all sorts of other remnants of classrooms past—that Friedman intends to give new life through art.

“Nothing is ever truly broken,” he says, surveying his pile.

Micah is drawing in a sketch pad with long, swooping strokes.

“Where have you been?” I ask.

He answers without looking up.

“Mental-health sabbatical.”

I open my mouth to tell him I’m sorry for jumping away, that it’s not him, it’s me, but I stop short, unsure how to start or if it’s even true.

He looks at me sideways while drawing. “Is it just me, or are you being weirder than usual?”

“I—I just wanted to say, about the other day, in the hallway—”

Micah holds up his hand. “Gonna stop you right there. That one’s on me. Think I misread some signals.”

“Micah—”

“Seriously. Message received. We’re project partners. That’s it.”

Before I can tell him I have absolutely no brain or heart or calendar space to give, Kali trots over, an accusatory finger pointed in my direction.

“Do you know who it is?”

“Who what is?” I answer.

“The guerrilla poet?”

“The what now?”

She rolls her eyes like I’m an impossible moron and turns her phone to show me today’s edition of the Underground. There, front and center, is a picture of my bathroom stall poem with a post: RANDOM ACT OF POETRY BY MYSTERIOUS GUERRILLA POET.

“So far, it’s just this one, and all we know is that this so-called poet is a girl,” says Kali. “It’s really not you?”

I shake my head.

“Then we both have a huge problem,” she says.

Micah cranes his neck to look at Kali’s phone, then cocks a knowing eyebrow at me. “How do you know it’s a girl?”

“Because it’s in the girls’ bathroom,” Kali says, annoyed. “And now people are, like, posting other stuff in there, too, and someone showed Gifford and she’s been going on and on about how public art is so inspired. Like sticking something on the bathroom wall is so hard. It’s basically graffiti, and the poem isn’t even that good.” Kali points her bony finger at me again. “Anyway, heads up. Looks like someone else is in it to win it.”

Kali trots off, ponytail swinging, and Micah narrows his eyes at me.

“A poem made of magazine clippings. You wouldn’t know anything about this, would you?”

I smile, and Micah is already up and headed for the door. We practically run to the bathroom.

“Excuse me? Where are you going?” I point to the sign with the little girl on it when he starts to follow me inside. “See the dress?”

“Huh,” Micah says, smiling. “I always thought that was a cape.”

He puts both hands out in front of him like a flying superhero. I roll my eyes.

“All right, Superman, but let’s be quick.”

When I give Micah the coast-is-clear sign, we hurry into the bathroom stall and lock it behind us. The back of the door is covered with words. Some written in marker. In pencil. On neon Post-its, stuck to the door next to my stay on track cutouts.

go to college

ace the test

snap out of it

don’t mess up

why are you like this?

try harder

“This was you?” Micah says.

“Not all this.” I touch a note that says be someone better. “Just the clippings. And they weren’t my words, exactly.”

“But you breathed life into them.”

Micah is face to face with me in the tiny stall, his black curls grazing my nose, and I can smell wintergreen gum on his breath. The same electric energy pulses between us as on the beach, in his kitchen.

This time, he pulls away from me, and I don’t blame him one bit. I’d steer clear of me, too, after the way I treated him in front of Damon. But his eyes hold mine, the little gold flecks dancing.

“This should be our project.”

“Bathroom stall graffiti?”

“No. Well, yes. Words that mean something to people our age.”

“Right. ’Cause the world needs more angsty teen poetry?”

“Nope. The world has enough noise. It needs more truth. More real.”

“The world can’t handle my real.” I look at my magazine clippings again. “I can’t handle my real.”

“Write it anyway.”

He scans my face in a way that makes me feel totally naked. Like he sees the real me, which may even be more terrifying than being stark raving nude in front of the entire school.

“You still want to work with me?” I say.

“Don’t have much choice,” he says, with a hint of a smile. “It’s in the official rules: No quitting until it’s done.”

I jump at the sound of footsteps. The bathroom fills with girls’ voices as I peek through the slit in the door.

What if you get caught in here?

“Hey,” Micah says, his hand on my arm bringing me back to my body, to the electric zaps where his skin touches mine, zaps I’m desperately trying to ignore. “Come back to me.”

“But they’re gonna see us,” I whisper.

Micah frowns. “So what?”

He thinks this is about him again, and maybe it is (a little), but it’s more about my words. If people know they’re mine, they’ll know about the Lily I’ve tried so hard to hide.

“No one can know I wrote this.” I peek through the gap once more. “Whatever we do with this project, it has to be anonymous, okay?”

“You mean until we turn it in?”

“Right…well…I’ll figure that out later, but for now, promise me. A-non-y-mous.”

“O-k-ay,” he says, dragging out his letters to match mine, and then, before I can stop him, he flips the lock on the door.

“What are you doing?” I whisper, panicked.

Micah sighs. “When are you going to start trusting me?”

Without further explanation, he strides out like he owns the place. A girl by the mirror squeals, “What the hell, pervert?” Through the crack in the door, I see him walk to the entrance of the bathroom, turn, and loudly declare, “Ladies, B-minus for cleanliness, but A-plus for reading material. Keep up the good work!”

He shoots them a thumbs-up, and with all eyes on him, I slip out of the stall undetected. As I wash my hands at the sink, I see my flushed face in the mirror. A girl next to me whispers about “that weird rehab kid.”

“If you ask me,” I say, tossing my paper towel into the trash can, “the world could use more weirdos.”

—

Between Micah’s eyes and my poem on the wall, my heart is jumping all day.

During track practice, the rhythm of running works its magic for the first time in forever, an idea forming with the thud-thud-thud of my feet. Friedman’s words come to me. Art connects us. Makes us feel less alone.

The pieces start clicking together. The puzzle isn’t fully formed, but the energy of an idea surges through me. I don’t even care that Coach barks at me, “Pick up the pace, Larkin! Keep daydreaming, and you can kiss state finals goodbye!”

I even engage at dinner when Staci’s telling us about how she’s decided to go back to work, teaching a few days a week at the yoga studio. I tell her that sounds cool, and Dad smiles at me and gives me a wink across the table. Alice answers yes-or-no questions about her online courses. Yes, they’re going fine. No, she doesn’t need help. But my mind is too alive with possibilities for this project to fall into the Alice black hole tonight.

After dinner, I almost run to my room to message Micah.

LogoLily: I know how we can share our project AND keep me anonymous. At least for now.

100-acre-wood: Do tell.

LogoLily: Meet me Sunday night? School parking lot. 1 a.m.

100-acre-wood: Why, Lily Larkin, are you suggesting we break a rule? Clutching-my-pearls emoji

LogoLily: Just be there.

100-acre-wood: Aye, aye, Captain.

LogoLily: And bring your chalk.

100-acre-wood: Double-high-five emoji. Can’t wait emoji. Excited to meet rule-breaking Lily emoji

I shut off my phone and sit alone with my thoughts.

What if this doesn’t work?

And the project tanks?

My breath starts to catch in my lungs, so I find a scab on my stomach. It would be so easy to scrape it off. Reset my brain with the mindless motion.

But I stop my fingers.

And pick up my pen.

My Monsters

At night

the monsters come.

One

by

one

by

one.

They sit on my chest

laugh in my ear

steal my breath

whisper words I don’t want to hear.

They crowd me out.

Go away, I say.

But my voice is tiny

and no match for monsters.