The Lake Effect

Violent light spasms over Lake Huron, the sky twisting colors together like the melted ice cream merging into the skin of my wrists. Through the windows comes a surge of freshly electrified air; through the doors, the tourists come running into the shop, soaked and startled at the raucous bang of thunder, so loud it blocks the shrieks of the children clinging to thighs. Funny how the lumbering, layered cumulus makes the cottage-goers shiver. Before, it was all browns and yellows, fried potatoes, charcoal, and wood, but now the lake churns green as the wind tunnels new coves, erases hearts, turns sand to slate-gray bullets. Still in all I can’t help but watch for waterspouts, tidal waves, any unfamiliar ecological threat other than this same old storm. The store lights flicker, and the tourists scatter. For once, the aisles are barren, the windows free of fingerprints. We locals wipe down tables and stand in the doorway as everything from the beach to the street is wiped clean.

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one tequila two

Smell the camouflage-print trees. Feel the hollow above your tongue, granules under ankles and wet, sweet wrists, with specks of orange in the dark, silver flasks and the summer moon. Walk steady, though your teeth are numb, in the collective heat of the crowd, baby, just go where they push. Their sour mouths on your shoulder, because you're bound to this trajectory, in the middle of fingers and knees in this string bikini, borrowed from your sister, triangles a snap from letting go. Share the bottle of schnapps with unknown boys. Weave through arcades and steal quarters that cling to slots to show off. Press a cold beer bottle to your sternum to stop talking so much, and of course you want this tongue in your mouth, you want these fingers pushing past your fabric, pinned against a pick-up truck, you want to ride on that boy's back all the way into the backseat, where his hand slides higher when he asks: "you’re not chicken, are you?” and you can’t remember the word to stop his crawl, so blind, blurred, and sinking, fingers like concrete pipes, burning inside until Before and Aftermath is smudged like ink, like chalk swept into dust, and thoughts tied down and out of sight for the rest of the night.