Infinity Forever and Ever
Cuyler Meade
Jenny listens to the cattails in the morning, their pit-pit-pit against the soft flesh of her fingertips, or the tik-tik-tik against her chipped, chewed nails. She walks fast, or slow, or whatever speed she wants because she has nowhere to be and only time.
It is early summer, and the little birds that congregate like a billion fairies, or, more accurately, like a crap-ton of little birds in the big tall trees that surely have names but which Jenny has no reason or desire to know, are waiting for Jenny to walk by so that they can go all nuts and fly around crazy, like something really bothered them, but only for a second before they come back to the tree as if nothing happened. Because nothing did. It was just Jenny. Just her walking by at her meaningless speed. Nobody important. It must be nice, to be part of such a big flock, that knows how to fly where you fly, and vice versa, and who don't laugh when you tweet about something they think is dumb. Birds are always just, you know, flying around. Where are they going? They never go anywhere, seems like. But they're together a lot. This kind, anyway.
Jenny thinks that. She thinks lots of things. Like whether to go to the pool today. Or what exactly Miggy meant when he said she looked nice last week, the afternoon she was wearing the new swimsuit Mom finally agreed to buy her despite smushing her lips together until they looked like two wriggly worms that probably one of the bajillion little birds up there would've plucked right off her sour face if they'd been shopping for swimsuits on the river trail instead of in TJ Maxx, which is a gross place to try on swimsuits, by the way. Miggy has been cute since he started getting taller finally and stopped only listening to Daddy Yankee and started paying attention to good music like the Vines and Eve 6. But Vanessa and her cousin were giggling when he said Jenny looked nice like there was something Jenny didn't know about, so Jenny wasn't sure it was actually nice what he said. You can never really know these days with boys.
Jenny ends up going to that new arcade, the totally retro one with the ancient games and the cute senior boy working the ticket counter who last time she went was growing maybe kind of a shriveled caterpillar of a mustache and blushed when Jenny pointed it out. She likes that, the way she can make an older boy feel something just with her words and maybe her eyes, or maybe other things, too, but who knows. She hopes she'll find some friends there, not caring much who, just figuring it'd be fun to be with some cool people for a change. Not Jace, her stupid younger brother, or his stupid friends who always come around, except Ezra who's actually nice.
The breeze is really pleasant during Jenny's walk to the arcade, cooling the light sheen of sweat on her face and also probably rustling the cattails back on the trail, though Jenny wouldn't know because she's not there anymore. But there aren't any of Jenny's friends at the arcade. Only two boys from her class who probably are the most annoying boys in the whole school, Oscar and Derrick. They're always together, like they don't even know how to go anywhere alone, but it seems like they barely have any other friends, probably because they're so annoying. Jenny wishes there were even a single other kid from school there because she already made eye contact with the boys by accident and now it's gonna be so awkward if she just leaves. Like she wasn't supposed to be there or something, or like she was scared to be there on her own. Of all people to let think something gross like that, Oscar and Derrick are literally the last people she would want to.
So she smiles in a way she thinks is maybe described as coquettishly at the older boy at the counter and stays and pulls out a card with some credits she had from last time and cashes them in at the machine for quarters. Jenny's not about to be intimidated by the likes of Oscar and Derrick who, really, are such losers, and plus her favorite game is right by the racing game they're almost adorably playing together, so she strides right up and plinks a couple quarters into the machine and watches the cartoon monsters pop up for her to pick one. This isn’t one of the ancient games, just regular, and the graphics are actually good. Jenny always picks the big gorilla.
Jenny glances down at the boys to see if they've noticed her and, obnoxiously, they seem to have not, so deep in focus on Cruis’n USA as they are, hooting and grunting at each other like a couple of dumb baboons. She focuses on her own screen as the cartoon Peoria, Illinois, comes up for her to make the gorilla pound on. She almost feels bad because the arcade Peoria looks nice, kind of pretty, tall buildings with actual people walking on the streets and not with basically nobody ever anywhere the way it is here in this stupid hick town where nobody even lives. But she doesn't feel bad enough to not make the gorilla punch all the buildings down and beat the level.
By the time she's on to the next level, Jenny has forgotten about Oscar and Derrick and is fully focused on her multi-colored metropolitan destruction. And so it's not until she digs in her pocket to pay to keep playing that she notices that she has an audience. Oscar and Derrick have finished their race and are just standing behind Jenny, watching over her shoulder as she plays the game, and when she looks back at them with a sort of what-are-you-even-doing-there face, she's super surprised to discover them just quietly smiling and saying things like “keep playing, the next level’s great” or whatever and somehow being not at all annoying.
She turns back to the screen and hides a smile and plinks the quarter in to keep playing and she keeps playing, a little weirded out but pleased with their attention. When she does a thing in the game, she's pretty sure she hears one of them say “nice” and it doesn't sound at all like they're being jerks about it. And when Jenny needs to get another quarter but, with her hand deep in her pocket, discovers she's out of them, she's actually really bummed to have to turn around and be like, “Well, I guess that's it. I'm out of quarters.”
And then Oscar and Derrick do something extra weird, and they dig into their own pockets like they're looking for quarters to maybe give her? Which can't be right because why, but Jenny never finds out for sure because they're also out, but they look really sheepish about it like maybe they really would have given one to her. Which Jenny thinks is actually so sweet and really unexpected, so without even really thinking about it she says, “Well, anyway, what are you guys up to?” and they both smile really big and Oscar especially looks surprisingly kind of cute maybe and almost in unison they say “Nothin’” which, again, really adorable.
So Jenny tells them to hang with her if they want and marches out of the arcade without even making eyes at the clerk, and they follow behind her kinda like little puppies or maybe little baby quails, which Jenny really loves. And she says they should walk by the river and there's a really cool place she'll show them if they want and they do so they all go.
The walk isn’t long, but who cares if it is, there’s no rush anyway. Derrick is a little more talkative than Oscar and asks Jenny some questions as the boys meander alongside their guide, sometimes switching sides, sometimes one lagging behind, sometimes one boy going in front and turning around to walk backward so they’re all facing each other. Jenny is happy to share about volleyball camp, which was kind of dumb, and about having to go to wrestling with Jace, which was extra dumb, except it turns out Oscar and Derrick both wrestle, which Jenny didn’t know before, and she says after they tell her that it was only dumb because Jace sucks at wrestling and she has to sit in the stands for the whole day instead of getting to swim at the hotel pool, but that if she were watching guys wrestle who actually, you know, had an idea what they were doing, it would probably have been okay, maybe even kind of fun. Oscar is the better wrestler, Derrick says, which makes Oscar smile shyly, which Jenny thinks is so cute, and also it’s sweet that Derrick would say that about his friend in front of a girl or anybody.
It’s funny because Jenny has grown up around these boys all of their lives, the town being that small that pretty much everybody knows each other somehow and especially if you’re all in the same grade, which they are. But she’s never not even once really spent any time talking to them, on account of them being totally weird since basically kindergarten and never doing cool stuff, which is the kind of stuff Jenny tends to prefer, obviously. Which is why it's surprising to discover that Oscar is quiet, but laughs a lot and in the right places when Jenny or Derrick say something that you should laugh at, which in Derrick's case is shockingly often, and also even though he's quiet Oscar does have a few things to say. Like when Jenny asks them why they like wrestling Derrick just kind of says it’s something to do, but Oscar kind of looks at his shoes and says for a long time about how his dad wrestled and always wanted him to wrestle and then trails off and after a while Derrick says that Oscar’s dad died, which of course Jenny knows but kind of forgot because she hasn't thought about it in forever, and what a cool guy he was, like another dad to Derrick even, who has a dad but he isn't around at all really, all of which makes Jenny feel pretty bad about some things. And then all three are quiet for a bit.
And then Oscar makes a joke to break the silence and it isn’t really that funny but all three laugh really hard because it feels so good to think about something other than Oscar’s dead dad. And Jenny changes the subject and asks what other stuff they like to do and both boys kind of shrug and say band is okay at school but neither is really good at it yet. Jenny does choir, but she acts really interested in the instruments they’re playing and what songs they learned last year and what they think of Mr. Rodriguez the music teacher, who Jenny is delighted to learn they both also like a lot. And Jenny talks about how Mr. Rodriguez likes the Red Hot Chili Peppers, which makes him cool, and the boys obviously don’t listen to the Red Hot Chili Peppers but sort of pretend they do for a minute until they can start talking about other bands they do know, like Jet and the Strokes and the White Stripes, all of which Jenny also loves. Jenny talks about how it’s cool that there’s, like, finally rock music again, and the boys agree, maybe not totally knowing what that means but enthusiastic enough to agree to almost anything at this point, and all of it makes Jenny feel really safe and interesting in a way that feels kind of strange and new.
And when they get to the place, the boys are legit really impressed and Jenny feels this pride that she is showing them something they haven’t seen and also that these actually really nice boys if you give them a chance want to spend time with her. Even though they're kind of awkward and say stupid stuff like “dude, sick leaves” about absolutely normal leaves, she thinks it's kind of endearing and sweet that they don't really know what to say and honestly, if she's being honest, she doesn't totally know either and so it kind of puts her at ease.
The spot is this great little nook off the side of the river trail and there's a big tree with low thick branches you can sit on and you can hear the river a tiny bit even though you can't see it and there's a dense canopy of branches and leaves blocking out the whole sky and it's shady but warm and it maybe feels like a place where you'd find actual fairies or spirits or whatever, which Jenny says eventually and the boys don't laugh or anything at all. Like maybe it was actually a cool thing to say even.
And the three of them lie there, each on their own big fat branch, and just kind of say whatever thing comes to mind, except when nothing comes to mind at all, which is a lot of the time.
And although there's no need, no need at all, for this day to end, and although it feels for a while like probably it won't because why would or should it, as if there were anywhere else to be or anything else to become, after an infinite while, the sky beyond the canopy does begin to darken, and the mosquitoes start coming out, and it gets a little chilly, and the boys finally say maybe they'd all better go home, but could they all hang out tomorrow? And Jenny grins the big big grin she only sometimes grins, like in old photos of her as a toddler or something, and says yes, please. And they make plans for where and when to meet and find their way back out to the river trail and then walk opposite ways to go home.
And Jenny's fingers find the cattails again, which are not silent even before they do, because the wind is rustling them and they're saying tsss-tsss-tsss into the night, just like they always are, until her fingers find them. Then they say pit-pit-pit-pit-pit-pit-pit.
