Emma

I was like a puppy transfixed on the remains of a chicken bone still dripping from dinner’s grease.
As he walked, my eyes locked on the teeniest details: the slight glisten of the hair on his forearms, tanned and strong. The space between his thigh and barely there butt that winked at me every time he took another step. But mostly, his hands. The way his boyish fingers curled around the handle of that old school red and white Marlboro thermos, a “gem,” he said he’d discovered while cleaning out his dad’s garage. ####

I had laughed. Why would a clunky old thing like that, with probable cobwebs inside, be something to get excited about? ####

And yet, here we were. ####

It hadn’t taken much convincing for me to join him on this glorious summer morning. “Wake up. Let’s have a day. We need to put this thermos to use,” was all he had said. I rolled my eyes but proceeded to get dressed, my mind in a woozy haze. More and more these days, that stirring inside my stomach appeared every time I talked to him, both intoxicating and terrifying. ####

We’d met only two months before. He was a local, I a student. He was younger, intriguing, a beautiful baby face with the wisdom of an old man. And I was crazy about him. ####

He looked back at me and smiled in the sunlight. We’d come upon a grassy rock patch by the water. He set down the blanket and beckoned me over. I looked into his muddy brown eyes, like melted chocolate. I wanted to savor this moment, to drink him in. ####

The heat increased, and I finally made some cutting remark about utilizing Mr. Marlboro. He was amused, of course; I, who had undermined this silly old thermos, and I, who now demanded its use. “In a minute, “ he whispered, a mischievous smirk on his face. I had presumed that it carried lemonade or iced tea, some kind of refreshment complimentary to a summer day picnic. ####

But alas, no. Of course it hadn’t. Of course he pulled two water bottles out of his bag just as he opened the thermos. It was empty inside but a single rose and a letter. My heart twinged a little. He had always been sweet, but up until this moment, I had nothing tangible as a souvenir to his existence. He pulled out the rose and tickled my nose with its petals, teasing. He left me to read the letter. It was an ode and a promise from him to me. The sweetest words I had ever seen that were now mine on paper, forever. ####

I will never forget the thermos’s transformation from banal to beautiful that day—how something so inanimate could at once be so intimate. ####

Sometimes, in a quiet moment, I open it up just to make sure the treasures are still there. And they are. Of course.####

I will never forget that summer with the magical boy who carried his love for me in a beat up Marlboro thermos.