August 27, 2021:
I never knew that other girl's name, when we met at the I-Beam, bonding of an evening over shared music and bubbling hormones.
She was small, pretty, joyous in her dancing. We were happy to share the bands we loved.
No name, no number, it seemed too forward. I was addicted and undeserving, she was too pretty and full of life.
She promised though to meet me at my friends' show the next week. For a moment of a moment that promise returned me to life. I bought a futon, my first proper bed in San Francisco, and brought it home rolled in the backseat of a taxicab I couldn't afford. Not so much with expectation, certainly not with hope, but perhaps with some atavistic Boy Scout sense of I dunno what. That maybe we'd share it if the universe turned in just the perfect way.
It didn't.
I went to that show, but she wasn't there.
I wonder now...
But, no. No, I really don't.