Streetlights Like Fireworks Read Online Free PDF Page B

shine back through her reflection but I can tell she’s not
seeing those buildings. She sees only her own eyes, within them total solitude.
She can’t see me watching her. I’m not there. Not in that moment, whenever it
took place. She’s completely alone and it feels like she will be for a long
time to come.
    ~~~
    “I think I should try to find her,” I say, “try bringing the
guitar back to her.”
    Before this afternoon, I hadn’t been thinking that at
all. I kept assuming that eventually these random images would stop coming.
After all, I don’t know her, whoever she is. She can’t possibly have anything
to do with me. But when I saw her eyes again, and felt her complete loneliness,
something shifted for me. Even though I can’t imagine why the guitar would
matter, I know she needs something. Some part of her life is incomplete. I can
sense it. I can also relate to it since I’ve felt the same way for a long time.
    Lauren sits across from me at the Coffee Grounds, a
Starbucks alternative that somehow clings to life in Edmonds. “Seems like a
good idea,” she says.
    She stirs sugar into her double-espresso while I suddenly
feel self-conscious for ordering a decaf iced mocha. A chocolate milk,
essentially. I half-expected her to give me a hard time for ordering it but I
guess she didn’t notice.
    “I fully realize that doesn’t make any sense,” I say.
“But there it is.”
    Lauren shakes her head impatiently. “Why does everything
have to make sense? If that’s the way you feel, then that’s what you should
do.”
    “Other than the fact that it’s insane. On top of that, I
have no idea who she is. Provided she even exists outside my imagination.”
    “We kind of covered the imagination thing, remember? You
need to trust your intuition.”
    “But how is any of this even possible?” I mean the guitar
but I guess I’m also asking a larger question about the flashes. I can tell
Lauren understands.
    Her eyes meet mine. She has the most amazing eyes—a mix
of colors, ranging from blue-gray to tan. Hazel, I guess. Lauren’s cheeks
redden a little when I forget to break off eye contact but she doesn’t look
away.
    “It’s not the guitar, it’s you,” she says. “But I think
you know that. I’m assuming stuff like this has happened before. It has,
right?”
    “A few times,” I say. Which isn’t entirely true, of
course. But I’ve never spoken to anyone about the things I experience. Even
with Lauren, I’m having a hard time going there.
    She leans in toward me. “Maybe more than a few times?”
    I hesitate, then nod. “There’s been stuff in the past.
Nothing like this, though. Just, like, feelings.”
    Lauren considers. “Well, that’s all this is too. Just a
way stronger feeling. Let me guess—your family isn’t exactly comfortable with
any of it.”
    “Total denial,” I say.
    “And your friends? Just guessing again, but you probably
haven’t told them about your special skill either.”
    My heart starts to beat faster. Finally, I’m talking to someone about this. Not just someone. Her. “I
don’t know if you can call it a skill, exactly. It’s more like—I don’t know
what it is. But I have no control over it, that’s for sure. I never know when,
or if, it’s going to happen. Shit, it’s just freaking weird.”
    Lauren laughs, excited, as if she’s just discovered
something. And that something is me. “Personally, I think it’s weird that most
people pretend they don’t know half as much as they do,” she says. “That’s just
my way of looking at it. But you can get better at controlling it. That’s for
sure. Like anything else, you just need to practice. And, of course, not
pretend it doesn’t exist.”
    “How do you practice?” It hasn’t occurred to me before
that someone even could.
    Lauren hesitates for a moment, then reaches into her bag
and takes out an antique pocket watch. She holds it out to me. “Here. Just go
with it, okay?”
    I’m not