It's Inside the Closet - Ariana Speyer

That’s where she told me it was, the one time she showed it to me. She had had a few drinks, which was unusual for her. Generally, she was very tight-lipped, liked to keep herself to herself. But this one night, I guess she was feeling nostalgic or something, her kids were all away, at camp or something, I really don’t know, and she told me it was in the closet. She had only mentioned it once or twice before, laughing at it, over the course of the summer that we were together. At first I thought she was prom queen or something, I didn’t remember what the hell she had said. And I certainly didn’t go to my prom, I didn’t even graduate, so it’s not like I care all that much about those things. But that one night she was saying stuff like I wish you knew me then, things were different, every day was a surprise. Shit like that. Like she was in a movie or something. She had only had two drinks, gin and tonics, but I guess since she never drinks they really hit her. We used to practice, oh my god, would we practice. Our little walks and everything, she said. I didn’t know what the fuck she was talking about but I let her rip. I was glad to see her coming out of her shell, being more of a woman, I guess. Usually she wore cut off jeans and an old car mechanic t-shirt or something. I mean, she was cute, that’s for sure, I could see that. But that night she had put on a little dress and some sandals and the way her collarbone came out was just perfect. After a while, she kind of skipped over to the closet in her bedroom and took something out of a box on a high shelf and brought it over to me with this small, private smile on her face. It was one of those tiaras that they put on people. This is it, this is the Miss Arizona crown I wore, she said, real quiet. And then she sat, looking at it, like she was looking at a world that had washed away, with no place for me in it.