Tonight the Streets Are Ours

Lindsey shrugs, unperturbed.

“Aren’t you worried?” Arden presses her. “I mean, they could…” They could do anything. Ground Lindsey forever. Put her into some sort of boarding school for juvenile delinquents. Forbid the two girls from ever seeing each other. They were parents; the choice was theirs.

Lindsey sighs. “This is who I am. This is what I did. And Arden, what you said last night made me think … like, okay, I should take responsibility for the things I do.

“So yeah, I’m sure they’ll be furious. And yeah, I’m worried. But these are the choices I made, and this is where I am now. So whatever the punishment is for that, I’ll take it. Because you know what? I wouldn’t trade in last night for anything.”

“Wow,” Arden says. “Why do you say that?”

“Well. You remember that girl I was talking to? Jamie?”

“The one with the piercing that made her nose look like a door knocker?”

“It’s called a septum piercing. I thought it looked really cool on her. I’m going to get one. She said it didn’t hurt that much.”

“Your parents will love that, too.”

“Who cares? They’re not my owners. Anyway, Jamie turned out to be really cool. She’s a sophomore at Pratt and she actually lives at Jigsaw Manor. She showed me her room—it’s hidden behind a curtain by the room where the band was playing when we came in. You’d never know it was there. And the walls are covered floor-to-ceiling with her work. She’s good. She does mixed-media collages, like really politicized stuff, about gender and race and…” Lindsey trails off, as she seems to run out of politicized issues to list. “Anyway,” she goes on after a pause, sounding unusually shy now, “she kissed me. I mean, we kissed.”

“Linds! That’s fantastic!” Arden takes her eyes off the road for a moment to look at her friend, who’s blushing but grinning hugely. “And how was it?”

“It was everything I’d hoped it would be,” Lindsey replies simply.

Arden feels a pang. She wants to feel that way about someone.

“She actually apologized for being rude to you,” Lindsey goes on. “She thought we were dating and we were having, like, a lovers’ quarrel. That’s why she was being kind of nasty when you met her. Once she realized you weren’t trying to get inside my pants, she was totally cool.”

Arden snorts a laugh. “Us, a couple?”

“Well, when you take a moment to think about it, you can see exactly why she’d assume that.”

Arden takes a moment to think about it. “Good point,” she agrees.

“But she wants to see me again. She said next time I’m in New York, I should get in touch, and she’ll take me out on a proper date.”

Arden immediately thinks of all the ways this could go wrong, will, most likely, go wrong. This girl could break Lindsey’s heart. She could leave her for someone older, someone who doesn’t live three states away. She could stand in the way of Arden and Lindsey’s friendship. Lindsey could try to go to college in New York City just to be close to Jamie, only to find that she and Jamie don’t even really like each other that much.

But Arden sweeps these thoughts out of her mind. Because right now, Lindsey is happy. And there will be time enough to deal with the unhappiness when it comes.

“What happened after you kissed?”

“Not much. I mean, we made out a lot. She let me sleep in her room.”

Arden waggles her eyebrows up and down.

“Not like that. I mean, I would like that, someday, don’t get me wrong—I just thought having my first kiss was enough for one night. I want to have something to look forward to.”

“So you just slept? I’m not missing anything here?”