Happiness

When was the happiest night of your life?

Mine was October 7, 2016.

(At first—since I remember a photo from that night—I checked Instagram to see when I had posted it—October 16, 2016—but that wasn’t right. I had a feeling. So I went through my camera roll, scrolling all the way up, and found all the photos taken. They were taken on October 7. I had posted a photo from October 7 on October 16. It was the Aries full moon. I had wanted to mark it. So I’d used a photo from the previous week.)

I was in Brooklyn. Hanging with a friend I was in love with.

(Is this the story of my life? Friendship is possibly the greatest romance.)

We were only supposed to get a few drinks but then the night did what it did.

We went from one bar to another. I was wearing a gray leather jacket. I still have it. Never wear it. Can’t throw it out.

It had rained while we were in one of the bars.

When we came out, to go to another, it stopped.
The streets had that smell and shine to them.
Everything so photogenic after rain.

I remember one of the bars (we must have gone to 4 or 5) had a blow up palm tree and a jukebox.

It was in that one that I realized I was in love with my friend.

When he took off his beanie and went to order drinks. I don’t know why. I just knew then. Watching him stand at the bar. Waiting to order.

When we came back to his apartment we ordered blow and drank a ton of wine.

Somewhere in the middle of that—after the blow came—we read Letters to a Stranger by Thomas James. Out loud. Over and over.

“Why do people lie to one another?”

Is that the greatest line ever written?

And then some things happened that I won’t share.

And then I slept over.

And then in the morning he gave me a hologram of Mary and Jesus.

It was so cool and 80s.

He walked me to the train and the train was coming (it was above ground?) right as we walked up. So I forgot to take the hologram and just rushed in.

I texted him and said I really wanted it. He said he’d give it to me next time.

But he didn’t. We both kept forgetting every time we would see each other until we didn’t even remember we’d forgotten.

There was nothing extraordinary about that night. I was just happy to be in a room with someone who understood me. And it’s not like we shared anything that private. We just read poems that did. Written by other people.

This is a photograph from October 7, 2016.

(I had longer hair then. And you know what. That photo of me pulling the Rimbaud shirt over my head, in a bathtub, the one I use on Twitter and also here—my friend took that photo. I don’t know why I keep using it. It’s not even that beautiful. I just loved that night, I guess).