Tomasz Jedrowski

“I adored this book more than you knew,” it read there in your stocky, right-leaning script. “I wanted to keep it . . . but it’s yours. Bring it back one day if you can. I’ll be here. J.”

gray-blue eyes the same color as the Baltic Sea in winter.

Did you ever have someone like that, someone that you loved in vain when you were younger? Did you ever feel something like my shame? I always assumed that you must have, that you can’t possibly have gone through life as carelessly as you made out. But now I begin to think that not everyone suffers in the same way; that not everyone, in fact, suffers. Not from the same things, at any rate. And in a way this is what made us possible, you and me.

This is how I lived back then—through books. I locked myself into their stories, dreamt of their characters at night, pretended to be them. They were my armor against the hard edges of reality. I carried them with me wherever I went, like a talisman in my pocket, thinking of them as almost more real than the people around me, who spoke and lived in denial, destined, I thought, to never do anything worth recounting.

We went around introducing ourselves, and when it came to you, you shook my hand—yours padded and large and warm—and said your name in that low, clear voice that spoke of natural confidence. I could hardly respond. Your face was broad and solid, well-constructed, with high cheekbones like outposts guarding your eyes, narrow and intensely gray-blue.

and you and some other boys smoked, and I chatted with the girls. But not with you. I avoided you, so that you couldn’t avoid me. I didn’t want to be in the field of your power. I envied your lightness and the beauty you carried with such ease.

Then you put your hand on my shoulder again, just like you had done the second time we’d talked. And just like then, the knot at the bottom of my belly—home to both fear and desire—stirred like an incoming tide.

I was thinking about the rest of the summer, the rest of my life, and struggling to see anything. It seemed like the only thing that was certain was change itself, unstoppable and careless like fire eating wood.

Our eyes met for a moment, and you smiled.

“Why did you stop coming to the river?”

I turned my head away. No words came to me. Finally I looked up and saw you looking at me with tenderness.

“Don’t be scared.”

The way you said this—softly, perfectly calm—pierced right through me.

“I should have known you’re one of them.”

“Them what?” I said, nervous suddenly, wondering whether I had made a big mistake.

You turned to me briskly. “Dreamers,” you said, your mouth widening into a teasing smile.