Bolides by Victoria Hood

      Lewin Bormann CC



​Bolides
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Stars hung like bodies on chains and we watched as some of the bodies swung, fell and disappeared. “That was a big one.” He stated it like he stated most things: with the type of confidence you can’t fit inside your pocket. “Bolides.” 


We all held hands as we walked to the dock. We held hands like kids hold ice cream cones: we held them like all our joy would die if we lost it, if I happened to let go I knew I would cry and cry and cry until someone gave me another hand to hold. We all held hands as the night sky seemed to warn us of the night. “It’s Friday the 13th.” They said it as if they were conjuring the haunting themselves. I shivered with fear because I always knew better, my mother raised me better than to walk around at night, especially on a Friday the 13th. “We’re going to cut through the graveyard.” They said and we did. They said and they released my hand, I clung on to him, I refused to let go of him. I’m supposed to be the spooky one, I thought as our feet touched soil. I’m supposed to like walking in graveyards at night, I wanted to I wanted to but all I could picture was the people I’d be waking up. A graveyard no longer accepts new graves, it is just a row of dead people. Rows and rows and underneath the graves are smaller columns of people stacked on top of one another. There is no room under a graveyard, there are only more graves.

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I felt I could breathe again after we finally made our way through the dead bodies. I felt finally like I was a balloon floating away. It was thanks to him, to his hand, to the way in which he grasped my fingers that made my heart float away. That was the first time I fell in love with him. Holding hands under the moonlight, me and him, they are standing right next to us—they are not ruining the moment, this moment was meant for three, it was meant for me and him falling in love and them standing with us observing this love, heightening this love, making this love real in the world we’re standing in. (There are other times and moments that the three of us make up. Most of these moments are times in the past, times when I never knew if either of you actually liked me or if it was all pity all along. Moments on the computer where we judge each other with sincerity and permission. Moments where we are huddled together in laughter. I will always hear both of your laughs in moments of the dark.) 


When we made it to the dock the sky seemed to light up, not to become day but rather a less haunting night. It lit up in the way that said congratulations you made it to your destination, you now have more time to enjoy not dying. We made it to the dock and we lay with our feet in the water and both of you in my hands. “Do we just keep holding hands?” Someone asked. (You can never pinpoint a voice in the darkness.) We all laughed, we laughed the kinds of laugh you can laugh when it is dark and you do not see any other bodies. We all laughed and they let go of my hand right away. He lingered. He lingered with me, waiting a moment before we release. Enjoying the way in which we felt in each other's hand. He lingered and I lingered and our love lingered, resting on the dock in between us. 


(We released our hands and the world felt darker. Not much. But some. We released and I remembered what life feels like outside of warmth and outside of support. I became a baby, only for a moment, a baby who couldn’t hold its head up. I was flailing. For a moment.)


“There are phosphorescence in the water.” They said. On cue we all sat up, dangled our legs, and splashed the water until we could see the creatures illuminate. “It’s so pretty.” We all said it but all in different ways. We all meant it in all the ways one could say it.


“Sharks feed at night.” I said. Everytime a wave felt rushed or something made a sound in the water, I could feel eyes on me, I could tell they were all sharks. I took my legs out of the water. I sat criss-cross-applesauce on the dock as you both fearlessly dangled into shark infested waters. I was in awe, I am in awe. I’m supposed to be the spooky one, I thought, but I won’t be the one eaten by a shark. 


There was a moment when a car came. It seemed as though they might drive onto the dock, through us, and into the ocean. Of course they just stopped at the edge. They saw the look on my face, “They’re probably just watching the sky like us.” “They could be murderers.” I said it, of course I said it. “They’re more likely drug dealers. Some people put drugs in lobster traps and they come at night to collect them.” They thought this would soothe me. He knew it wouldn’t. I felt then, when you grabbed my hand, like I could float under the water with you. Like if I had to choose between facing drug dealers or sharks that I could talk myself into the water with you. (Without you, without your hand, I would likely shrivel up into fear.) I thought of what it meant to continue laying there after the sharks and the drug dealers. I wondered how foolish we were to leave our backs to them. I looked up at the stars but I felt my body tighten with worry that at any moment an axe could blow through my head. It would be me first, then him, then them. Unless they were the ones to orchestrate all of this. Then it would be me, then him, then release for them. 


What would it mean to never return? If we never left the dock. If we never walked back home, wet bodies after jumping in (only he could convince me), feet on the gravel soaking up the pain. What would it mean to own the doc? To never leave, to refuse the drug dealers, to tell them that we won’t tell, we do not care but we cannot leave this place of love. In the moment I never knew if love could exist anywhere else. If I fell in love on the dock could love persist anywhere else? I am oozy with love for both of you. My body will not stop creating and secreting more and more love for you both. My house reeks with the smell of love.

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We laid, the three of us. We laid and watched the stars. I laid next to the two of you. Me in the middle. Monkey in the middle but you did not keep the jokes away from me, you would pass the ball my way. Them, me, him. We laid and watched the stars as they tried to keep existing. So many would pass by us, a parade of shooting stars just waiting to be wished upon. Those were ours. I know that somewhere in the world someone else could have seen our stars and made wishes too but I know those stars weren’t listening to them. Those stars were created for us, for the three of us. Those stars were made so we could whisper to them, tell them our secrets and dreams. Most importantly, those stars were there for us to fall in love. We told them our wishes and they enacted their own. Now when I see bodies dangle I think of falling in love with you.

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Victoria holds an MA in English from the University of Maine. Her work has been published in Tiny Spoon, Interpret Magazine, pioneertown, Querenica Press, The Hooghly Review, Bitchin’ Kitsch, ergot., Cult Magazine, JAKE, G*MOB Magazine, Dollar Store Lit Mag, and Meow Meow Pow Pow Lit. She is also the winner of FC2’s 2021 Ronald Sukenick Innovative Fiction Prize, for her collection of short stories My Haunted Home released by FC2. Victoria’s poetry chapbook Death and Darlings was published in 2022 by Bottlecap Press; her hybrid chapbook Entries of Boredom and Fear was published in 2023 by Bottlecap Press. Her book of poetry, I Am My Mother’s Disappointments, is forthcoming from Girl Noise Press (2024). Victoria strives to create work that can meld together the punk roots her parents raised her in with the disillusionment of losing her mother at a young age. Overall, she hopes to discomfort, humor and charm.
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