Blood

I stole my dad’s pen knife and we cut our palms and became blood brothers, even though you’re a girl. It was June and we were little kids. Under the one tree in the middle of the field with the long grass, sitting there with our palms pressed together, wondering how long we had to do that before we were officially blood brothers.

We grew up together. We went to the same films, hung out in coffee houses and record shops. When we could finally get served, we drank together. Shared our lives and pitchers of Alabama Slammer in off-high street bars in the nearest town.

You had boyfriends, and sometimes I had girlfriends, but I was always a little bit in love with you. I liked to think that, of all the blood rolling around my body, some of it was yours and that’s something I had that the guys you were going around with didn’t.

Once we were drunk out in the same field where we became blood brothers, and I told you that. You said that you thought about you and me that way sometimes, but you didn’t say how it made you feel. You held my hand and it felt a little bit like when we’d cut our palms with my dad’s pen knife. I thought about how some of your blood was my blood, and some of my blood was yours. If we ever had become an item it would have been too much like incest.