Every You, Every Me by David Levithan

They must have tried the same way. Knowing there was a problem, but thinking it would be a bigger problem if they brought it up. So instead they tried to muffle it with ordinary things. They saw the scenery, not the stage.
    “So it’s all come full circle,” you said.
    “Would you like that?” my mother asked.
    “What?” I said.
    “To go rafting over the summer. To go away.”
    “Let’s talk about the summer like it’s sure to exist,” you whispered in my ear. This wasn’t a memory. You were whispering it now. “But you and I know better, don’t we? How about we do away with the summer?”
    “That sounds great,” I said.

18E
    I imagined the photographer in that field. Waiting for me.
    I knew it was right to avoid her. I knew we had to pretend like we were ignoring her, like she wasn’t having any effect.
    But I pictured her there, waiting. And I knew: She had something to say to me. Something I didn’t want to hear. But something that I would hear eventually, whether I wanted to or not.
    Why else do this?
    Why else try to pen us in?
    She had something to say.
    You had something to say.
    It felt good to imagine you her waiting. It felt good to imagine how you she felt when the sun set and I wasn’t there. It felt good to imagine your her next photograph in the middle of that field, eventually blowing away.
    But the good feeling, like the avoidance, was only temporary.
    I knew we were simply postponing the inevitable.
    The only difference this time was that at least we could see it coming.

18F
    When we got home from the drive, after having dinner in town, I went straight to my room. I wanted to call Jack, but then I realized he was probably out at some party with the team. The first month or so, he’d invited me along. But I couldn’t picture myself there, numb to everyone else. So I let him go. And he stopped asking, after a while.
    I heard my mother open the front door, open the mailbox, come back inside. The usual pattern of coming home, as normal as my father turning on the television.
    Only this time she called out my name. Then she walked upstairs. Stood in my doorway.
    “There was something for you in the mailbox,” she said. Curious, but not curious enough to say more.
    She handed me an envelope with my name written on it.
    I didn’t move to open it until she was gone, until I could close the door.

19
    Another photo of me.
    Another photo of that day.

    “Let’s go into the woods and take some pictures,” you said. “I found this old camera.”
    “Sure,” I said. “After school?”
    “Yeah, after school.”

    And what happened during school? What changed?
    Because when I met you at your locker, you were different. You handed me the camera.
    “Here, take this.”
    But you were distracted.
    “What’s wrong?” I asked.
    And—yes, I remember.
    You said, “Everything.”

    I followed you into the woods.
    I followed you.
    I would have followed you anywhere.
    I thought that.
    And then you went somewhere I couldn’t follow.

    But back up. Return to the woods. Look at the picture. There you are. Someone was watching. I have no idea who. But there I am.
    I must be looking at you.
    You didn’t take this photo.
    I had the camera.

    “Take my picture,” you said.
    So I lined up the old camera.
    “Is there film in this?” I asked.
    “This way, you’ll have me for posterity,” you said.
    “What do you mean?” I asked. I wasn’t sure there was any film.
    “Evan, I can’t take it right now. I just can’t take it.”
    “Take what?”
    “Take the picture.”
    “What?”
    “I said, take the picture.”

    What happened next?
    What happened next was
    What happened next was
    Jack?
    No.
    Yes.
    Your scream.
    No.
    Yes.
    What happened next.
    Stop.
    What happened
    Stop.
    Next
    “Stop!”
    Stop.
    I was tearing up the photograph.

    I couldn’t stop tearing up the photograph.

    I was telling myself to stop.
    I was hearing you yell. “Stop!”
    I cannot stop it.

    I cannot stop it.

20
    I