Where You End by Anna Pellicioli

a second? I can’t think when I’m chasing after you.”
    â€œDon’t chase. You can stop if you want, but I wanna walk. I want to get out of here.”
    â€œYou don’t know these woods. You’re gonna get lost.”
    I could hear the ocean on the other end. I knew it couldn’t be so hard to find the ocean. The salt air was already pulling at my skin.
    â€œWe’ve been here before, remember?” I say.
    We had. Every day, at least once, we did it somewhere in the Delaware woods and then held hands and shut up until we got to the ocean, where he swam and I stayed afloat, hoping no sharks would smell our sins and swallow up my dream.
    â€œMiriam, he’s not a bad guy,” Elliot said.
    â€œNo. Of course not. He’s old and disappointed. My problem is you.”
    Elliot sighed. “What did I do?”
    â€œAbsolutely nothing,” I said. “You just sat there, as if you had no opinion, as if nothing he said mattered at all.”
    â€œDoes it?”
    â€œDoes it? Are you kidding me? Are you the same person who can’t survive without music, who thinks a song is some sort of cosmic knife cutting through to the core of your existence? Are you the guy who plays three instruments and cries when we light the Shabbat candles?”
    â€œWhat is that supposed to mean?”
    â€œIt means you do have faith and you don’t think it’s stupid. It means you believe that music matters, that photographs matter, that hope matters, that stories matter.”
    â€œSo does my dad … ”
    â€œMaybe. Maybe once upon a time. But that’s not what he was saying tonight.”
    Elliot rolls his eyes, which makes me want to push him over and kick him in the ribs.
    â€œWere you there, Elliot?”
    â€œYes … ”
    â€œLet me remind you. We were talking about our plans, and he said he didn’t think it was a real plan, that music and art don’t save people’s lives. I said I know music and art aren’t antibiotics or surgery, but that sometimes that kind of thing can save a life.”
    â€œSo … ”
    â€œSo he told me it was time we stopped investing in things we can’t count on, that it doesn’t do any good. No, what did he say? I know: It doesn’t help anybody .”
    â€œI know what he said,” Elliot interjected.
    â€œDo you? Because you were dead to the table … ”
    â€œWhat was I supposed to say?”
    â€œI don’t know, Elliot. Anything. That you think music matters, that it’s why you spend your days immersed in it, that you don’t think we should all just grow up and wake up to a world where the only things that count are the ones we can test in a lab, the ones that never ever fail us, the ones we have hard evidence for.”
    â€œI don’t know what you mean.”
    â€œDon’t you see that’s what he was saying?”
    â€œI don’t know what you’re talking about.”
    â€œHe was telling us we should all be scared. That we should give up before we even start, that because God doesn’t always give us what we want, we should turn away from everything that requires any faith.”
    We were both scared now, the ocean roaring ahead of us.
    â€œWhy are you even bringing God into this?” Elliot yelled.
    â€œBecause you can’t count on him , can you?”
    â€œI don’t understand what you’re saying,” he said, which doubled me over.
    â€œYes you do,” I said, tears in my eyes. “You under stand. You understand better than anybody else. I know you understand. You’re just pretending you don’t understand, because you’re too much of a wimp to say you understand in front of your father.”
    â€œYou need to chill out,” he said.
    â€œAnd you need to grow up,” I said.
    â€œYou always act like everything is so complicated … ”
    Here, I could feel some kind of ugly truth