She was the first person who showed me that if you actually listen people the way you listen to music, you're going to find a world so rich and alive, you'll wonder where the hell you'd been all this time. And she taught me how to listen to music. We were there. We were somewhere around 14, 15, and we were in a room more beautiful than any room I'd ever seen before. It had looked so familiar, like so many of the rooms I had seen on the teenage girl blogosphere with those pastiched walls made of photos and magazines and posters, but I was so far from scrolling through painfully pretty words and worlds I thought would never be mine. I was standing in the doorway and my breath disappeared and in that moment my brain spoke to me and said: ‘we really are infinite’. She walked right into it like it was nothing and plopped down on the bed, looking for a song while my eyes bounced around and across every corner of the room and then back at this girl, who, reduced to a snapshot, would be a manic pixie dream cliché, but actually, here, in real life, was no character, but creator of this sanctuary.
All I want to do is to be with you
Even if it's all the time
I'll forget about most anything
Even if I fall behind
She closed her eyes and had the most beautiful smile, the corners of her lips gently rising to the sound of the music. I sighed. The song was more perfect than one I ever could have chosen, like she knew how I felt before I even knew myself and I had hardly even known her, not yet.
Before we get too old
I want you to know
I've never seen such beautiful eyes
I'd Rather Sink — Than Call Brad For Help! It was huge, probably spanned half the wall, if not more. And I don't think I'd ever seen a canvas resting on the floor before, never seen these beautiful things relaxing and just being, in the same way we were. She had song lyrics on the wall and even though the words were almost meaningless, she filled them with sincerity, and they belonged. Then she opened her mouth, and the loveliest sound fell into my ears. I had heard beautiful voices before, but I had never heard them like this. Carefree, not a note of self-consciousness, of performance, of effort. Just her voice and nothing more.
I told you before
But I'll tell you once more
I don't know a word of what I said. I was just trying to not look or sound stupid, and I just wanted people to like me. But you can't talk without letting a piece of yourself out, when you've stopped thinking about what you're saying and just keep saying, and she was the first person who ever wanted to show me she was listening — wanted to make sure, even if she'd said it once, twice, three times before I noticed. She remembered the things I said earlier that week, the things I had forgotten the moment after they left my mouth, and she saw how they related to a thing I said yesterday at lunch, and to a thing I said this morning before class, and to whatever thing I said just now. And I heard her answering to all those moments, because suddenly I remembered them, because she brought them back to me and then gave me more than I even knew it was possible to ask for. At the time, I didn't know what it was. I just knew this girl was someone I had never imagined could exist and, for reasons that couldn't have been more opaque to me, wanted to be my friend. So I had no choice but to give her my heart. She saw it not for what it was, but for what it could be and would be.
I love you, and goodnight