Strawberry Lips

I can still smell her skin so clearly

The "Milk and Honey" hand soap that her mom kept in the house

Late nights in her basement, playing games

The kind that grown-ups just couldn’t understand, and she’d say:

“Shh... don’t tell them

About the way we hug and kiss—

But not kiss kiss, of course, just play pretend...”

She would always be the girl, and so I’d be the boy,

But I didn’t mind that

Because she’s the one who tasted

Like

Strawberry pop-tarts in the mornings before school

Toasted, how she liked them, bringing heat to our cheeks

Pressed close on the bus seat

Knowing when we’d get home,

We’d sneak away, build our own little world

Where she would tackle me, as a joke, Press a pillow to my face

And I’d say I couldn’t breathe,

But not from suffocation, instead

From the giggles that would bubble

From her mouth,

From her skin against mine,

From the way she’d call the shots

And the way I’d gladly let her

“Fashion show”, we would call it

Try on each others’ clothes,

Her princess t-shirt was too small for me,

Too tight on the stomach I hated,

But she said

I looked beautiful

And because it came

From her strawberry lips,

I believed it.