Mud Baths

The heat ate their bodies slowly, between trees and swamps, as mosquitoes converged in the sticky wrap of the oxygen. They looked upon the dead waters, hoping something more would become of their lives. Lisa and John always shared the same cigarettes, the same bottles of alcohol, daydreaming and distending. Nothing was accomplished. The cicadas screamed their ephemeral cries, like some sort of unique haunting above them. Sometimes Lisa and John would read down by the river. Languid pages blinked in the dry wind. Or they would just look at one another, in silent language.

"There has to be something else we can do," Lisa said in a flowery voice.

John yawned, blinked, and turned the pages of his book absentmindedly. "Like what? What is there to do? It's summer, Lisa."

"I know, John. But ain't summer 'pose to mean something? Something that has some sort of... significance?"

"I think you read about that in those there books. You got your head filled with all types of thoughts."

"What I think about ain't in them books, John. These books are dull."

"Hey. They belong to my mom."

"Sorry."

They watch the sun turn the clouds into phosphorescent abstractions, moving as slowly as their lives.

"We can go swimming," John offered, ready to do something now.

"The last time we went swimming we got full of leeches! Remember that alligator?" Lisa cried. "I wish we had a community pool," she added safely.

"I wish we had a mall in this town. At least we would be in AC."

Insects came unto their skins, scratching and crawling, then leaving. Hours of sunlight were left in the day, which only made the day seem infinite, in some stuck sort of machine of sky, light, and possibilities.

"You want to kiss for a little bit?" John mumbled, finally putting down his book.

Lisa rolled her eyes but smiled as she did so. Shrugging, she said, "I guess."

They kissed.

Time slowed even more whenever they kissed. If only they could continue to kiss forever, then they would be immortal! But then they got bored of that after a while and stopped.

"Let's go home," Lisa said tiredly.

"Okay," John said, but with a glow of personal satisfaction.

They grabbed their books and things and went home.

Lisa and John were neighbors - they lived next to each other for ten years in the sleepy county of mosquitoes and dead waters. The land laid indolent, stuck in a time that held no modern achievements. They used to go to the same school until John decided to drop out. Lisa begged him to finish, but John had lost all interest and desire in school, saying that it was rudimentary and held no true significance to him. He did not feel as if he needed school since they lived in the country. He just wanted to work on the farms with his dad. He was content with working hard every day, sweating, and getting strong. Lisa hated the farms and would always try her hardest to keep a certain distance, but since John worked there just about every day, she was forced to visit the farms. The animals always stunk and came with annoying flies. She would wait down by the fence until he was done then they would go down by the river and read or make out or drink enough beers to destroy the rest of the day. This was the only part of Lisa's life that made her feel content. Happy. She did not need farm animals or dropping out of school to satisfy her infinitesimal needs. John was another story; he needed to keep his hands busy. Even after work, his nervous hands would still be seeking something to do, which usually involved Lisa's body, but Lisa was fine with this - it made her feel alive, if only for a quick second in the vast plains of their nothingness. They used their energies to erase their complications, but boredom was never far from their desires and aspirations. Their bodies trembled under the trees. Shadows assisted their exploration of fingers and shirts and jeans. They never went all the way - Lisa believed in marriage and all that, but John was not all that into the idea of marriage (even though they did love each other), so he respected her constitutions. Nature filled in the rest with its lascivious beauty.

One summer they got into a big fight because Lisa wanted to know what John was going to do with his future; Lisa had plans to go to college in the city, which was a sickening idea to John.

"You can't just keep avoiding it, John. You can't keep working at the farms forever."

"Why not? My dad does it, and he seems to be doing just fine."

"But you're not your dad. You can't just waste your life doing the same things he does."

"So my dad's wasting his life? Is that what you're saying?"

"That's not what I meant, John," Lisa said.

John angrily got up and went into the woods, leaving her in the grass, crying. Eventually, the insects covered up her sounds, and he felt much better about himself, about his decisions. Everything will work out on its own, he thought simply. Everything has been doing just fine for this long, so why was she making such a big deal out of it? He believed in the concept of streams; an ever-going flow of whateverness, of happenstance. Why was she trying to swim against the currents of their own lives? She would surely drown if she kept that up.

He walked deeper into the forest. Shadows grew with more contrast. Leaves and branches came in multitudes. He was just moving in the green expanse, without thoughts now.

He came upon a small creek that she hated because there was a story once about a man who had drowned a girl in the very same creek. She said that it was a bad place, but he could not feel any wrongful energies or anything of the sort. He almost laughed at her silly superstitions. Then he went into the water, first up to his knees, then, fully submerged. He held his breath underwater, hearing a strange ringing vibration in the bubbles. He felt nothing.

When Lisa found out that she was pregnant, John decided to quit working at the farms. Lisa thought about dropping out of school, but she saw the look in John's eyes when she mentioned this and decided that it was a stupid idea. John did not press the issue. He said that if she wanted to drop out, she should. Lisa got offended at this and went away and locked herself in her room for days. John was at an utter loss. He knew that pregnant people tended to have sporadic and phantasmagorical emotions, so he left her alone in her room, wondering forevermore of her true intentions.

A week later they found each other down by the river. Lisa was somnolent and otherworldly. John did not say anything but only watched her quietly amongst the yawning trees and screaming insects. Their eyes were like worlds, far apart, drifting endlessly.

Finally, she said, "I got rid of the baby."

John took a moment upon hearing this news. Seconds destroyed the space and time between them, and as each second was lost and destroyed forever, so was their small fusion of a relationship.

"I don't understand," he said, much like his usual response to life.

"I got rid of the baby," she said again, in a smaller voice. "I'm going to college in the city at the beginning of fall. I already applied and everything."

John took this in as slowly as someone drowning.

"Okay," he whispered, not looking at her, but looking into the darkness of the forest. A minute or two passed; it was hard to tell time.

"Say something," she said.

"What do you want me to say? You're leaving. And you're leaving me with nothing. I will be all alone." Then he said, "You got rid of the baby, so I guess you're free now."

"What's that supposed to mean?"

"Nothing."

"I'm sorry. I'm just not ready for a baby, John. It was stupid of us to have done what we had done."

"Everything is for nothing," John muttered to himself.

"What did you say?"

"We had finally made something out of ourselves. Something with significance. Now everything is gone."

"John, but I still love you..."

"Don't. Just don't. Let's just stop pretending that anything even matters."

Lisa started to cry.

It was then that John walked off into the darkness. He followed the same rural path to the creek where it was known that a man had drowned a woman.