I haven’t seen it since it was condemned three years ago. The windows are boarded up and trash nestles at the corners and foundation as if taking refuge from the weather. The Texas winds have knocked the oval orange and blue neon sign from off its perch above the entrance; it’s hunched on its side like a shattered Easter egg. The letters no longer say EAST END THEATER. The only word still legible is END, which feels both poetic and sad.
This isn’t our destination. Jeb, Jenara, and I used to have our parents drop us at the movies, but the theater doubled as a decoy for kids who wanted to sneak a few hours free from adult supervision. We would gather at the giant storm drainage pipe on the other side of the lot, where a concrete incline dipped into a cement valley. Stretching some twenty yards, it formed an ideal bowl for skateboarding.
No one ever worried about flooding. The pipe was made to drain the excess from the lake on the other side—a lake that had been gradually shrinking for decades.
Since it was as dry as a desert inside, the tunnel served as a hideaway for make-out and graffiti sessions. Jenara and I didn’t spend much time there. Jeb made sure of that. He said we were too innocent to witness what was going on in the depths.
But that’s where he’s taking me today.
Jeb cruises through the littered parking lot and across an empty field, then takes the incline on his bike. As we descend the concrete’s drop, I tighten my legs around him and let go of his waist, stretching my arms high in the air. My wing buds tickle, and I whoop and holler as if we were on a roller coaster. Jeb’s laughter joins my giddy outburst. Too soon we’re at the bottom, and I hold on to him again, the wheels skimming through puddles on our zigzag race toward the drainage pipe.
We stop at the entrance. The tunnel is as abandoned as the movie theater. Teens quit coming here when Underland—Pleasance’s ultraviolet, underground skate park and activity center owned by Taelor Tremont’s family—became the popular hangout on the west side of town. The rain’s coming down harder now, and Jeb balances the bike so I can climb off. I slip on the wet cement.
He catches me with one arm around my waist and, without a word between us, pulls me in for a kiss. I hold both sides of his jaw, relearning how his muscles work under my fingertips, reacquainting myself with how the rigid planes of his hard body fit so perfectly against my softer curves.
Raindrops glide over our skin and seep into the seam between our lips. I forget we’re still wearing our helmets, and the cold wetness of my leggings, and even the heaviness of my soggy shoes. He’s finally here with me, his body pressed flush to mine, and those white-hot points of contact are the only things I know.
When we finally break apart, we’re soaked, flushed, and out of breath.
“I’ve been dying to do that,” he says, voice husky and green gaze penetrating. “Every time I heard your voice on the phone, all I could think about was touching you.”
His heartbeat races against mine, and his words twine my stomach into a knot of pleasure. I lick my lips, unspoken assurance that I’ve been thinking of the same thing.
Together we lead his Honda into the tunnel and prop it against a curved wall. Then we take off our helmets and shake out our hair. I peel off Jeb’s jacket and my backpack.
I don’t remember the tunnel being this dark. The overcast sky doesn’t help. I take a cautious step farther in, only to be bombarded with the worrisome whispers of spiders, crickets, and whatever other insects congregate in the darkness.
Wait … don’t step on us … tell your friend to put his big feet away.
I pause, unnerved. “You brought a flashlight, right?” I ask.
Jeb comes up from behind and wraps his arms around my waist. “I’ll do better than a flashlight,” he whispers against me, leaving a warm imprint just behind my ear.
There’s a click, and a string of lights flickers to life on the tunnel’s wall, pinned in place somehow, like a vine. The lights don’t give off much of a glow, but I can see that none of the skateboards are still lying around. Skaters used to leave their old wheels so everyone would have something to use when they came from the theater. We lived by a code back then. It was rare for a board to get stolen, because we all wanted the freedom to last forever.
We were so na?ve to think anything in the human realm lasts forever.
Fluorescent graffiti glows on the walls—some curse words but mostly poetic ones, like love, death, anarchy, peace, and pictures of broken hearts, stars, and faces.
Black lights. I’m reminded of both Underland’s and Wonderland’s neon landscapes.
One mural stands out from the others—an ultraviolet outline of a fairy in oranges, pinks, blues, and whites. Her wings splay behind her, jeweled and bright. She looks like me. Even after all these months, I still do a double take when I see Jeb’s renditions: exactly as I looked in Wonderland, complete with butterfly wings and eye patches—black curvy markings imprinted on the skin like overblown eyelashes. He sees inside my soul without even knowing it.
“What did you do?” I ask him, making my way toward the graffiti while trying to avoid squishing any bugs.