On This Day, I See Clearly

JANUARY 2006
We sat there and we smoked hookah and we talked of everything and nothing, and when I decided to really regret getting a medium Sprite instead of a small that's when I saw her. Her blonde hair was pushed back behind her ears and she was sitting on the couch in the middle. I would've recognized her about anywhere; hell, I was usually watching her on TV just around then anyhow. As I sat in the booth I wondered if it was her, could be her. I knew filming happened in and around town. The Golden Globes weren't that far away; it had been two days. It's possible, right?

I had to know.

He said I should, and that "Talk is cheap" cliche would get him in a rented tuxedo down the line.

But I took another sip and went inside, approaching her and turning her square of friends into a Pentagon.

"Excuse me, miss?"

She looked up at me and smiled--that's when I knew.

"Are...you're Kristen Bell, aren't you?"

"Yeah. You recognized me in this little place?"

My heart stopped. How many times had I been here before, how many times had she, how had I just been thinking of taking someone here who would completely fall through on me..."Hello?"

I swallowed, and suddenly I went from K-4 to back in the moment. "Yeah, I'm sorry. Longtime follower, first-time drooler." She laughed. She actually laughed.
* * *
"I mean, I can't promise anything."

"No, no, I know that."

Silence.

"Just keep your phone on."

"Fair enough. I gotta go."

"All right, Butch. Have a good night."

"Good night, Kristen." I didn't call her Veronica once. I was quite proud. I walked over to him.

"Let's go."

"What happened?"

"We have to get out of sight and hearing range." We did. "I got that shit ON LOCK, SON!"

"It was her?"

"Damn well ought to be, I recognized her on sight."

"You got her number?"

Pop the collar, brush the shoulder. Off into the night. Nothing was ever going to come of it.

But even so.

FEBRUARY
"Funny. Where's the I-met-you-at-Fumari-but-you-never-called-option? Anyway, uh, just wanted to see if you wanted to get together. I got a couple days off with the weekend, so if you want we could hang out. Yeah, call back. This is Kristen, by the way. My friends call me Ronnie."

"BULLSHIT."

I rolled my eyes. Nobody believes. They never do. "Oh, should I play it again?"

"I don't know how the hell you did that, but you're fucking with me."

I rolled my eyes. "Whatever." I shook my head.
***
I clenched both sides of the sink and let fly a spray of beige and purple I am perfectly willing to never see the likes of again. Why am I so nervous? It's just a girl.

And Michael Jordan's just a guard. But you should call. I mean, that's a fake number, anyways. It's a big giant joke. A colossal--

"Hello?"

"Kristen?"

"Yeah. Who's this?"

"I-I-Butch."

"That only took you two days."

..."you realize how many drinks I had to have to get enough courage in me?" That laugh is awesome.

"So what's up?"
***
I hope she's all right with my short hair. I hope this sweater quietly radiates masculinity. I hope the Axe is working. I hope I didn't put on too much. I hope that breath mint holds. I hope she shows up.

She does.

Survive now. Vomit later.
***
It happened at 1:47 am at Market in 5th in the all-way crosswalk, the only one in the county and the one that's best. All the voices in my head stopped. Time stopped. People walked around.

Her lips were like foam beanbag chairs eating me alive. My heart stopped again. I was sure I was going to die this time.

I would've regretted nothing except what I missed...

JULY
I look at her in the eyes. I'm waiting for something, and I don't know what it is. Probably rejection. I'm not sure.

Two roads diverged by the side of the beach, and I...

"I know you do. Why wouldn't you? I'm fucking awesome."

...I took the road I had less traveled.

"But I love you, too."

"You call that acting?"

She laughs. "That's more of a being in the moment sort of thing."

The food suddenly vibrates with a new intensity.

THE FIRST DAY OF SUMMER, 2008
"Do you, [Butch's Government Name], take this woman to be your lawfully wedded wife, in sickness and in health, for richer or for poorer, for as long as you both shall live?"

"Do you, Kristen Anne Bell, take this man to be your lawfully wedded husband, in sickness and in health, for richer or for poorer, for as long as you both shall live?"

Let the record show she started crying first. But only by a couple of seconds. Jo caught the bouquet, the first dance was to "Bohemian Like You", and we didn't until the honeymoon. I had no idea a wedding was that exhausting.

JUNE 2009
"Look at that." I do.

"That's pink." She looks at me as if I've grown a breast on my head. It takes a couple seconds.

"THAT'S PINK!"

We hug and kiss and laugh and then I sit down on the bathroom tile. We're going to have a zebra.

SOMETIME IN THE FALL OF 2021
"I have to find out for school." God, Emily's growing fast. I'm going to need a gun soon.

"They still do that?" She nods. "Man, they were doing that back when I went." She gives me her mom's smile.

"Did they have that one room made out of brick, Daddy?" I hear her mother laughing from the kitchen. "That's not funny." She comes in with the lemonades and sits next to me on the couch.

"Well, honey, it started a long time ago down the coast. Mommy was relaxing after work and Daddy was wondering about his place in the universe, and it so happened to do those things they went to the same place..."

...it's a shame the aforementioned blonde tonight wasn't Kristen Bell, because that short glimpse into the future was pretty great.

np: "In The Sun" by Joseph Arthur