Sixteen

I'm 16, round, with hair that looks like I'm trying. I'm a city girl lost in the country, pretending my father's house is familiar, pretending it's home. I defy authority and take accelerated German so I can reinvent myself in Melk, Austria. I will come back trim and worldly and probably not a virgin.

I also keep up with my French, which is how I end up exchanging long notes en Francais with Chad, a boy who puts henna in his long hair and smells of patchouli. He wears black and soon I'm wearing black and we're two outcasts, crossing the quad to take class with the Johnnies and Bennies. He tells me he's gay and lends me his copy of "Maurice."

I'm careful with my powers, now. I watch the rowers and I run lights for the Moliere play and I pretend to be nothing special. I don't want to stand out. I don't want anyone to know that with just my touch, I can take nothing and make it something.

It's New Year's Eve and I'm up in Anna's guest room, dancing with Patrick. I think he's gay, too, like all of the long-haired boys I hang out with these days who don't talk about being gay with anyone... maybe not even each other. It's Cowboy Junkies and we're caught up and ignoring our friends and he says, "I want to marry you." I'm lit up inside because he doesn't know about me. He doesn't know about the gold, and he still asked.

It's that platonic love that blooms between two people destined to be friends, two people caught up in the possibility of it all. It's romantic and all-consuming and cannot be defined with conventional labels. We can make mix tapes and and plan our future in the big white house because it's safe -- It's girls who set my pulse racing, and it's boys who make him swoon. Our love makes me want to travel the world, alone, to dive into my art and learn about his life through letters and postcards.

I think about trying again, embracing my powers. Just a simple touch and I'll be golden again. Make something happen. I think about riding the wave and letting it take me where it will, even if I end up far away from everyone I love, and reason. Even if, by the time I land, I've forgotten who I am.

Then again, maybe not. Maybe I'll just keep eating. Maybe I'll stop going to school. (Who needs to study, anyway? I ace everything every time my pencil touches paper.) Maybe I'll get caught up in nonsense and try to be like everyone else... forever.

It's a lot. The weight of it, the responsibility.