Little lights on in the dorm room while we’re talking: the off and on switch on the power strip, bottom ring on the wax melter, blue glow to the emergency phones outside my window. When I stare at these things long enough, all I see are stars. 

You have a way of talking about the future that doesn’t make me fearful of it, and that’s on your mind right now. 

It’s all an experience, you say, like you’ve said a couple times. You’ve cracked this same code many times.

I’m not sure if I want that, I say, and I’m panicking, maybe. 

Experiences haven’t been enough for me, historically. I need souvenirs as well. You’re playing with your hands, grabbing the air, and keep talking until I tune you out. 

I am thinking of when we all visited New York city together, over fall break. It’s a city of lights, movie stars, and light pollution. I was overwhelmed by the buildings and the lack of greenery. At the same time, I was fixated on the experience I couldn’t take with me. Grabbing at it, I reached for the air around the bugs stuck to streetlights, letters in graffiti, metro cards, friend’s decorations in their childhood room, strangers, friends. 

We didn’t sleep for three days, running around the city like kids who grew up there. On the last night, we drank soju on the stoop of someone’s fancy apartment complex. The building was so tall I couldn’t see the top of it, and we were content at the bottom. Our conversations kept getting cut short by the people walking out of the front door to go work their night shift. 

I was on weird terms with everybody and trying not to cry on the subway. I left with no money, too much “I ❤︎‬ NY” stuff, and some memories. 

Next up: contra dancing, after a friend extended the invite. I’m in the bathroom trying not to panic. The people outside are dancing joyfully to the fiddle and whatever else is playing. I’m trying to leave and end up dancing with old men for the next hour instead. They appear hurt whenever I mess up the steps, and hold me so tightly that I can smell their breath. 

That same night: you opened the door to let us into a friend’s house on Thurston, then fell out the door and into a different friend’s arms. We stayed locked out for the next minute or two. There’s a glow to you when you’re drunk like this, and I keep coming back to the unfamiliarity of it. 

We walked you back home, because it was so cold. You walked in frostbite weather saying,

Jesus didn’t have a coat so I don’t need a coat. ‍

I explained to you that Jesus didn’t even have shoes, so you took yours off. I brought up the water into wine thing, and you drank more.

I wanted to tell you that Jesus had God, and you just had me. Instead, I picked the shoes up. I made sure you got home okay. 

In my version of the end of the world, stars will start falling from the sky first. I imagine this literally, giant spheres of fire bouncing off the Earth’s surface, and leaving ring-shaped scars everywhere. The world is singed until it is nothing. In my day-to-day life, I try not to draw conclusions about anything. At night, when talking with you, I sometimes entertain them. 

Here’s what I do know: if the world was ending, I would still walk you home. If you had no shoes and no coat, you would still be cold. Depriving yourself of warmth doesn’t make you Jesus and the temperature is dropping quicker than I can pray to something. 

The end of the world would probably also include a contra dance. Stars are dropping so fast now we’re all getting whiplash. Jesus is in the corner, turning water into wine while he still can. He’s dancing like the rest of us. Everyone is falling into the arms of good friends. We are all spinning, do-si-do style. 

We’re trying to figure out everything on the stoop of an expensive apartment building. New York city, in its entirety, flips upside down. We’re still in the way of people. They’re venturing out to go work the night shift. Then the morning shift. 

Then I like to think Jesus packs up his winter gear and walks away. You and I sit down and talk about some stuff. Then we go our separate ways. 

Are you okay?  I ask, and I try to quantify how many times I've asked you this.  

I’m okay, a classic answer from you. You’re playing with your thumbs, with your nails, and you do this when you lie.  

Be well, okay, I reach, again, at the air surrounding you. I don’t know what else to take. I could give you a hug, probably, but you wouldn’t react well. The stars crash like bombs in the background noise, shaking the Earth’s shell. I didn’t expect the ending of things to be so loud. 

Okay, you say.