September 13, 2022

balloon hunting

The college boys did it last Saturday night, driving down 9G looking for something to do.
Sure, it was a wedding they crashed, taking a dirt road to the field that doubled
as a parking lot. Of course, they shouldn’t have arrowed in so quickly to the bar 
at the back of the tent, even though no one was behind it. And yeah, they shouldn’t 
have said they were friends of the bride, not thinking the bride—when she asked them
who they knew there—was someone who could have been their mother. Still, 
they eked out a good hour-and-half with a few glasses of rosé and a DJ set that convinced
some real dancing out of them. Under a sky dipped in stars, they became people 
who wanted only to be part of some kind of happiness, however brief or anonymous. 
And now, having watched them take the dare, I’m keeping my eyes out, too.