THE BOULEVARD by Bonnie Nadzam
I dreamt it was the end of the world and you were finally mine.
I came down off the mountain to find you, and you came out of the woods. We met in the city. High above us on the corners and at the gates of bridges, stern angels and dead Indians carved out of granite, their eyes flecked with mineral glitter.
Everything happened faster here. Wind jerked the stains of clouds over the pavement like apparitions in a magic lantern slide, and though it was mid-summer, the trees had already lost their leaves, and it was as cold a morning as New Year’s Day. The lake was a disc of frosted glass, and a glacial wind was winding and racing among the high rises, sweeping everyone north up a wide, dark boulevard.
You held me in place beneath a street lamp. You had that clean soap smell, and I put my nose in your hair.
It’s so cold, I said.
You were so wise. Here, you said, and lifted the hem of my dress with your warm fingers.
We would take off all our clothes to share heat.
Yes, I said, and blood was singing in my ears. Yes.
All around us the people on the boulevard were turning to stone. Some of the rushing crowd had frozen in mid-stride, the wings of their light summer jackets swept out behind them, forever. Others were stretched out like fallen statues on the pavement. Somewhere, a cold iron church bell rang once, twice, twelve times. It was already noon. Beside us a woman was turning gray and freezing in place, but her pale yellow skirt was billowing in the daylight, and she still had one live and ghostly eye, pointed right at us. The wind boomed.
She can see us, I gasped.
At my feet, your beautiful white shirt and my silver dress were hardening into a pool of polished marble.
Ssh, you said. We don’t have much time. You pressed your bare breast upon my own. The sun was setting, the sky a rumpled gold. The length of my back went rigid against the icy pavement. Above your head the stars were taking their positions. The light began to dim in your eyes. I put my hands on the sides of your face. Don’t go, I said. Don’t go.
It was just how I always imagined it would be, the arches of my bare feet braced against your hip bones, your hands beneath my head, and all around us, the ruined buildings, the blank unmoving faces.
Bonnie Nadzam is the author of the novel Lamb (Other Press, 2011). Her stories have appeared in Harper’s Magazine, TriQuarterly, Ninth Letter, Iron Horse Review, and Callaloo.