My high school boyfriend leans on me, the full weight of him disarming the rhythm of our steps as we walk home from school. The worn sleeve of his forest green hoodie covers his hand draped across my shoulders. There is a significant gap between our heights, his stride longer than mine, he pulls me close as the winter wind picks up. His friend, Jamie, strolls alone in his own hoodie and shivers, colder than my high school boyfriend, who leans on me.
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My high school boyfriend leans on me. My knees prop up his back, American Lit notebook in my lap too close to my face to adequately write my essay outline. I scrape my pen along the metal spiral, the ca-jink jink jink vibrates in my fingertips. Angelo plays his Switch, periodically lifts it up so I can see where he’s at. I wait for him to die before asking him to shift so I can turn the page and write my last topic sentence. He growls as he snuggles further between my knees, his sharp shoulder blades dig in my tender flesh below my kneecaps as my high school boyfriend leans on me.
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My high school boyfriend leans on me at dinner on a double date with my friend Monica and her butch girlfriend. Empty plates, dirty napkins covered in buffalo sauce balance in small piles around the booth. Angelo’s head under mine, I breathe in his leathery Drakkar Noir cologne, the smell of weed in his hair. Monica and her girlfriend are tonguing each other, her hand grips Monica’s thigh under the table. Monica breaks away and asks me to go with to the bathroom. My high school boyfriend leans on me more, holds me down so I have to struggle a bit to get out from under him. I play along for a moment, laughing behind a grimace and then break free. Angelo yelps as his neck flinches and he bangs his forehead against the edge of the table. He accuses me of doing it on purpose. He would never do that to me. He was only playin’, he says, there was no need for me to get up like that. When we return from the bathroom, I split the bill with Monica’s butch girlfriend. My high school boyfriend leans on me to whisper that he’ll pay me back. Monica’s butch girlfriend cackles and says, yeah he will, on your back.
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My high school boyfriend leans on me when he is cut from the basketball team for his bad grades. He has more free time now, and he wants to spend it with me. When I hang out with Monica on Wednesdays, he’s with us, “just tagging along,” he says, he’ll stay out of the way of our girl time, but constantly looks up from his phone at us eating chips in my kitchen. He says he doesn’t want any. Jamie is still on the basketball team so we don’t see him as much. I tell Angelo that I have math to do and I’ll call him later. He kisses me deeply, cinnamon breath, his tongue sweeps mine. He is impressed by my dedication to school, he winks. Monica stays at the dining table and he hollers for her to walk out together. If he can’t distract me, neither can she. My high school boyfriend leans on me one last time, watching Monica put her boots back on.
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My high school boyfriend leans on me after he comes on my breasts, his knuckles in my collarbone. I try to fix my bangs so they stick less to my forehead, fluff them up again, but he pushes them aside and says I should grow them out, the bangs make me look like a child. My high school boyfriend leans on me, inhales my hair, wipes my chest off with his t-shirt.
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My high school boyfriend leans on me with his fist against the wall. He threatens my mother on my behalf when I tell him I can’t go out that night. I am pissed at her, but it feels strange that he’s more angry than me— at me. It’s not my fault, I tell him and his hand, the wall, my mother yells. Once he leaves she tells me that was out of control, my high school boyfriend leans on me too much.
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My high school boyfriend leans on me–stay home with me–call me right now, I need to speak to you. His eyes bore into me, don’t talk about me to other people. Whose number is that? Who’s texting you? Your mother is a bitch. Monica looks at you funny, like she’s into you. You better not dump for me a girl. Promise me if you dump me, it won’t be for a girl. My high school boyfriend leans on me, his nostrils flare, his smell is feral and hot. If his jealousy were a smell it would be timber and vetiver.
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My high school boyfriend leans on me on our rainy walk to school in spring after a sleepless night of crying and begging him to trust me. The crook of his arm possesses me, pinning my arms to my sides. The rain whips my hair across my chin and I cannot reach to wipe it away. Brown molted leaves from last fall clog the sewers, rancid. Blood under my skin spreads its yellowed-black wings in all the spots he’d leaned on. Water rises along the side of the road next to the curb, nowhere for it to run, run out to sea.
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