She was wearing her boys shorts and one of my older skate shirts, no bra.  She sat on the bed painting her nails and the scent of the nitrocellulose was whirled around the room by spinning of the overhead fan. We had sublet a room in Davis for the summer in a quaint little neighborhood in the south side of town. The heat was overbearing for most of the day and we would sit in our room content with each other's company while the day drifted by. 

I was writing a paper for Shakespeare's middle works and she was just sitting on the bed with a bunch of textbooks strewn about, painting her nails. it was the first time I had ever lived with a girl and we shared everything in that little room. She caught me staring at her and grew self-conscious. 

"Don't look at me, I can't concentrate while you stare at me while I do this" she said with a smile.

"I can't help it, I think you're beautiful."

She blushed and didn't answer, but continued painting. The fan whirling. The heat settling outside. The computer humming as I watched her in silent observation. She was meticulous about the task, her fingers deft in their movements, dip, stroke, stroke, dip, even and smooth. Her hair was tied in a loose ponytail and I can still see it clear today, her form bathed in the soft afternoon glow.

It wasn't all good times, there were the fights and arguments, but it still makes me smile when I think about that afternoon and subsequent moments during that summer. Watching movies late into the night, lazy weekends with breakfast in bed, the smell of her hair on the pillow, truly learning to know and love someone.

Like many other boys, my first natural reaction after a breakup was to go on a tear. I hooked up with a bunch of girls, cast aside any emotional development, and tried to forget everything by drowning out the pain. And besides being able to high five all the homies after every notch in the belt, a long stretch of my life was absolutely meaningless. I was too childish to live anyway else.

And sometimes I just wish that this all had never happened, but these feelings always subside.

And I continue to watch her sitting on the bed. These are the things I miss most after all this time. Sometimes beautiful things get broken, but I suppose that it isn't any reason to forget that they ever happened.