It’s Fourth of July, I’m eleven years old. We grew up together. It was one of those friendships that was made

for us only because we were similar in age, and it just fit. It was easy until it wasn’t. To me fourth of July

didn’t define freedom, it defined love: messed up, selfish, burning love that ached inside me until years

later when I was eighteen.

The four of us, my older brother included, walked across the street to sit at the end of the dock, put our

feet in the water, and wait for the fireworks to scare the stars away. I always preferred the stars at that age

because their beauty was silent. We’d stay on the dock for hours, listening to music, pretending we

weren’t watching defining pieces of adulthood encircle us like an inescapable hug, and when the

fireworks finally started, we never paid attention until the finale. 

Fourth of July wasn’t just a celebration of the country’s independence, it was the beginning of

moments we’d spend away from our parents defining our independence. 

We’d walk out of the garage door while sounds of our parent’s laughter grew sluggish in the humidity. Part

of me longed to stay inside in a perfect bubble of predictability but I also wanted to be a kid, so I followed.

They crossed the wooden fence as if it was nothing, I clambered over it catching my foot on a splinter as I

always did. No one noticed so I brushed it off and kept walking behind my older brother, my childhood

friend Kate, and my brother’s best friend who is still his best friend. 

“We have to be a little quiet,” John said. But that only made us want to test him to see what amount of

noise we could get away with, it wasn’t much. He always turned the music down. The wooden dock shook

beneath our footsteps. Sunlight fell into the lake turning grey when it touched the water’s surface. I wanted

to turn around, walk up the hill and back home. I told myself they wouldn’t notice if I left right now. If I

slipped away silently my shadow grew much taller than me. My body looked skinny almost unhealthy. I

touched my side all I felt was rib bones, skin, and a pain in my side. I’d learn years later that that pain was

fear and it was there for a reason. Fear expresses itself on me in physical pain. We sat down at the end of

the dock and John turned on John Mayer’s “Slow Dancing in A Burning Room” and John Mayer’s “Half

of My Heart.” 

John sat on the end I tried to get a seat next to him, but I was small and by definition

insignificant. I felt an overwhelming need to be safe. To sit next to someone who would watch out for me

if not because they wanted to but because I wanted to feel like I was his little sister. I knew what would

happen. You’d been touching me for almost a year already. Only you called it messing around like it was

game. 

Our feet dangled off the dock, the water below us was pitch black. The water was warm and

figments of the remaining sunset rested on the water’s surface waiting to be carried to shore, but it still

smelled like something was dying. Felt like something deep down below the surface was dying. The

water was the kind of warm that makes you wonder what awful thing happened here. 

It’s Fourth of July and I’m 12 years old. I wanted the day to last forever, not because I’d miss the

people, I was with but because I’d be visible because John could see me but we were on opposite sides of

the dock. No one’s looking as you always believed but you were wrong. I watched it happen.

I watched you move closer to me careful not to move the dock beneath us. It was the kind of dock

where every movement caused a ripple effect. Your body was close enough to mine that we’d be touching

but no one could feel it but me. Our proximity made me feel safe but the kind of safety that also feels like

a false sense of belonging. Moments later, your hand was on my thigh, and I pretended I couldn’t feel it

then you jerked it away in a motion that made me feel undesired. Then it was back, and I felt lonely. John

was behind you showing you something on his phone. I looked away, splashing my feet lightly in the

water thinking this is what kids do, right? But in that moment, I couldn’t remember. You squeezed my

thigh. A tear moved down my cheek slowly begging me to pay attention to where it hurt. “Why are you

being so down and sad, Kiley?” John asked. “It’s fourth of July, have fun with us.” I brushed my tear

away and spoke in a tone of voice I knew my brother wouldn’t question. “I am having fun,” I said. Your

hands were on my bare back and for seven years you’d continue touching me when the lights were off, on

family vacations, in the pool, in the hot tub when no one was looking. When we were alone, and I began

to wonder why people always left us alone together. It was because they didn’t know. You’d say all the

right things because you knew what I’d believe, but you never asked if you could touch me. 

I wasn’t the kid anymore; I was the plaything. It’s now eight years later and I can finally watch

fireworks without feeling your hands on my body.