June and I met the summer of 69 and I was more surprised than she was that we stumbled into the same bar out of the summer ran. Clearly, everyone had the same idea as we did as the cacophony of various voices filled the cramped hole in the wall.
"I'm not a weatherman but I think he needs a new job." Her face full of sweet amusement and full of beauty.
At first, I wasn't sure she was even speaking to me with the various of people piling together, "Hello?" She said trying to get my attention again as I continued to dry out my hat from the sudden rain. "Oh hi," I said nervously and smiling down at her soft pale skin and gorgeous hands.
"Yeah, weatherman, crazy," I responded like an idiot. She smiled and laughed and used a dry napkin to dab her dry face.
Her smile was everything, I couldn't keep my eyes off of her pearly white teeth and her pale pink lips. Focusing on everything she had to say. She was beautiful. Out of all of the bars, she could have stumbled into on this day I was lucky enough to be sharing shoulder room space with an angel.
"June!" She said extending her arm out as far she could. "Patrick." I took my big rough hands into her small delicate ones and shook. Her light demeanor was welcoming and soothing compared to the anger and annoyance that filled the room. I was a little wet but her entire body had been drenched by the rain and she didn't seem to mind it at all. "You come here often" she joked breaking the trance I had fell into while shaking her hand.
"Ah, no actual first time." Honestly, it really was my first time on that side of town in the entire six months I had been there. I stumbled in the bar by sheer luck as everyone else did. I am actually glad I had decided to turn left instead of my usual right on Warren Road today.
"Well, It's nice to see someone has a sense of humor about this rain," I said smiling at her.
"I love the rain. I love the smell of it. I love how clean the air is after it has stopped." She said smiling after every sentence. I was mesmerized by her word after 5 sentences.
Laughing a bit I motioned to her drenched sun dress before saying, "Did you go dancing?"
She smiled and chuckled a little bit. "Actually, I did! Would you care to join me?." Before I had the chance to answer she was yanking my entire body through the crowd of people. Bumping and pushing our way towards the doors she turned and smiled, it was bright it was wicked, it was freeing. Before I knew it she and I were barrelling through the day bars doors and were out in the pouring summer rain. As we ran with her lead in the sudden downpour I found myself smiling and almost laughing with this crazy wild woman I barely even knew while we ran in the street like kids.
We made it to the end of the block before I slowed up my galloping pace once stopped she turned to me laughing a bit. "Where are you taking me?" I said, slightly out of breath, placing my hands on my hips trying to remember the last time I had ran anywhere.
"Do you trust me?" Her smile never left her face, she extended her arm inviting me to take it. Inviting me to run away with her. Even with every part of me saying I shouldn't run away with this beautiful incredibly intoxicating woman I did. My hand tightly gripped by hers I ran for what seemed like miles behind her until we rounded the corner to a train station. June stopped slightly out of breath this time and she turned to me still smiling as I felt the cool release of her hand out of my sweaty palms and turned back to me again. "Do you still trust me?"
Like an idiot, I hesitated longer than any man standing in front of a beautiful woman should have. "I want to," I said to her, watching the express on her face change from sheer innocent joy to bashful amusement. Everything about her was beautiful the way the late summer sun twinkling off her amber locks to her clear gloss painted fingernails. Man, she had the prettiest hands I had ever seen.
"Have you ever heard of Woodstock?" June said, with a smile and bright eyes.
"That music festival taking place in New York?" I said with questions to her direction of the conversation.
"Yes! It's on Friday! Come with me!" June exclaimed.
Friday was 4 days away and New York was not just a hop skip and a jump around the corner.
"June I can't, I have..." I stopped with hesitation before her swollen soft lips met mine, the kiss was wet, exhilarating, crazy and coated with sugarcane. I couldn't believe it, June the Amber haired Angel had just planted her sweet lips on mine. Whatever was happening in the world and in her life took me by full surprise. The magic of her kiss enchanted me as I wrapped my arms around her and I was falling down the rabbit hole. She pulled back without saying a word her hands pressed on my cheeks and her hypnotizing green eyes paralyzed everything inside me. Her eyes locked onto mine and she stepped two steps away from me dropping her hands before saying "Dance with me!"
With just the clothes on my back and a woman I just stumbled into by accident just a few hours prior, I was on a train headed for a long 17 hour ride to New York City for the first time in my life. I couldn't sleep much on the train, in contrast, June slept cozy with her head rested on my shoulder. I spent the night staring out the window contemplating if I was going to write a letter to my folks to let them know that I wasn't going to be home for dinner. Or writing a note to the police department letting them know that if they had found me dead, I let some girl I barely even knew kidnap me across the country to New York City and if anybody seems to find my remains tell my family that I love them.
When the raven haired maรฎtre d' came by and asked if she and I wanted anything to drink I was too nervous to speak in fears of waking the precious angel up to answer. Just as I settled back towards my view of the cities zooming past us June woke up a little asking where we were. I remember the sleep in her eyes as I began to tell her I wasn't entirely sure where how far we ventured off too. June placed a soft kiss on my lips resting her soft hands on the tip of my chin. We kissed as if we were lovers, not just two strangers on their way to New York to the summer musical festival. Her eyes were so hopeful. I wondered how can some so carefree and spontaneous as she, so I asked her?
We talked for hours she told me how her family back in Houston was against her protesting the war and how she wanted to go to college but her mother told her she needed to start a family. She told me that her favorite color was red and she loved lilies. She talked about her older brother, who she idolized deeply that died in the war and how they were so close she felt that if anything was going to change in this world it had to start with who we were and what we made happen. I watched her intently as the corner of the mouth curled up on all subjects that she was passionate about. How the vibration of her laughter when she would say something fun traveled through her and to me. When she got to the part of her story of how she ended up in West Virgina her heart was warmer than it had been. Preaching peace to anyone who would listen made her feel as if she was making a difference for once in the world. She and her fellow travelers were on their way to the courthouse to rally when it started to rain.
They had been on the bus for weeks trying to people to understand that living in peace was the right thing to do. The peace group was full of all sorts of people, their leader Jeremiah was injured in the war and had been bound to a wheelchair for the rest of his life due to the loss of his left leg. He once thought our country was great and he too was told that we had to protect it. He took in all refugees who would listen. He started in Oakland California and drove his bus across country to talk to everyone who wanted to make a difference. She said that missing a leg made it hard for him to drive so that's when he met Kyle. Kyle was unequipped for the military being gay and too sick to fight having the real urge to fight either way.