Everybody keeps saying that I’m so lucky. I don’t feel lucky. My mouth hurts, and my jaw. I’m sitting in the little room listening to The Jesus and Mary Chain and trying to remember what it was like to kiss him since memories are all I’m going to have now that I have these hideous braces.I really wish people would stop saying I’m lucky. They think I am because I only have to wear them for a year, not two or three like some people, and there’s no headgear or anything like that involved. Still. I can’t kiss anyone. Not that I would ever kiss just anyone. But I can’t kiss him and I can’t eat corn on the cob. I’ve seen what happens and it’s really not good.I didn’t tell him about the braces thing before I got them and I didn’t say anything when he called tonight either. He’s going to find out, obviously. Even if I don’t see him, someone will probably tell him and then he’ll get someone else — someone without braces I’ll bet — and I’ll be here, sitting and listening to the ethereal fuzz of Just Like Heaven on repeat.
I don’t expect him to wait for me. I know what I have to do. I have to be strong and silent and never open my mouth again until the braces are gone. I need to find my journal and write down every single thing about kissing him so I can’t ever forget.
*
Jim Reid of The Jesus and Mary Chain photographed by Mike Laye for The Face, June 1985.
Welcome to the Little Room is a series of 250-word re-imagined vignettes from my ’80s youth with a focus on music and style. It appears weekly on periodicult.com.
