010314 #jonquil She really felt like skipping out of school, but Mary said hi, and she said hi, and they just started walking, out the door, down the wide cement steps, down the sidewalk as if the whole thing was perfectly mundane and they did it every day. Gwen kept alternating between giddy disbelief and a strange kind of serenity. They talked about just whatever, bands, stupid annoying people, what kind of tree that was, nothing. It was just uncomfortable enough to be heightened, electrified. A ginkgo tree was flaming yellow, hadn't been yesterday at this time. There was really no reason for Mary to have turned south at ———'s, but she did, and neither of them commented on it.