ME: No! I don't want to hear it. Not that way. I never want to hear those words unless they're coming from your lips. The flesh-and-blood you, not the fantasy you.
YOU: I thought you wanted me to say it. You're not making sense.
ME: The heart makes no sense.
YOU: So what do you want from me?
ME: The answer is in your question -- I want it from you. I want you to say the words because they're flying out of your mouth, because you can't possibly stop them, not because I led you to the brink of them. And I want to know that they're being said to me. To me. Not to some girl in the movies or a book. Not to some idea of Girl that you've picked up along the way from other boys and other girls. To me. Stargirl. Do you know me, Leo? Really know me?
YOU: You're making it hard to say yes.
ME: OK, short course, pay attention... Susan Julia Pocket Mouse Mudpie Hullygully Stargirl Caraway 101. She dreams a lot. She dreams of Ondines and falling maidens and houses burning in the night. But search her dreams all you like and you'll never find Prince Charming. No Knight on a White Horse gallops into her dreams to carry her away. When she dreams of love, she dreams of smashed potatoes. She loves smashed potatoes, and she dreams that she and Starboy are eating smashed potatoes, possibly on a blanket at a deserted beach, and as Starboy digs in for another scoopful, he drops the spoon and his mouth falls open (showing some smashed potato goop, but she finds it cute), and he looks at her in a way she's never been looked at before -- he sees her! -- and she can practically see the words boiling up inside him -- they're unstoppable! -- and here they come, gushing over the smashed potatoes: "I love you, Stargirl!" They just keep coming at potato flecks fly -- "I love you, Stargirl! I love you, Stargirl!" -- like a cereus blooming not once but over and over a thousand times in a single night.
