Category: Nikola
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Caledonia
The last time I saw Juteau cry was in October. Truthfully, I didn’t see her crying, but I saw the aftereffects: the smear of mascara trailing like dirty rainwater down the side of an abandoned building, the eyes as red as a desert sunset. She didn’t want to talk about it, and I didn’t want…
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Bodies In Motion
He gives me flowers before he kisses me, blue flowers and a blue kiss. I don’t know why I let him do it. I am not interested in him in that way, not any longer, or in any way actually. Perhaps he has put something in my tea, a powder dissolved from the flowers he…
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The Scent of Ghosts
I get up in the middle of the night to go to the bathroom and find Juteau sleeping in the purple tub. Her hair is draped over the back of it, and it hangs in dark waves over the porcelain. She breathes softly and her eyelids twitch as I slip into the room, but she…
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Out of Balance
They are beautiful earrings, silver spirals hanging from my earlobes, long and delicate strands of metal. They nearly brush against the tops of my shoulders. I both love them and hate them. Nikola is gone. He says he will return, and these earrings are his promise of that. Promises are nothing new to me. They…
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The Cartography of Desire
I started to write about this: The rain, pouring like a waterfall. Me in the yard, wearing nothing but a red sweater, sodden and heavy, leaving one shoulder bare and me naked below the waist. You on the porch, dry hands on the wooden railing, unable to look away. I’m cold in the wet…
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Happy Birthday To Me
It is my birthday today, and it does not start off on a very high note. I wake too early, with a terrible headache that feels like the ghost of Andre the Giant is trying to crush my skull like an empty beer can. On top of this, there is a pain in my right…
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Fries and Shakes
“That is so absolutely not attractive,” I say. “Wait, wait,” Bez says. “I’m not finished yet.” “Doesn’t it hurt?” “Only if they’re too hot,” she says. “You don’t want to get a burn on the inside.” My phone rings and I answer it without looking, which is unlike me, given my general dislike of the…
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A Sleepless Night
I am very sleepy today, and all the coffee in the world isn’t going to help, I think. The Kitchen God looks on disapprovingly as I brew some anyway. “Be quiet,” I say to him. “I don’t want to hear it.” He remains silent, but I know what he’s thinking. Jealous, fickle Kitchen God. I…
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3 a.m.
I should be in bed, but I am not. I have not felt well today, or yesterday either for that matter: a little lightheaded, a little unsteady. I’m not sure what it is, if it’s a bug I’ve managed to catch or some internal imbalance of my body’s own making, but it’s unpleasant and unsettling.…
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Distractions
Nikola takes me home, once lunch is over, and I kiss him before he rides off on his motorcycle. He’s working on a project that he is eager to return to, one that he won’t discuss with me. I don’t press, because I am the same way when I am working on something as well.…