Food – Page 7 – A Piece, of the Sky

Rain bounced off the windows. Clouds hung low, caught in the last rays of the sun, burnt into a fluffy, coral color. Drops inched down the panes. Jeopardy was about to go into the final round. Alli and Ran sat in their usual position on the couch: Ran holding Alli and Alli leaning on her shoulder.

The show cut to commercials. Alli ducked out from under Ran’s arm and stood up, crossing the room, with her glass of rosé. She alighted by the windowsill, staring out at the pink and yellow tableau. The sky’s painting of a sunset. Alli turned the stemware with the edges of her fingers resting on the rim. The trees swayed in the spring rain. An advertisement for lawn mowers blared from the TV and Ran turned down the volume.

“What’s wrong?” Ran asked.

“I have to get over Nealy,” Alli said, still looking out the window.

Ran sat back. Her heart pounded but she said nothing.

“I’ve been carrying her around for too long,” Alli continued, looking over her shoulder.

“It’s understandable,” Ran got out.

Alli looked back out the window, at the water pooling around the storm drain, “I wonder if my seeing you is a part of that holding on.”

Ran muted the TV, “But I am here; she’s not.”

“You have me,” Ran spoke again, after a pause.

Alli turned back around, framed by glass, her silhouette framed by the window and graying sky, “Yes, but what if having you, isn’t allowing me to get over Nealy?”

Ran got up and put her empty glass in the sink, “You can’t live out your relationship with Nealy through me – we’re two different people.”

“I know that,” Alli seemed frozen at the window, wearing a green cashmere sweater, a button-up shirt and jeans, frozen in amber, “The rational mind knows – but the heart sees what it wants to see.”

Ran stop pretending to be distracted by the faucet, and faced Alli, “Should we take a break? See other people?”

Alli sunk inward a little. She looked down, but then looked up, right into Ran’s eyes, “That would be wise.”

Ran turned back to the sink, and wiped her hands on a dishtowel, “So be it.”

Alli opened her mouth to say something more but then closed it. She set the half-empty glass down on the windowsill and rose to go.

I am sorry that my motivations were so muddled, Alli thought.

Alli took her black overcoat off one of the wooden pegs in the hallway and left, walking out into the rain, toward her apartment. Ran, still inside, resumed washing the glass.

Music

Goldfrapp

Satin Chic [Through the Mystic Mix, Dimension 11]

You Never Know [Mum Remix]

Alli lay in the multipurpose pool, at the gym, in a T-shirt and shorts. A game of water polo raged nearby, but not close enough to tussle the water where she was floating.

The water was warm, and at just the right salinity. She closed her eyes and let the water fill her ears. Buoyant, Alli could use this pool of ions, a sea of electrons, as an extender, an antenna for her signal. Tethered to that terrestrial room, Alli could unspool her link to this side, and spelunk further and further out, into the in-between, to Atev.

She stood on a rocky outcrop, overlooking the beach. The crashing of waves greeted her ears. Alli was here in Atev, on an island that exceeded Keo’s description of Naxos, Greece, in beauty.

Aro waved from the top of the hillside. A small table, covered in a white tablecloth, whipping in the breeze, stood next to a castle. Aro was dressed for summer, in a white suit and blue ascot, held by a golden pin. She held a cigar in one hand, and a bottle of Les Hauts de Smith sat on the table, waiting for them.

Alli, now in a navy-blue cashmere sweater and khakis, hiked up the hill, toward Aro. As she took a seat, a waiter poured a glass of the red wine for each of them.

“So, I hear you are going to be the next Sky Avatar,” Aro said, letting out a plume of smoke.

“Where did you hear that?” Alli blanched, pulling herself closer to the table.

Aro sighed and re-crossed her legs, “I hear many things in the capital.”

Alli shook her head, “I’ve never known how to take any of it.”

“Come on now,” Aro chided, leaning forward, “You’re not going to reject this opportunity, are you?”

Alli looked around, nervous, “No of course not, but do you think I am ready for it? It’s like being told, tomorrow, you are going to be an ambassador.”

Clouds were floating by, further out to sea. The butt of Aro’s cigar burned bright, a whole tobacco leaf curling into ash, “I think you’re ready for it. It’s not natural to like beginnings or endings.”

The waiter brought them two plates of salmon and sorrel. The breakers of the other land pounded the shore and receded out to the horizon.