Ichigo Ichie
By Francesca Tangreti
“Come on,” Miki said. “Please. Look at me.”
A long breath. Safiya tossed the rock up—lost it between cumulus and crepuscular ray—found it a foot before her forehead. It hit the heel of her hand like a water-cool kiss. She said, “I don’t know what you want from me anymore.”
“To look.”
“I did. Saw you, too. Didn’t go so good.”
“Why?”
“Come on,” Safiya said. “You know.”
“Say it anyway.”
Safiya palmed the stone again. One seam of bright white ran through its butt end, like it had split apart, then been fused, like memories, like time.
With a lurch, Safiya pitched the rock at Miki. It passed through her shoulder, like the water at her ankles, like the sand underfoot, and crashed into the lake.
Miki sighed. Safiya shrugged.
At their backs, a sly wind whispered sweet nothings through overgrown grass and molting birches. Cloud clusters shifted, casting Rorschach shadows upon the shallows. Everything was love, which was to say, everything was dead.
“I miss you,” Safiya said. Miki’s chest vibrated with a hum beneath her ear. “Is that funny to say?”
“I don’t think so,” said Miki. Safiya lifted her head, met Miki’s gaze. The sun turned her eyes into black pearls. “I miss you. Is that funny to say?”
“I don’t think so.” Miki made a face at her. “C’mere.”
Miki craned upwards, neck straining, to kiss Safiya softly. Safiya kissed back, palming Miki’s cheek. She sort of heard Springsteen: Baby, baby, baby, I swear I’ll drive all night again, just to buy you some shoes / And to taste your tender charms. Not a perfect metaphor, but something like it. Neither snow nor rain nor dark of.
“You ring in my ears,” Safiya murmured into the corner of Miki’s mouth. “I don’t think I’ve ever been without you.”
“What, like tinnitus?” Miki said, laughing a little. Wrinkling nose, rising chest.
Safiya brushed an errant curl off Miki’s forehead. “Like the Aeolian harp. You know that thing? You’re like—there’s this Atwood quote. She calls a painted angel a slab of painted laundry. You’re like if the laundry had arms and played gnarly harpstring in the evangelical orchestra of—fuck.”
“Don’t cry,” Miki said.
“All I do is miss you, but you were never here in the first place.”
“Hmm.” Miki dragged a knuckle along Safiya’s jaw, a dream-light touch.
She kissed Miki again. Tore a dandelion from the earth beside her. Rose to pick more. Turned to hand them to Miki, who was already gone—not completely, but sunbleached. The first photo in the album, double-exposed and blurred, migraine aura. Gum-pink, beatless heart, a flash of bone like a sheepish grin.
Safiya’s hand strangled the weeds. She took one big breath and blew. Seeds hit the wind, passed through Miki’s frown, a skein of crows, another tear, and Safiya left holding all stalks.
Francesca Tangreti is a graduate of Rutgers University, where she won the Faculty Choice Award. She writes because she can’t stop. She has been published by the winnow, giallo, Something Involving a Mailbox!, the Red Ogre Review, 300 Days of Sun, the Gyroscope Review, t’ART, and others.