Words about Zee
We sat outside and watched the river go by. It was cold and the sun was going down, giving the buildings a tangerine and silky smooth look. Clouds held shape as two men were yelling at each other, ready for a fight. The man with the ponytail sounded violent and I wanted to go inside. Somewhere warm, so the icicles would drip from our noses and the tips of our fingers.
It could have been her eyes or the way a smile was always creasing her lips, but I had trouble listening to her words. Zee smoked, and wouldn’t look me in the eyes for very long, always casting them to the riverbank.
She was stunning. More so than I could remember. When it was just pictures instead of afternoons sipping coffee, discussing politics or Warsaw and the riots.
Zee was talking about her classes and things I couldn’t understand. Medicine is for special people, with special hearts. I can only learn what I am shown, visually, and from a distance. Always from a distance.
“Did you hear me?”
It was her eyes and the small glimpses of her collarbones. “No. I’m sorry. What did you say?”
“Are you going to be around before I go back?”
“Yea. I should be. I’m usually around.”
We became silent and the river gurgled against the rocks and all of a sudden, I missed the sounds of summer. Children running along patches of dirt and grass, kites dipping and fluttering on a ice blue sky. Men in lazy boats, casting out, taking a sip of beer, reeling in. Over and over as they would go by. Sometimes they waved. Sometimes they just drank, hats lowering closer to block out a midday sun.
“I’m cold. I should go home.”
“Yea. It is cold out here.” I didn’t want to tell her that I had no place to be and no one else to share conversation with. I didn’t want to tell her how beautiful she was or how much I enjoyed the sound of her voice. Or how captivating her fingers were, when she spooned the foam from the top of her cappuccinos, and how her eyes shimmered when I was able to make her laugh.
“So… I’m going to see you before I leave, right?” Zee and her smile.
“Definitely.”
We shared a hug and I watched her get into her car.
The leather seats in my car were cold and stiff. I looked in the review mirror and told myself I was a fuck up, and a coward, always getting the words I should be saying, stuck between my teeth.
Maybe next time. When it isn’t too cold or too quiet, and I can slip those words in between the moments we share, letting them get lost inside the foam of cappuccinos or the water against the riverbank.
