Work Text:
///
This blue world has never needed a woman
to eat an apple so badly, to destroy an apple,
to make the apple bone—
and she does it.
I watch her eat the apple,
carve it to the core, and set it, wobbling,
on the table—
a broken bell I beg to wrap my red skin around
until there is no apple,
where is only this woman
who is a city of apples,
there is only me licking the juice
from the streets of her palm.
If there is a god of fruit or things devoured,
and this is all it takes to be beautiful,
then God, please,
let her
eat another apple
tomorrow.
— Natalie Diaz, from When My Brother Was an Aztec
///
one
it is the safest, most holy thing to kneel when you pray.
there’s some kind of penance; you remember, briefly, kneeling on rice as a child when you’d done something bad or wrong, the way your knees would burn and your hands would shake, even when you put them into fists. it was never that long; your parents and your nannies simply wanting you to behave. there’s some kind of penance you find comforting, kneeling in the big cathedral and confessing all of your sins privately: thought, word, and deed.
you have a lot of thoughts that you have to repent of, and often: just today, the way you stared at the gentle sharp bone of the girl in town who was ringing up your shampoo and conditioner, and how you longed to kiss it. just a flash, just enough to tell you that that part of you — prideful and lustful and greedy — still sits in your gut. even the psalms —if you, oh lord, kept a record of sins, oh lord, who could stand? but you say your hail mary’s and clutch your rosary and you wear your wimple and habit and speak six languages and can do calculus in your head; you are the best fighter in the order, sure and smart; you let an older nun cut your hair, a little clumsily, and you try not to long for anything other than this ascetic safety, these bare walls, that will keep you safe. so you kneel, and you repent and repent and repent, every day.
mary wanders in, probably back from a mission, a little dusty and most likely bored, waiting for shannon to finish training. when she sees you she smiles, always kind and always funny, her hair in neat braids, guns still at her hips, and you smile back.
‘am i disturbing you?’
‘no, of course not.’ mary is, you admit, sometimes better company than god and all the saints for your sins. ‘please.’
mary sits next to you and you stand, first, allow your knees to adjust, just for a moment, and then settle next to her.
‘all right?’
she nods, relaxes into the pew. ‘yeah, all good. pretty easy.’ she sees your tense posture, something you try and try and try to let go; you want to have friends, and sisters — a family. you want to be kind, and funny, and seen for something other than the skills you can offer the world. it’s terrifying and disarming because that means people will see you. but — ‘you doing okay?’ mary asks.
‘i, um — do you know about sor juana inez de la cruz?’
mary smiles, faintly. ‘a little. do you want to tell me about her?’
‘she — she was brilliant, and, in the 17th century, she wasn’t allowed to go to university,’ you start, thinking about how you had poured over everything about her in boarding school. ‘she entered a monastary as a postulate, and become a nun, because it was where — it was where she could be herself. she had a huge library, and hosted a salon, and — she wrote love poems.’
‘sounds pretty badass.’
you smile down at your aching hands. ‘the church, of course, said she was wayward. she — was probably, or, some people, think she —‘ felt like me, felt like i do — ‘liked women. and, in addition to that, the church hated her feminist stances, especially about education. only a few of her writings survive today.’
mary, in devout kindness, reaches out and gently holds your hand.
‘when the church condemned her, they confiscated all of her books and instruments. she, uh, she signed a document agreeing to undergo penance — yo, la peor de todas.’
‘i, the worst of all women,’ mary says quietly.
‘yes.’ you feel like you might start to cry so you lean your head back, look at the ornate ceiling before you close your eyes. ‘she died caring for other nuns who were sick. she was in her mid-forties.’
mary’s hand is warm and steady, and she waits patiently, perhaps more grace than you had ever been shown in your life.
‘i — ‘ you sniffle and mary doesn’t say anything when you wipe a few tears. ‘you love shannon?’
‘yes,’ mary says, her voice as steady as her hands. ‘i do, very much.’
‘do you — repent? for it?’
‘no.’ mary isn’t angry, like you feared she might be. she’s calm, and caring, and you feel like you can’t breathe. ‘i don’t repent for any of it.’
you let out a big breath and squeeze her hand. ‘i can’t say it, aloud. about myself.’
‘that’s okay.’
‘más merece la causa de mi daño — the cause of harm to me deserves much more.’
‘that your girl sor juana?’
it’s said with enough humor that it settles you, just a little, from the panic and shame weighing so heavy you fear, sometimes, your spine might snap with the weight of it all. ‘a love poem of hers.’
‘well, if it means anything,’ mary says, ‘you deserve so much more too.’
you swallow and allow yourself the smallest nod.
‘now,’ she says, brighter and louder and shaking the dark cloud away like sweet smelling holy incense, ‘let’s go get dinner. shannon should be done, and i know she has a few pranks up her sleeve for the new recruits. you should help, if you want.’
you want to stay to pray; you think you could pray forever. but there are already bruises on your knees. ‘okay,’ you say. ‘i’m hungry.’
/
two
‘hey,’ ava says, knocking on your door in a pair of loose pajamas, similar to the ones you have on. you’re at your desk, reading scripture — the new testament, lately, blessed are those. ‘can i come in?’
‘sure.’ you sit back from your desk and she looks around, decides in a flash that sitting on your bed is just fine, and bounces once.
‘these mattresses suck.’
you laugh, just once. ‘are you okay?’
‘oh yeah.’ ava waves a hand in the air. ‘i mean, like, impending doom notwithstanding, and whatever. mostly i just wanted to see if you were okay.’
she’s beautiful, her hair in a braid down her back, tendrils of curls escaping, the soft gold from your candle and silver from the moon ethereal. ’why would i not be okay?’
she rolls her eyes. ‘well, you know.’
you just wait; you’re too afraid to say it, too afraid to breathe.
‘i like girls,’ she says, just like that, with a little shrug, kindly leaving off the too for your sake. ‘the nuns at the orphanage were always going on and on about leviticus this, deuteronomy that, but, like, okay, first of all, the bible has been translated a bazillion times. apologetics can eat my ass.’
‘did you tell that to the nuns?’
she grins. ‘obviously. i did a lot to spite them.’
‘i… have absolutely no doubt about that.’
ava’s smile doesn’t waver. ‘second of all… girls! i mean, i’m bisexual. queer? gender is way expansive too, obviously, so either, probably, or both. but, okay, to me, boys are fine. i had, like, pretty good sex? recently. in a ferry supply room.’
you raise a brow.
‘whatever, it was fun. with a boy. not the point. i like boys, they’re hot. but, bea… girls, oh my god. i think about girls mostly when i’m, you know.’ you send up a prayer for strength right then and there, to very little avail because ava just continues. ‘their hands, and their lips, and their eyelashes, and their freckles —‘ her eyes widen, a little, at what she’s said, and you feel your entire body get a little hot, the space between your legs get a little slick. ‘sorry! sorry, even if you’re — however you feel, you’re still a nun. sorry.’
‘it’s — it’s okay.’
she reaches out and touches you, just for a moment. ‘i just, i guess i got off track, but i just wanted you to know that i think the world of you. i know we haven’t known each other very long, and i don’t have faith like you do, but —‘ she shakes her head — ‘you have shown me such kindness, when you certainly didn’t have to. a lot of people haven’t, in my life. and, bea, i also know that love isn’t wrong. love is, like, god’s ultimate thing, right?’
your voice is so thick with tears you’re afraid you won’t be able to words out, but: ‘i suppose so.’
’so, like, fuck all the people who told you different. if you’re gay, or bi, or queer, or whatever, you’ve been really, really kind to me. you’re wonderful.’
you definitely can’t talk now, or you’re sure it’ll turn into a sob, so you just stand and ava does too, when you hold your arms open. she’s small, and soft, and she smells like flowers. she tucks her nose, a little cold, into the crook of your neck and it makes you shiver, just slightly. you allow yourself an indulgence, a kindness: you bring your hand to rest on the back of her head, to hold her close, to protect her. once you head read, somewhere you don’t remember, a poem about being butch, how they experienced life make sense the moment they were young and another girl wanted to be kept warm, or safe, and they were able to hold her: everything, in an instant and for the first time in my life, felt right. i was a little knight beside the campfire.
ava backs away from the hug, a tremulous little smile on her face, and you grab your robe, leave your feet bare.
‘i’ll walk you back to your room.’
‘how chivalrous,’ she says, shoots you a wink, and takes your hand.
she kisses your cheek and you walk back, feel the touch there. feel her touch everywhere.
dear god, you pray, then your favorite: you make known to me the path of life.
it doesn’t escape you that ava, in hebrew, means exactly that.
dear god, you pray, and, your hands clasped and shaking and brave, something new: do not forgive me for loving her.
/
three
you’re alternating between trying your very best to stay focused on the inventory list and then losing said focus and watching ava mix drinks, her strong, slight arms exposed in a cropped tank, her hair falling into her eyes often enough that she keeps running a hand through it.
‘hey,’ someone says, a boy — a man — and sits across from you. you suppose he thinks he’s charming, and he’s… attractive enough, all tan skin and green eyes and muscles. you fight the urge to roll your eyes immediately; you haven’t, really, ever been hit on — other than ava’s incessant flirting, which warms you and sends you into a panicked spiral hourly — but you’ve watched guys try to get ava to give them attention for a month now.
‘guten tag,’ you say, as formally as you possibly can, barely looking up from your inventory, which is a whole lot more interesting now than it was a minute ago.
‘i’m josh.’ american, worst case scenario. ‘do you speak english?’
you debate just fully lying. ‘yes,’ you say, ‘i’m, in fact, english.’
‘oh,’ he says, genuinely surprised. ‘very cool.’
’sure.’
‘so, what are you up to?’
‘i’m the manager,’ you say, gesture to your notebook, ‘and i’m doing inventory.’
‘awesome! well, can i maybe get you a drink? i know you’re on the clock, but —‘
‘i’m a lesbian.’ it comes out, just like that, borne of annoyance and perhaps a little longing to say it without consequence, without the world burning down or turning to salt around you. ava, at that moment, has walked over to help you out, but she hears you and then a grin lights up her face. she walks to your side and puts her hand on your shoulder, leaning into you in an obvious way that makes your head swim a little, and josh’s eyes get big for a second.
‘oh, uh, very cool.’ he looks embarrassed, at least. ‘i’ll uh, yeah,’ he laughs, just once, good natured and mostly at himself, ‘i’ll go. sorry.’
‘it’s okay,’ you say, just as ava says, ‘yeah, scram,’ in a way that’s harmless and charming.
immediately after josh gets up, she sits down in his place. ‘yes! bea! yes!’ she holds out both of her hands for a high five and she’s so exuberant that, even though you feel your cheeks burning and your heart racing, you do indulge her. ‘how did it feel? to say it!’
‘it felt —‘ true, worthy, noble, terrifying — ‘right. it felt right.’
‘ugh, i love this for you,’ ava says. ‘i have to get back to work —‘
‘— very responsible, employee of the month —‘
she’s unfazed ‘— but tomorrow we’re definitely celebrating.’
she’s spinning away with a kiss to the top of your head before you can respond. you go home before her, and fall asleep on the couch with the light on, waiting for her to get home. she wakes you a while later, a little wine on her breath, and when you shuffle to bed she insists on tucking you in and kissing your forehead before she changes and brushes her teeth and washes her face. she falls asleep next to you and wakes you before your alarm, which has been one of the great annoyances of your time together. ava has the habit of waking up early, early enough for sunrise, and then is also capable of being late to anything. you prefer to sleep the exact recommended amount — you actually, if given the choice, prefer to sleep late into the morning, but you certainly don’t have that choice right now — because ava is bouncing on the bed and hitting your butt with her hand.
‘ava, please,’ you groan into your pillow.
‘i packed us breakfast! let’s go on a little hike.’
you groan again.
‘please, bea.’
‘fine. stop hitting me.’
‘i made you coffee, too. i know you’re grumpy.’
it’s true, but once you roll over and wipe the sleep from your eyes, situate the glasses that had made ava squeal when you first put them on in switzerland — for use at home; you can’t fight in glasses, so you wear contacts mostly — you see her bright form come into relief in the bruise blue of the morning, holding a cup of coffee out hopefully.
you sigh and take it and drink it in bed while she flits around, straightening things that are already in their cluttered place, waiting for you to be ready to go. once you feel slightly more awake, you get ready, slip into some running tights and your trail shoes and a quarter zip long sleeve, because of the morning chill, over your sports bra. ava is in god’s tiniest shorts, even though you know she’ll be cold, and a sweater she’d definitely stolen from you out of the dirty laundry hamper. she puts on her little backpack, full of what you can guess are croissants and maybe, if you’re lucky, fruit, and bullies you enthusiastically out the door.
switzerland is a lot of things to you: hurtful and lonely and the start of a path your life never really meant to take — but it is also beautiful, with ava talking, mostly to herself, about customers and the books she’s reading and the new pants she saw at her favorite thrift store, a recipe hans said he’d make when you go over for dinner this weekend. you turn off at the edge of a street near your apartment and hike an easier trail. ava quiets down, and, even though you’re tired, you can appreciate her sentiment: the sunrise dips the snowcapped peaks in pink and gold, the rock turning a faraway purple.
once you reach the edge of a lake, another half mile in, as the sun starts to warm in its summer duty, ava motions for you to stop and then puts her backpack down, emerges with a little blanket which she spreads along a flat, large rock at the shore. she gets out another thermos of coffee, croissants, and a pomegranate you had splurged on in the store yesterday, too delighted to see your favorite fruit to stop yourself.
‘sit, sit,’ she says, and then smiles, big and bright at you. ‘i’m really proud.’
you look out over the lake. ‘i don’t — i’m still a nun.’
‘sure,’ ava says. ‘you’re a nun and a lesbian. you can be both!’ she spreads her arms wide. ‘if you want, obviously.’
‘well, i don’t think i have much choice in the second.’
‘exactly!’ she takes a bite of her croissant and you wait for her to finish chewing. ‘that’s the spirit!’
‘i, well.’ you pick at the pomegranate seeds she’d put in a tupperware, and then let a few burst to life on your tongue. ’thank you.’
‘i think you should practice saying it again,’ she tells you, leaning back on her elbows and smiling an impossible smile.
‘here? right now?’
‘yeah! there’s no one around, just me.’
‘god.’
she rolls her eyes. ‘god already definitely knows.’ she can sense your hesitancy, the way you roll the long sleeves up your arms and then roll them down again, over and over. ‘here, i’ll go first,’ she says, and then, without having really any time to prepare, she takes a huge breath in and then yells, ‘i’m queer! hi god, it’s me, ava! i’m bisexual!’
a few birds shoot away from their grotto nearby but, other than that, nothing happens. the lake is calm and smooth and the mountains don’t crumble.
‘see.’ she bumps her shoulder into yours. ‘now, you try.’
‘ava.’
‘come on, bea.’ she’s whining and pouting and it works, every time, much to your dismay.
you swallow, and then you say, ‘i’m gay,’ very quietly.
‘okay,’ ava says, ‘great start. love it. but with a little more oomph, now.’
it’s ridiculous, but it spreads out all around you: the blue sky and the vibrant green of the trees and the red of the pomegranate seeds, staining the tips of your fingers the same color as ava’s lips. it’s a truth, now, spoken and irrefutable: ‘i’m a lesbian,’ you say, a little louder.
‘whoo hoo!’ ava cheers.
‘hello god,’ you say, as loudly as you ever have, and then, ‘i’m gay! i like girls! i’m a lesbian!’
‘fuck yeah, bea!’ ava wraps her arm around you and kisses a shoulder, doesn’t comment on the few tears that you wipe from your cheeks. ‘that was awesome.’
it’s a sanctuary, you realize, in a way that no church or cathedral or school or convent or home had ever been: the mountains and the fruit and ava’s sheer joy in who you are.
‘you know, there’s this movie i liked, that i would watch after the nuns went to bed, and there’s a part in a monologue that’s, like, “for three years i had roses, and apologized to no one.”’
you chest aches. ‘v for vendetta, yes. i know it.’
‘oh,’ she says.
‘i have seen movies.’
she smiles, gently, gracious. ‘i — i feel a little like that, now. like, i know it’s going to end, getting to be here with you. but, i love it here, with you.’ she hands you a little aster, bright lilac petals and a yellow center, just barely now starting to blooming around you — love, wisdom, faith. ‘it’s not roses, but —‘
‘apologizing to no one.’
you long to be brave: you push her hair behind her ear and tuck the flower away there, safe and beautiful. ‘yeah,’ she says, voice a little wobbly. ‘apologizing to no one.’
/
four
‘i’ll be back in an hour, with food. i’m sure ava will need to eat, and you should too, bea.’
you nod, more concerned about the way ava hasn’t moved from where you and camila had helped her onto the top of the toilet seat in the bathroom, her head drooped forward and her right arm held protectively over her ribs. camila leaves silently, and you take off your armor as fast as you can, discarding it neatly in the corner, before you walk to ava and wrap your arms around her shoulders, cradle the back of her head. you’re still standing up, and so she presses her face into your stomach and you feel her crying. you shake with the desire to do so as well, because you saw her die; you held her in your arms as her body was broken and her heart had exploded in her chest and her brain was oozing out of her broken skull on the tips of your fingers. she cries and you don’t but you hold her, until she calms, until she sniffles and moves her head with a little whimper to look up at you.
‘i’m going to give you a gift,’ you say, a gentle hand cupped around her jaw, ‘and you can’t tell anyone. ever.’
you know she’s in tremendous pain, the halo healing all that it can but then giving out when it needs to recharge, and you’re fairly certain she’d broken every bone in her body. but if she could be shaking with excitement, she would be. ’great. promise. done.’
‘did it hurt?’ you say.
she grins.
‘when you fell from heaven?’
‘beatrice,’ she says, ‘this is the best day of my life.’
‘surely not.’
‘definitely not,’ she agrees. ‘but that was incredible. a cheesy pickup line, from you? i’m all healed.’
you shake your head, fighting a little smile. you help her stand, the task in front of you a little less daunting now because she’s calmed, and so have you, just enough. she can’t lift her arms, so you help her out of her armor and the shirt underneath; you take her boots and socks off, and then unbutton her pants and slide them down her legs while she holds on to your shoulders.
she doesn’t make any jokes, although you’re waiting for them — i gotta say, bea, i imagined you getting me out of my pants so many times, but this wasn’t one of them — so you know she’s exhausted and in a great deal of pain. there’s blood everywhere.
‘can you — do you want help?’
you know her past; you would never, ever touch her without permission; you would never think, inherently, that she can’t do something.
but then: ‘first shower together,’ she says, working up the energy to make a dirty joke on what seems like your behalf. ‘no funny business, though, beatrice. i know i look ravishing right now, but we will have to refrain ourselves.’
you look to the ceiling in a show of exasperated prayer, and it earns you a huff of a laugh and then a groan.
‘alright.’ you turn your back toward hers and take off your robes until you’re left in an overshirt and simple, tight black boxers that you usually wear on combat days. she manages to pull down her own underwear, to your infinite relief, and you unclasp her bra in the back and let it fall off her shoulders. it hurts, deep into your soul, you think, when you see that her underwear are light blue, with little daisies on them, a pair you’d washed countless times in the alps and tried, desperately, not to think about.
you make sure the water’s warm and then hold her hand while she steps in. you do your best to avert your eyes, not caring about your clothes getting wet, and she manages to stand and let the water wash away most of the blood. there’s some still on her face and in her hair, though, so you ask, ‘do you want me to help?’ again.
she nods. ‘yeah, thanks.’
‘of course,’ you say, although your hands shake and you resolutely do not look at the hollows of her sharp collarbones and the drops of water collecting there. you wash the blood off of her face first, especially careful with her ears, then rub shampoo into her hair as gently as you can, mindful of her broken skull and willing yourself not to see it when you close your eyes; you condition it gently and wait a few moments before making sure it’s rinsed out. ‘good?’
‘yeah.’ she sighs. ‘i feel a little better. thanks, bea.’
you nod, then step out and hold a towel up for her, which, thankfully, she seems healed enough now to handle on her own. you take your own towel and dry off in the bedroom, change into new clothes — pajamas, from switzerland, a pair of running shorts and a hoodie you had often worn when the nights were chilly, ones that had somehow ended up in this room in jillian’s house — and then get ava’s favorite sleep shorts and sweater, a pair of soft underwear and her favorite socks, printed with little dogs. you bring them to her in the bathroom, and she tells you that she can get into them herself; you wait anxiously, braiding your hair just outside the door, and listen for any signs of a fall, anything that might require your help. but then she emerges, clean and small and tired, steadier than she had been half an hour ago.
she walks to the bed without saying anything while you busy yourself with straightening the bathroom and putting away your armor as properly as you can in a closet, and then you walk to where she’s curled up in bed.
‘should i wake you when camila comes?’
‘mhm.’
‘do you — will it hurt you if i —‘ it’s a request you don’t quite know how to make aloud.
‘get in here,’ she says, reaching an arm back in your direction.
you lie down behind her, over the covers, but you still wrap your arm gently around her chest and she laces your fingers together. you bury your face in the nape of her neck, the hair that falls just there, and take a shaky breath.
‘it’s okay, bea,’ she says. ‘i’m here, it’s okay.’
it’s not okay, not any of it, but she’s right about one part: she’s here; she’s in your arms, and, for right now, she’s safe. it feels, a little, like, above being god’s, and the halo’s, and the order’s — she’s yours.
camila knocks at the door after a few minutes; you extract yourself from where ava has fallen asleep and open it. camila is in a simple habit, her wimple discarded somewhere, and she looks in at ava and then at you, your wet hair and your civilian clothes — shorts — and puts the tray down on the small table, then pulls you to the threshold and hugs you, tight.
‘i — you were right,’ you say, thickly into her shoulder, and she runs a hand up and down your spine, not shying away from your touch or your tears: nothing about you is wrong, nothing unholy. ‘about — about ava and me. or, at least, what i feel for her.’
‘i know,’ she says, lifts your chin with a smile. ‘i usually am.’
it gets you to laugh, just once, and she soothes the top of your hands with her thumbs. ‘i thought, for a moment, that she was going to kiss me.’
camila hums. ‘maybe, one day, she might.’
‘thank you.’ you squeeze her hand. ‘for your friendship. and for the food.’
she laughs quietly. ‘of course, beatrice. you’ll let me know if she needs anything else?’
‘i will.’
she turns with a nod, but then: ‘she feels the same, for you.’ she smiles. ‘i’m right about that too.’
you bite your bottom lip and nod, and camila leaves with a wave. you walk over to the bed and it pains you to wake ava but she’s using so much energy to heal; you know the caloric requirements to heal from injury, even aided by the halo.
she stirs awake, and you help her sit up in bed, get her situated, and when you see that camila has brought her a cheeseburger, you have to laugh at ava’s look of pure adoration. she eats the entire thing, far too fast, and then groans, but she’s still smiling, breathing easier now.
‘you gonna stay here tonight?’
you are still finishing your chicken sandwich, at a normal pace, but you nod. ‘if that’s all right with you?’
ava grins. ‘i wanna wake up next to you for my whole life, bea. don’t you know that by now?’
you fall asleep holding her again, under the covers this time, your legs tangled together.
instead of praying to god, really, you feel her smooth skin and think of the sufis:
if anyone wonders how jesus raised the dead,
don’t try to explain the miracle.
kiss me on the lips.
like this. like this.
when someone asks what it means
to ‘die for love,’ point
here.
/
five
lilith finds you in california. you’re along some cliffs in a suburb outside los angeles, your favorite place to trail run. it’s probably a gift to you that she had let you be on your own and hadn’t found you sooner; if anything, you think she understands grief better than most.
it’s sunset; the air smells like sage and salt. the ocean is quiet today.
‘this is quite romantic,’ lilith says, materializing by you after you run down a switchback to get to the beach and sit in the rocky sand. you can see catalina island in the distance, swathes of coastline jutting out on either side of the small beach with its tide pools and perpetually closed lifeguard shack that sees very few people.
‘hello, lilith.’
‘you look… honestly, kind of hot. not being a repressed nun suits you.’
you roll your eyes.
‘i like the blonde,’ she says, flicking at your ponytail, and then she picks up your right arm and looks at the space between the top of your hand and your wrist, the precious tender juncture there with its strong tendons and floating, inexplicable small bones. she frowns when she reads your tattoo. ‘this is too sad to even make a joke about.’ she puts your hand gently back in your lap. ‘you miss her?’
‘of course i miss her.’ lilith has known you for a long time; she has shown you moments of kindness you had never expected — maybe this is one of them. ‘i hurt, all the time. it’s beautiful here, and awful. it’s smoggy and you can’t walk anywhere and it’s different from anywhere i’ve ever been. i’m in love with it.’
lilith is quiet, unchanging. you’re not even sure she needs to breathe. but she doesn’t say anything cruel, and she doesn’t leave: a kindness indeed.
‘i wanted more time. i spent so much of my life hating who i was, and who i loved, and then i met ava —‘ your voice cracks on her name — ‘i met ava, and she just opened everything up, for me.’ you wipe a few tears. ‘and, god, she was right, the world is amazing.’
‘you’ve been around.’
‘you’ve kept tabs?’
she smiles. ‘something like that.’
‘do you think she knew?’
‘what?’
‘i said it too late.’ it’s perhaps the biggest regret of your entire life.
lilith turns toward you very seriously. ‘ava’s an idiot. and i don’t really know what it’s like for her on the other side; i’m trying to help, but i —‘ she shakes her head — ‘i’ll keep trying, bea. but she loves you. she knows. sometimes, i can feel it. i can’t explain it, but i can find you, no matter where i am, because i can feel it.’
you nod.
‘so if i can feel it, i know ava can feel it. you showed her, over and over and over again. incessantly, in front of all of us.’
she says it with a good-natured eye roll, fond and teasing, and it makes you laugh, even though it’s kind of snotty and gross, it loosens something in your chest.
‘she’ll come back. one day.’
‘yeah.’
‘saint beatrice da silva,’ lilith says. ‘couldn’t have picked a gayer coincidence myself.’
‘i am gay.’
lilith rolls her eyes. ‘oh, i had no doubts ever. now i certainly have been made aware.’ she touches your arm gently, your tattoo, just for a moment. ‘it’s beautiful here. you picked the patron saint of prisoners for your namesake, you know that?’
you nod.
‘and, now, it seems like you’re pretty free.’ lilith smiles, gently. ‘see you around, bea.’ and then she’s gone.
the sunset rocks the ocean with color, vibrant and the most beautiful one you’ve ever seen in your life: the moon overhead, orange and signaling, in some times, a harvest; the waves red-tipped and awash in pink. you put in your headphones, quiet enough you can still hear the rocks pushed back and forth by the tide, a gentle solitude — i hurry bout shame, and i worry bout the worn path, and i walk it off, just to come back home. you stand, make sure your shoes are tied and wipe sand from the palms of your hands: unharmed, thousands of miles and millions of years stuck to your fingertips. a word about gnosis, it ain’t gonna buy the groceries.
you run back up the switchback to the path back to your car, your quads and calves on fire and your lungs pressed tight against your ribs as you try to breathe.
and you do: it harms me, it harms me, it’ll harm me, i let it in.
/
—
you had agreed, after resistance purely so ava would make a canva slideshow presentation and airplay it to your tv, making you laugh as you split a bottle of wine, that you could come to seattle, after the war, to go see the ferry boats and house in queen anne that was apparently meredith grey’s house. it was made far easier because one of your friends from aikido had moved and recently had top surgery, so they were having a little get-together at a bar there, and there’s probably nothing ava loves more than dancing, after all this time. sex, maybe, but dancing is a close second.
‘the wild rose,’ ava says, typing it into her google maps, although you know where it is; you’re only a few blocks away. you’d done all of your grey’s anatomy sightseeing the day before, and now ava had dressed up, pouting about having to wear a jacket over her dress, grinning at her choice of lipstick in the mirror and grinning even more after she kissed you against the door of your air bnb and then wiped the red from your lips.
‘it’s right here,’ you say, and ava’s smile is gentle and you love her.
the bar itself is genuinely a dive bar, which you don’t prefer, necessarily, but there’s so many queer people you almost want to cry. it’s been years — years — of what feels like catching up on lost time: getting to love ava, but also getting to know yourself, and your desire, and pleasure in so many ways.
you find your friends and ava goes to get shots for the table — a dubious start to the evening — and it doesn’t take long for everyone to get loud and happy and a little drunk, you included. ava tugs you up to dance and you see the way she looks at you, the same way she had all those years ago: delight, and adoration, and something so far beyond words it might not even be just love.
and you kiss her this time, a prayer a prayer a prayer. you kiss her and she tastes like vodka and lemon and her lipstick, and you put your hands in her hair, and your friends whistle but no one cares. you dance and you press your hips against yours and you haven’t apologized in so, so long.
eventually, ava drags you outside, even though it’s drizzling, because she wants to share a joint with your friends and she wants you to come. you take a hit and it’s heady; the smoke floats up and everyone laughs when you hear pussy is god blaring from the inside of the bar. you dance and you drink and, eventually, you say goodbye, mostly because ava’s definitely a little crossfaded and you want to make sure she wakes up in the morning in time for your flight back to california. being queer saved my life, you remember from ocean vuong, a quote ava had printed out and hung up back at cat’s cradle, when you were about to fight a holy war.
you understand, more than most: being queer had saved your life, and ava’s life, and the world. there are harms, everywhere, but this is not one. you will indulge ava in a street hot dog outside the bar and chocolate in your air bnb and eat until you’re full; you have a tattoo of an aster on your shoulder and collarbone, her favorite. now you kneel for her, and no one else.
the bouncer, tattooed and butch and handsome, smiles at you as you leave, ava laughing into the crook of your neck, your hand on her hip, steady. ‘you and your partner are adorable,’ the bouncer says. ‘have a good night.’
‘thanks,’ you say, stand tall and make sure ava does too, and ava beams. ‘you too.’
they smile. ‘get home safe.’