Durga: Tell me what you would do if we met in person.
Benkinersophobia: You’re changing the subject.
Durga: Am I that obvious?
Benkinersophobia: Nothing about you is obvious. But I read you well, Durga, and often.
I would take that any day. Two giant wings expanded in my belly, flapping their way to my chest. They weren’t butterflies. They were powerful tsunami waves, consuming me each time I spoke with Ben.
He’s a fantasy, Emery. You will wake up one day, and he’ll be gone. Keep your distance. Save your heart. Nothing good lasts.
Like always, my warnings didn’t deter me. I typed out a reply, hoping I was Ben’s fantasy, too—a warrior princess who fought his demons beside him.
Durga: I love you.
I’d said it before.
After he’d talked me down a ledge caused by a failed finals exam.
Or when I got evicted from my apartment sophomore year, and he offered to break the rules and help me in person.
And that time I nearly caved and answered Dad’s postcard, where he told me he loved me, missed me, and would always be here to balter with me.
Probably a dozen times after, too.
Each time felt different.
This time, the declaration came from comfort. I needed him to know someone cared about him, was there for him, and would always be there for him. Because at the end of the day, that’s all any of us really need. Someone who shares their sunshine no matter the weather.
Benkinersophobia: I don’t deserve it.
Durga: Just tell me what you would do if we ever met.
Benkinersophobia: I’d say, “Hi. I like your ass. Would you like to fuck?”
Durga: Romantic.
Benkinersophobia: I thought so.
Durga: You don’t know what I look like. You may not like my ass.
Benkinersophobia: I like you, therefore I like your ass.
I never stopped smiling when I talked to Ben. I hoped, wherever he was, I made him smile, too.
Durga: Have you heard of the Maasai?
Benkinersophobia: From Africa?
Durga: Yes. About four hundred years ago, a Maasai leader had a daughter named Naserian. She dated a village elder’s son, who eventually broke her heart. Naserian’s father banished him. When he left, he took his elder father, mother, sister, uncles, aunts, and cousins.
Durga: A month later, Naserian dated another man who broke her heart. When he was banished, he took with him his father, mother, sister, uncles, aunts, and cousins. The Maasai numbers began to dwindle, which left them vulnerable.
Durga: See where I’m going here?
Benkinersophobia: The Maasai have a shit ton of family members?
Durga: Ben.
Benkinersophobia: Naserian needs to chill with the assholes?
Durga: Ben.
Benkinersophobia: The Maasai need separation of state and daughter like ninety-year-olds in Congress need retirement?
Durga: BEN.
Durga: Stop.
Durga: OMG. You’re impossible.
Durga: Moral of the story—when you act in vengeance, everyone around you suffers.
Benkinersophobia: I’m not talking about revenge. I’m talking about regret.
Durga: Revenge and regret are cut from the same cloth. Both are infectious. Both are cured by forgiveness and forgetting. The last thing I want is for you to suffer.
Benkinersophobia: You worry too much about me.
Durga: Because I care.
My grin splintered as I waited for a response. Not because I didn’t think Ben loved me. I knew he did—just like I knew I made him smile and the real reason we refused to break the barrier and meet each other had nothing to do with the rules.
We were geode crystals.
Beautiful.
Tough.
Shiny.
Resilient.
Destined for a life sheltered inside an ugly rock.
My worry for Ben egged at me to press harder, to beg him to see himself the way I saw him, but I wouldn’t, because even geodes shattered. If we shattered to pieces, I would lose my compass, my refuge, my sanctuary.
Selfish, selfish, Emery. Tell me all about how you’re a good person.
I whispered magic words into the empty office air, even though I knew magic words wouldn’t save me from this.
Benkinersophobia: How do the Maasai still exist if they banished everyone?
Durga: Well, the story ain’t true, but it proves my point.
Benkinersophobia: You made up a story about the Maasai for me?
Durga: I know you're laughing. Stop judging.
Benkinersophobia: Durga?
Durga: Ben?
Benkinersophobia: I love you, too.
My cheeks still stung red when Nash walked into the office ten minutes later. He held out a to-go bag of overpriced food from a local steakhouse. Everyone else had gone out for Taco Tuesday lunch, so nothing but silence filled the room.
He gave me a solid thirty seconds to grab it before he plopped it on the coffee table in front of me and studied my flushed cheeks. “It’s lemon herb salmon with the little green things Ma makes that you’re obsessed with.”
“They’re capers, Nash, and people don’t make them. They cook them.” I tapped my naked nails on my phone screen, breathing from my mouth so I couldn’t smell the food. My stomach continued its relentless growls. “How do you know I like capers?”
“Is that a serious question? You and Dad would fight over them whenever Ma made Chicken Piccata.” Nash sat next to me on the couch, making it feel a hundred times smaller. He dragged the bag closer to the edge of the table and pulled out a black plastic container with a transparent lid. “You spilled the entire serving plate one year while trying to steal the capers from Dad and Reed’s plates.” It looked like the memory made him happy, which did uncomfortable things to my chest, even as I did my best to ignore him and the food. “Ma ended up doubling the capers in the recipe. Every time she makes Chicken Piccata, it’s like eating green shit with a side of chicken and pasta.”
My eyes dipped to the dish as he pulled off the lid.
Fuck.
Was I drooling?
“Betty still makes Chicken Piccata?”
“Yeah. Once a month.”
His words pulled me out of his orbit.
Out of the tussled hair that made me think words like cafune.