https://i.imgur.com/69iJjXr.jpg

INTERLUDE I

Letters to my daughter:

Risa,

You are one week old.

I ache.

I cannot say one moment or the other if the ache is good or bad. The midwives tell me that with each feeding, the pain will ease; that it is good for me, to recover, that it helps internal healing. But by gods, it hurts. And makes me so sleepy, I have to pinch or give myself a little slap not to accidentally fall on you while you eat. It aches.

But then there is a lull. Your tiny cherub's mouth pauses (thank gods, did you know I have to lather myself up? Apparently, this causes chapping. My girl, my girl. If you ever have a baby and feed it naturally—people forget to tell you about this. Get a good balm for yourself. You will need it.) and your long sweet lashes sweep closed. You smell like angels. I think you do, anyway. I do not know what angels smell like or even if there is a god or pantheons of —though no doubt you will hear me call on them over the years — but I swear. This smell must be of them. It is peace. It is warmth of skin with love. It is safety. It is golden. I love the smell of your warm little head. You have three hairs right now. They are golden red, like mine. Your eyes are blue.

You do not look anything like your father. I am happy, so, so happy about this. He is already gone. He was gone the moment he knew of you, before I even knew of you. I am glad he is gone. I do not miss him. I do not think about what it would be like to have him here. To see you. I do not.

I ache. This is the way life is I think. Someday, you will ache as well. But that is not yet and I feel love swell inside me akin to when you grew there and I swear I could fight a dragon with nothing but my spite, tooth and nail for you. It aches inside me. I cherish it.

I ache, in my heart. It is the good kind. I would do anything for you. I love you.

INTERLUDE II

THE GIRL AND THE ROBOT P A S T



I go mental every time you leave for work You never seem to know when to stop I never know when you'll return I'm in love with a robot*

It wasn't the fast cars. It wasn't the American-dream penthouse, or the hot tub, or the kitchen that looked like it was made to be on those home and kitchen shows or the old re-runs of MTV cribs. It wasn't the money. It wasn't the fact that he looked like he belonged on the front of a magazine either. It helped, yes. She was one hundred percent honest with herself. She knew she'd been so lucky. And there were times when she had looked at him when he had been bent over laptops or papers and simply stared in awe and wonder: how did I end up with him' How"

In the night, call you up and Wanna know when you're coming home Don't deny me, call me back I'm so alone

It was something else. It wasn't, and wouldn't ever be because he had walked out of a nerd-girls daydream. It was something else, and they'd tried to figure that out between them. But even in the land of dreams things fell apart.

She was lucky. She knew she was. They'd fallen apart in surprisingly adult, respectful ways. She...she hadn't expected him to actually be at the Penthouse when she started packing her things. They weren't mad at each other! They didn't hate each other ('least, she hoped so), she just took it as some weird unwritten post break-up rule that he wouldn't be there. And that this would be a lot easier to do.

In the night, wait up for you Even though you don't want me to Go to bed, leave the lights on What's the use

She told him about the job offer back home she took. She figured it'd be good, you know" to get out there and see the..uh...world for a bit. She tried to make it easier for both of them. A peaceful parting. A fond farewell. An oh-well-hey-we-tried. She thinks she did well. She thought it would be easier.

It wasn't. But both of them managed to say goodbye like grown ups. When Risa thought back on it, she thinks it was the hardest thing she'd had to do.

_____________ P R E S E N T



"Did you have a good Christmas?" Pause. "Did you even have a Christmas?"

"I worked," he admitted.

"Un. Accept.Able, sir!"

"And it's acceptable when the holidays only remind me of you and being alone for them is **** So I spent them working."

( Record skip. Thought stop. Heart flail. Flip-flop. Fist-in-chest. Broken heart cartoon sound effects. Hopeful heart glissando. Inward caution. )

"You could have asked me," not angry. Not reproachful, either. Genuine.

"It would've hurt too much," he admitted, looking at her for a long moment. "I'm not going to stand here and pretend to know whether or not you're okay with it - with you being there and me being here - but I know I'm not." A shoulder rose and fell before he reached up, drawing off the sunglasses. For a second, his eyes tightened at the change in light. Yes, the split was amicable, but that didn't mean that he...didn't feel the loss of it. It was ...."It's like having lost a tooth," he mused.

"It came out and maybe it didn't hurt too bad at the time, but I keep poking and prodding at the hole because there's something missing. And for me" That's hard."

She'd never had to excuse herself to go cry in the bathroom before. But there was a first time for everything in her life. She'd never heard him say something so raw and honest it had made her crumble worse than a granola bar.

She ached. It was such a good ache.

_____________

"Would you ever consider going back out with me again?" Fear. Don't get hurt again. But, neither wanted that anyway. Game over" Reload screen. Try again?

She told him she was afraid. A coward. So she said o.k.

And I never was smart with love I let the bad ones in and the good ones go But I'm gonna love you like I've never been hurt before I'm gonna love you like I'm indestructible*



*The Girl and the Robot - R?yksopp * Indestructible - Robyn

INTERLUDE III TWO YEARS AGO

"Can you make that square a little rounder?"

Risa Jones' smile froze in place. Josh had a cup of coffee with the company's logo in one hand and that was pretty much the only way one could identify the company's manager. Behind them, various keyboards were studiously or furiously typed away on; a few people murmured on the phone, a thousand mouse clicks went by as Risa attempted to figure out how—

"They want rounded corners" Or...a circle?" Head tilted at him. "Yeah, yeah! A little rounder, but still square. Otherwise the client loves the design Riza—" "—Risa." "Risa, right!"

Josh, frankly, looked like some sort of hobo Jesus. It was a running gag around the office which tie-dye shirt he'd wear to compliment a scraggly unkempt beard that went half way down his chest and the falling-apart sandals he loved wearing with his khaki shorts. At least he'd gotten the memo sometime earlier that year and started taking showers at work. He jogged, you see. He jogged to work in the morning. And used to get to work covered in sweat. The office was in a bright, re purposed old factory, one wall the original brick, the other floor to wall windows and painted cheery office..uh..white. There were no cubicles. So when Josh used to do that, or any co-worker decided tuna was for lunch...Anyyhooo—at least he'd started showering.

"Sure can do Boss! I'll have it adjusted and sent out with you and Lizbeth copied on it in, say, an hour?"

Josh gave her a thumbs up. "Aweeesome!" And then meandered off through the open tables of computers and workers. Risa didn't need to watch him go to know where he went. His flip-flops slappadappa'd cheerily on his feet.

Across from her, their monitors close enough to touch, Lizbeth's face peered around Risa's work provided acer and grinned. "Can you make that square rounder?" Lizbeth parroted in quiet mockery. Risa snickered like she was four.

"Hey, listen. There's a new coffee shop across the block that opened. Real mom n' pop shop, they roast the beans and package them right in the store, it's smellls like fucking heaven," Lizbeth began, "You wanna grab a cup there with me today at lunch?"

Risa drug her eyes away from her monitors and the fifty million windows, emails yet to answer, SEO tools, Google—"Fuck yeah" Enthusiastically replied before thinking. They high fived over their monitors and went back to work. Risa tried not to worry too much about breaking her New Years Resolution about Learning To Say No, a Risa Jones Special, and tried not to watch the clock.



_______________________________

FLASH FORWARD Lizbeth wrapped up her stream for youtube. Risa, wrapped in a blanket with a glass of ...she didn't know. Lizbeth liked wine, Risa couldn't stand it, but it's what Liz' had in the fridge and after the night dancing, with her head pounding from too many shots—a little bit of what ailed her should cure her of that distant headache that beat to the rhythm of: you're old. you're old. you never got hangovers. you're old. She knew the stream had wrapped up because Liz' hadn't yet got the sound dampening thingie-ma-bobs for her guest room in the apartment where she filmed and Risa had no idea about streaming but was pretty sure the silence meant she was done.

Lizbeth came out of the guest room in a cloud of raven dark hair, make-up flawless. As usual. Risa could do her eyeshadow if pressed, remember blush and lip gloss, but Lizbeth' Bow. Down. My god she was good. She had this entire dewy, fresh faced look, full on glow, that looked so much like she woke up like this it turned her head. Of course, no one had beautiful hot pink eyelids with eyeliner sharp enough to cut a bitch either, but it looked soooo good—

"You left something on the floor," Lizbeth grinned at her. Risa blinked owlishly and looked down. When she looked up, Lizbeth's perfume tickled Risa's nose, and she had leaned along the back of the couch so that when Risa turned their noses nearly collided. "—I, sorry you—huh?" Lizbeth chuckled. Somewhere, a romance novelist was losing their shit because it was the perfect, smokey sound. "Your jaw." Lizbeth said.

And then she kissed Risa.

____________________________

FLASH FORWARD "I don't understand. Why can't I—"

Lizbeth's fury was so out of place. Risa had never seen her so upset. "I told you not to fucking answer the phone. I told you not to use that voice message of us together. And I told you about fucking uploading those pics. But do you ever listen" Of course fucking not. Not Risa fucking Perfect Life Jones, clueless fucking happy go lucky puppy. Do you—"

Risa's first instinct was to be hurt. Tears pin-pricked behind lash immediately. Her second instinct was to lash out blindly and say some nasty shit. Risa knew better than that, and that she was better than that. So she didn't. But swallowing it felt like eating glass. "Hey, hey, calm-Lizzie what is going on?"

"I'm not into you, this was fun while it lasted, but we're done," Lizbeth said. It was so calm and slipped so easily from her mouth that Risa thought she was imagining things. "Sorry. " Lizbeth rolled her shoulder. Risa was mentally unable to think of anything to say. "Get your shit and get out," Lizbeth told her, composed and cold.

Risa did the only thing she could think of. She got her shit and got out.