Honey Girl

by Morgan Rogers

  She will miss it, when this champagne-bubble dream pops.

  She decides that tonight, in the hours before Yuki’s show, she will not brood. She crawls under the covers and pulls out her laptop. The Skype call is dialing before she registers it. It rings and rings, and finally Ximena and Agnes become grainy and visible. There they are, down to the overworked shadows under their eyes and Agnes’s lips, peeling and irritated from stress picking.

  “Hi,” Grace says. She feels herself drawn to them. “Miss you guys.”

  They are both cuddled on the couch. It has been many years of will they, won’t they, do they, don’t they, and she realizes she has missed that, too: the reliable uncertainty of their relationship status. Ximena holds Agnes around her small waist and buries her face in the shock of blond hair. “Hi, conejito,” she murmurs quietly. “We miss you, too. We were just talking about you.”

  Agnes’s eyes flutter open. She looks tired and sharp. “Hi, Porter,” she croaks out, and Ximena meets Grace’s eyes.

  She shakes her head slightly. Grace suddenly feels the entire country between them. She cannot hold Agnes and wait for her sharp edges to dull. She thinks of Raj’s words. They all have their hard things. She wants to be there, really be there, for this one.

  “Hey, Ag,” Grace says, because she can, because she must, because she wants to support her friends. “Bad day? Bad week? Bad person? Want me to fly back and put them in their place?”

  Agnes laughs, and it leaves her like a heavy, burdened weight.

  She gives a small smile, and Ximena presses a barely there kiss to her neck. Grace pretends not to see Agnes shudder. “What about if the bad thing is my brain?”

  It’s always the goddamn brains. “I’ll put your brain in its place, if it helps,” Grace says, scooting closer to the screen. I’m here, I’m here, I’m here. “Me and Ximena have grown rather fond of you over the years. What would we do without our feral white girl?”

  “She is feral, right?” Ximena asks. “And that means strong, and powerful and so dangerous that any brain wouldn’t dare try to fuck with her.”

  Agnes groans, hiding her face behind a lanky arm. “You guys are the worst,” she says.

  “Yeah,” Grace agrees. “Love you.”

  “So much it hurts,” Ximena adds.

  Agnes bites her lip. It’ll scab and bleed and heal, like she always does. Like she always has. When Grace looks at Agnes, she does not see a monster. She sees hurt and anger and the scarred remains of fear turned survival.

  “I was actually going to call you tonight, start giving you shit about your birthday and becoming old and decrepit this month,” Agnes says. “It’s not even—”

  “Relax,” Ximena murmurs, rubbing Agnes’s stomach beneath the heavy sweatshirt. “It’s a big deal for you, so it’s a big deal for us.”

  A trembling breath. It does not sound like Agnes, who Grace has always known as fierce and utterly composed, even at the height of her shrieking, furious anger. “I got a new diagnosis,” she says, looking up into the camera to meet Grace’s eyes. “Borderline personality disorder. It’s not even that big of a deal, you know?” Grace holds her breath. “It’s not like I wasn’t already living my life as a major depressive with clinical anxiety with a lovely little sprinkle of self-harm, right? So, what’s the big fucking deal?”

  There are a lot of words Grace could say. I’m sorry. I’m glad you told me. It’ll get better.

  They all aren’t enough.

  Instead she says, “You know I love you, right?”

  “I’m painfully aware,” Agnes replies. She pulls two small pill bottles from her hoodie pocket. “Anyway, I have two new prescriptions to turn me into a semi-functioning person,” she says. “They’ve just been making me sick so far.” She smiles, a bitter thing. “Guess you guys are stuck with me. No one else would take in a late-blooming nutjob.”

  “Hey,” Grace says. “As a fellow late-blooming nutjob, I take offense to that.” She presses her hand to the screen, like that will help. “Give us a little more credit,” she teases softly. “I mean, we liked you well enough when we thought you were just depressed and mean. Especially Ximena, right?”

  “Fuck off,” they both say.

  Agnes sends her an awful glare. “Anyway. That’s enough emotional vulnerability for a lifetime. I’ll deal with it. Whatever.”

  Grace snorts. “You’re already doing better than me,” she confesses. “Don’t think I’ve reached the ‘deal with it’ stage of anything yet.”

  “That’s because you’re not as well-adjusted as me,” Agnes says. “I’m going to therapy twice a week, but my therapist is driving me crazy. She says she’s absolutely positive I’ll adapt beautifully to this. Old hag.”

  Grace laughs. “You can’t say that.”

  Agnes makes a nasty noise. “‘Beautifully,’ she said, Porter. Beautifully borderline. Maybe I’ll write a book.”

  Ximena hides a smile behind Agnes’s serrated, angular body. “I’d buy it,” Grace says. “I’d—” She cannot understand this, what Agnes is going through, but she can understand loneliness so deep you can’t reach it, and sadness that consumes everything. She can understand wanting to let your limbs go weak as you sink underwater. “I’d get it,” Grace says, and she trusts that Agnes will understand that, too.

  Lonely creatures, she has learned, will always find each other.

  “Yeah.” Agnes sighs. “Your phone is lighting up, by the way. Since when do you have friends we don’t know about?”

  Ximena lets out a fake cry. “We’re being replaced. Maybe Porter was the hip-hop SoulCycle type all along.”

  Grace ignores their increasing dramatics to grab her phone.

  Yuki

  11:59 p.m.

  are you there?

  are you listening?

  where are you, grace porter?

  “Oh my God,” Ximena says, and Grace looks up, feeling caught. “I have never seen you look so lovesick. Is this what married life does to you? You’re glowing.”

  “I’m not lovesick,” Grace mutters. “And I’m not glowing. It’s just—I’m just—”

  “Uh-huh.” Ximena hooks her chin over Agnes’s shoulder. “Don’t get your heart broken, Grace Porter, okay? I’ll put you back together, but I won’t be nice about it.”

  Grace doesn’t meet her eyes. She fiddles with her phone, navigating to Yuki’s webpage.

  “I won’t. I’ll be fine,” she says. “Things are good here. Promise.”

  “Okay,” Ximena says. “We’ll let you go. Love you.”

  “So much it hurts,” Grace says.

  “Gross.” Agnes sticks out her tongue and the call disconnects.

  She clicks the Listen Live link flashing on her phone and is immediately transported into the world Yuki builds up, each word like a brick in the foundation. She settles in and pretends half her heart hasn’t been left in Portland, unable to find its rhythm when the people it’s connected to are hurting. She settles in and inhales embers and crushed herbs and wonders if she will remember the smell clearly once she has to leave.

  “Tonight, we are talking about the Akashita,” Yuki says over the radio. “It’s another yokai I’m sharing with you. I think my mom would be livid if she knew this is what I’ve shared from our culture. But, it’s interesting, isn’t it?”

  Grace listens.

  “Every culture has different stories for things that go bump in the night. This one, the Akashita, I couldn’t get out of my head for some reason. Maybe it’s because there is no way to say if this creature is good or bad. It reminded me of people. We are capable of so much good and so much harm, sometimes in the same breath.”

  Yuki’s voice is melodic and tranquil and quiet.

  “The Akashita is a yokai that was first drawn by Toriyama Sekien. It’s a hairy beast with claws for hands and a hug
e, red tongue. You can’t see most of its body because it is lost in a black cloud. It is a monster stuck in darkness and it guards, or maybe holds the key to, a floodgate.

  “You look up, and there it is. This unknown monster with its unknown motivations. Some say it is a bad omen to see the Akashita. They say that to see it means a terrible drought is coming. Some say it is a protector. It watches to make sure people do not take more than they need, and if they do, they are punished. They are swallowed up whole by this half-hidden thing in the sky.

  “Take too much, and you will be eaten. Take what you need, and leave the rest for those that have none. Leave space and room and chance for those that have none.

  “I think that’s what makes the Akashita so scary,” Yuki says. “Not its body or its hunger or the black cloud it lives in. I think what makes it so scary is that you see it, and you don’t know whether to feel scared or safe. You don’t know what it wants, and if it will shield you or eat you. It is the unknown, the uncertainty, that is terrifying, more than the darkness and the monster that crawls from its clutches.

  “I don’t know if the Akashita is a lonely creature. I think it could be, with only a black cloud for company. Maybe it is looking for other lonely creatures, thirsty and starving and drought-ridden. Maybe it opens its floodgates like one would hold out a hand. Or maybe it is a lonely creature looking for other, unsuspecting things. Maybe it has embraced its loneliness, and the floodgates wash away all the other fragile, weak things in its way. No one can say, really. No one knows. It’s unknowable.”

  Grace holds her phone with shaking fingers. Yuki’s voice is an echo in the background. An echo of all the things Grace feels when she looks up. Uncertain. Unknown. Afraid to be swallowed up and unsure how to ask for help.

  Her fingers hover over the keypad. She opens her messages to Agnes first.

  Grace

  1:03 a.m.

  what do you need from me to help?

  you don’t have to ask

  whatevs you need, it’s yours

  She switches to the long chain of texts with Yuki.

  Grace

  1:05 a.m.

  it was a good show tonight

  maybe I am uncertain too

  Yuki

  1:06 a.m.

  i was waiting for you

  And then:

  Yuki

  1:07 a.m.

  everyone is uncertain grace porter

  sometimes you just have to keep going anyway

  Grace takes a breath. It is August. Age twenty-nine is about to begin, and there is still so much she doesn’t know. It is the scariest thing in the world.

  August 26, 2010

  “Hurry up and cut it,” Meera says. “It’s Mama’s butter cake. It’s delicious, I swear.”

  “Give her a minute,” Raj mutters. “She only just learned how to make a decent cup of tea. Cake cutting might be a new level.”

  Baba Vihaan smacks him on the back of the head. They’re all huddled around a table at the end of the night. Floors still need to be swept and dishes need to be washed and the till needs to be reconciled but for now, cake.

  Grace tucks some flyaway hair behind her ears and bends down. There are three little candles in the center of the cake, burning brightly.

  “Mama wanted to come,” Meera confesses quietly, fingers picking at the designs on her kurti. “She got tired. She gets tired a lot now.”

  “Hey,” Grace says, reaching for her hand. “It’s okay. She needs her rest.”

  Raj crosses his arms, and Baba Vihaan clears his throat. “She sends her love. Now make a wish. Three wishes.”

  “Not how it works,” Raj says, and he gets another smack on the head. “Just saying.”

  Grace smiles and stares into the little flames. “What should I wish for?” she whispers, still gripping Meera’s fingers. “Any ideas?”

  “A car,” Meera suggests. “Sharing the Corolla with Raj is getting unbearable. Oh!” she exclaims. “A good semester, obviously.”

  “Health,” Baba Vihaan says. “Prosperity.” He rolls his eyes toward Meera. “Maybe a car.”

  Grace laughs and closes her eyes. “I’ll take all of those under consideration.”

  Her cheeks are still flushed from the mild humiliation of having “Happy Birthday” sung to her. Even stoic Raj joined in, gaining energy from Grace’s discomfort. Now she takes a deep breath and blows. She sends a wish out to the universe, and life has taught her she has to mean it, or nobody and nothing will listen.

  Good health, she wishes, for those that need it more than me. A good academic year.

  She hesitates, but the universe does not grant wishes to hesitation. She grips Meera’s hand tight and goes to blow out the last candle.

  Make my parents proud, she wishes, harder than anything else. Hard enough that she almost sees it take shape. That’s what Porters do.

  She opens her eyes and begins to cut the cake. She follows the tradition of serving each of them a bite. She serves Baba Vihaan first, then Meera. Raj looks like he won’t open his mouth at first, but Grace says please soft enough that the others don’t hear. “Please, Raj.”

  He stares at her for a long moment. He is wary of Grace, wary of the way Meera follows behind her, asking questions about school and life and the universe while they’re between customers. But Grace says please, and he opens his mouth for a slice of cake.

  “It’s good,” he mumbles, and she smiles.

  “Of course, it is,” she says. “Your mama made it.”

  August 26, 2012

  “Hey, Mom,” she says. “Just checking in.” She stands outside this little Salvadoran restaurant in the city that sells tres leches cake

  “Hey, Porter,” Mom says. There is a bunch of noise behind her. She might be in Scotland this month, or maybe it’s Madrid. “Happy birthday, baby!”

  She smiles in the window reflection. “Thanks. Are you busy?”

  She can barely hear Mom when she answers. “We’re at a summer festival!” she yells. “It’s way too loud, but I’ll call you when I get back to the room? We’re staying in this quaint little house with—”

  The call cuts out.

  “Of course,” she sighs. She goes inside. The cake tastes sweet. She eats it alone at a table in the corner.

  August 26, 2016

  Sharone makes mac and cheese and string beans and fried chicken and a pitcher of margaritas. They sit out on the patio, reclined back and watching the sun go down.

  “You’re going to do big things,” she says. “I hope you believe me when I say I see so much life in you, Porter. You make me wanna go back and do it all again. Your father is so proud of you.”

  “I was supposed to do medicine,” Grace says quietly. “Not this.”

  “So?” Sharone asks. “You ain’t supposed to do anything but stay Black and die. Anything you do beyond that is a feat in itself, you hear me?” She lifts up her glass in a toast, and Grace meets it.

  “I hear you,” she says, clinking their glasses together.

  The door opens behind them. Colonel leans against the door, still in his uniform, hat in his hand. “What are we celebrating?” he asks, limping out on the patio to perch on the arm of Sharone’s chair.

  She gives him a poisoned look. Grace stares down at her lap, into her glass at the little pieces of fruit Sharone squeezed in. She’s starting to feel a little tipsy.

  “We’re celebrating,” she hisses, “your daughter’s birthday.” She turns and plasters a smile on her face. “Baby, get that cake out of the fridge. We’ll cut it out here. The bakery messed it up a little, but don’t worry, I gave them a piece of my mind.”

  Grace hurries inside. She hears Colonel’s muttered “shit” before the patio doors close behind her. In the fridge, there is a white cake with buttercream frosting. In pink letters on top it says
Happy Birthday, Peter.

  “Happy birthday, Peter,” she says quietly, swiping a finger through the icing.

  August 26, 2018

  Grace spends the day in the lab. Her neck and shoulders and back hurt from being hunched over one of their older pieces of equipment. She’s exhausted, but the distraction is nice.

  One of the postdocs that added her on Facebook presents her with a small cupcake and a lone candle.

  “I have to watch for these results,” Grace tells her. “But thank you.”

  “You work too hard,” she says. “Take a break.”

  Grace blows out the candle, and some of the icing begins to melt. She doesn’t remember what she wished for, or the name of the girl that gave her the cupcake.

  August 26, 2019

  “Las Vegas?” Grace asks, staring at the tickets in front of her. “You’re sending me to Las Vegas as a graduation present?”

  Colonel clears his throat. He sits stiff in the chair across from her. “It was Sharone’s idea,” he says. “She thought you needed to let loose.”

  “She does,” Sharone says. She turns to Grace, grabbing her hands. “You’ve worked so damn hard, Porter, and in a few months, you’ll be done. You deserve to have some fun.”

  Colonel clears his throat again, and Grace straightens—muscle memory. “Everything is refundable. I advised her it was highly probable you already have things lined up. You’re in a competitive field, best to get things moving early.”

  “I don’t,” she says, backtracking when his face goes blank. “I mean nothing that won’t still be there when we get back.” She holds up the three tickets. “Is it for us three?”

  “Girl, what?” Sharone asks. “What grown woman wants to go to Las Vegas with their father and stepmom? And who says I want to go to Vegas with y’all?”

  Colonel looks upward for strength. “In other words, no. Take who you want. I assume you’ll make sure they’re responsible and won’t influence you to do anything regrettable.”

  “Oh my God,” Sharone says. “She’s never done anything that could even come close to regrettable in her life. Why would she start now?”