Honey Girl(58)

“Thank you,” she says, when she finally finds her voice. “I can’t wait.”

Colonel raises his eyebrows. “Well, you have plenty to keep you busy until then,” he says pointedly. “One last semester. Stick to your plan. Don’t let the promise of a trip derail you. You have big things to accomplish.”

Your plan, he says.

“I know,” she tells them. “I’ll stick to the plan. I always do.”

August 26, 2020

The night before Grace’s birthday, she goes with Yuki to the radio station. She sits in the second swivel chair and watches Yuki bring creatures to life with her slow, melodic voice.

Tonight, the show is about selkies. She listens to Yuki talk about seals becoming trapped in human flesh and their skins being hidden from them, leaving them imprisoned with men.

“Sometimes people feel ownership over the things that make us us,” Yuki says into the mic. “Sometimes the things that are familiar to us and feel safe to us, remnants of our childhood and old lives, are locked away by someone who wants us to be different and look different and follow their rules. Sometimes lonely creatures are not of their own making.”

Grace leaves the room, her nails digging into her palms. Sometimes the stories feel too familiar, too lived. Sometimes Grace does not want to relate to a monster in a story.

She sits in the hallway, earbuds in so she does not hear Yuki wrapping up the show. Grace is engaged in a debilitating round of Candy Crush when a shadow falls over her. She looks up, and Blue is looking down, big headphones wrapped around her neck.

“You good?” she asks. “Yuki got an idea for another episode, so she might be a few minutes. You know how she gets.”

Grace nods. Yuki gets single-minded and quiet and snappish when she has an idea, barely blinking and frustrated with anyone who interrupts her thoughts.

Blue flops down next to Grace, smelling like cigarette smoke and bubblegum and hair grease. “What’s up with you?” she asks. “Usually you’re in there making googly eyes at your girl.”

Grace laughs. The sound echoes in the empty hallway. “I’m not that bad,” she says. “I don’t know. I’ve been having this existential crisis about my place in the world and what I’m supposed to be doing with my life and who I even am.” She scrunches her nose. “Really inconvenient.”

“Oof.” Blue bumps Grace’s shoulder. “Big mood.”

Surprised, Grace turns to look at her. Tonight, she has her braids twisted up into two space buns, and she blinks back at Grace with bright yellow eyeshadow and gold hoops that say Bitch across the middle.

“Really, though?” she asks. “Sometimes it feels like I’m too old for this. I’m about to turn twenty-nine. Like, while I was busy getting a PhD everyone else was figuring all this stuff out. I feel so behind.”

“You give other people too much credit, okay?” Blue says. “Everyone’s just pretending they have it together, because they don’t realize everyone else is pretending to have it together. None of our dumbasses actually have it together.” She frowns. “Maybe people with generational wealth and access to resources that allow them to prosper in the middle to upper class? But that’s it. Just them.”

“Very specific,” Grace murmurs.

Blue smiles. “This is late stage capitalism, man. We have debt and will never be able to retire. Yaaaaay.”

The studio door opens, and Yuki looks down at them. “My ‘capitalism is a plague’ radar was going off,” she says. “Figured I’d come join the fun.”

Blue gets up. “Your space girl just needed a pep talk. Be nice to her.”

“I’m always nice to her,” Yuki complains. “You catching the bus, Blue? We can wait with you.”

Blue’s already shoving her backpack over her shoulder. “Got a ride,” she says. “And when we get back to my place, I got a riiiiide.”

Yuki gags. Grace covers her face with her hands. “Get out,” Yuki says. “Get out!”

“Don’t forget to shut everything down!” Blue yells, cackling as she sprints down the hall.

“Ugh.” Yuki gags again.

Grace looks up. “All done?” she asks.

Yuki nods. “It’s after midnight. Happy birthday, Honey Girl,” she says. She holds her hand out. “Come on. I want to take you home.”

At the apartment, she lays Grace out on the bed. She kisses her mouth, and her neck, and her breasts, and the flat expanse of her stomach. She leaves her own matching bruise on Grace’s narrow hips and smiles in the dim light at the shuddering noises Grace makes.

“You’re so sweet,” Yuki croons. “Just like honey.”

She threads their fingers together. “Are you sweet everywhere, Grace Porter?”

It is their first time this close, this laid bare. It is the first time Grace sees all of the pink creases and soft skin and gentle curves that make up Yuki Yamamoto. It is the first time Yuki sees Grace golden from head to toe, with gold-dusted goose bumps and sun-colored hair prickling on her thighs.

Grace shakes apart at the feeling of Yuki’s tongue on her, in her. She arches off the bed, pulled back down to earth by Yuki’s fingers. She keeps hold of Grace, so she does not float away.

“Yuki,” she whispers, eyes pressed shut. “Yuki, fuck.”