Ramey

short fiction

Ramey wasn’t as beautiful as she used to be. She was doing something weird with her hair. She always looked best with a straight cut, hung to her shoulders, a micro bang. But now she was trying on some Farrah Fawcett flip and it was pissing me off.

We sat outside of Cafe Meraki and there were white cloths on plastic tables and I ordered a Greek salad, no onions. She ordered an appetizer platter; olives, hummus, pita bread. She acted surprised by the size of it. As if an app platter isn’t for sharing.

What was that, her surprise. She never used to act like that, like someone who didn’t understand the extent of things. Once she told me if I’d just buy the smaller jar of peanut butter then, over time, I wouldn’t eat so much peanut butter.

She asked if I wanted to share the app platter. Was that a test. To see if I’d learned anything about my intake. Was she not buying my choice of salad.

I took a piece of pita bread from her plate, let it soil on the side of my plate in a pool of olive oil. She watched it, the bread, the whole time we sat there, our elbows rubbing those polyester tablecloths. She was waiting for me to eat it, then to ask her for more, but I wouldn’t do it, I didn’t touch that bread, because what was that about. That watching. Why was she doing that.

She used to touch the hair on my forearm or brush my bangs out of my face. Now, she was just still, her eyes wide like that, and it reminded me of the last time I’d seen her. Her hair straight, blowing slick like a sheet of paper struck by the wind. Eyes red and watching as she stood below a stop sign, my car backing away.

“Are you seeing anyone.” I asked her.

She was. “He’s alright. We live together now. He’s a successful sculptor. Does weekly 24-hour water fasts to access his full range of creativity. You’d probably hate him.”

Probably.

She told me about her new art studio, rents it downtown. One of her paintings will be featured in some art show. Downtown. She couldn’t stop saying the word, as if it defined her. We grew up in Garden Grove but none of that mattered now that she’d landed herself in Downtown.

LA. LA. LA. So cool. I know she thought it. What a pussy I was for still living in Orange County. I know she believed it. He Hides Inside The Orange Curtain, she probably said it to her anorexic sculptor boyfriend. I brushed my bangs away from my face, rubbed the hair on my forearm.

“Are you seeing anyone.” She asked me.

I wasn’t. “Sure. She’s Hawaiian, hair to her hips. She gives me morning head to access her higher self. You’d hate her.”

Ramey flipped one of her Farrah curls, lifted her brows, watched me. Said nothing.

I stabbed an olive, fed myself.

Once, in our green-tiled kitchen she lifted her spoon full of yogurt and placed it in my mouth. There was honey on it, a taste of strawberry. She had said, “I love this kitchen; don’t you just love this kitchen.”