Rocket Man
Category: Rivi
Perpetual Smug
“In my dream,” Rivi says, “I’m standing outside a blue house at the top of a big hill. There’s a black cat in the yard, and I try to walk around it to look at its face, but no matter where I’m standing, it’s always looking away from me.” We are laying in her bed, with dozens of photographs spread out around us. She has been looking through photo boxes, pulling out some, transferring others from one box to another. I have seen myself in many of them, and more full of faces I don’t know. “I can see my…
Typhoid Magpie
From her bedroom, Rivi brings me a copy of a used book she’s picked up earlier in the day: The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time. “I found it at Green Apple,” she says. “It was mis-shelved in the poetry section.” I turn the book over and look at the back cover. “I think I’ve read this,” I say. “It sounds familiar.” “Doesn’t matter,” she says. She takes the book back from me and flips through the pages. Mid-way through, she stops, and I see that there’s something stuck between the pages of the book. It’s a photograph,…
An Unsettled Cloudiness
“What am I looking at?” Tina asks. “Look closer,” Rivi says. We are all sitting at my kitchen table. Tina peers at the screen on the back of Rivi’s camera, staring at the picture there, a photo of Rivi’s bedroom from yesterday at three in the morning. “I don’t see anything,” Tina says. Rivi gets up from her chair and comes around behind Tina. She points her finger at a spot on the screen, and I know what it is she’s looking at: a blur in the flash-blown photo, a smear in the air, hovering directly over the foot of…
The Blood and the Smoke
“There’s a ghost living in my apartment,” Rivi says. “I woke up last night and she was in bed with me.” We are having lunch in Chinatown, dumplings and roasted duck. Tina was supposed to join us, but she texted us to say she was on a mission and wouldn’t make it. She didn’t say what her mission was. “She was curled up like a dog on my feet,” Rivi continues. “She had smoke where her eyes were supposed to be.” “You were having a dream,” I say. I pick up a dumpling with my chopsticks and take a bite…
Fist-Fighting Shatner on the Acropolis
Rivi and I are walking along Stow Lake in Golden Gate Park. As we go, she is counting the number of turtle heads she has seen breaking the surface of the water. “Three,” she says. “We should take a paddleboat,” I say. “Haven’t done that in a long time.” “Nah. I’m not feeling the call of the waves today.” “There aren’t any waves. There are never any waves. It’s Stow Lake.” “Let’s go to the de Young. That’s always nice.” She points at the water. “Four.” We have been in the park for a few hours today, having walked a…
Measures of Triscuits and Waffles
“I hate that it doesn’t snow here,” Rivi says from the kitchen. “It’s a drought,” I say, laying on the chaise in the living room. “It doesn’t snow anywhere anymore.” It is ungodly early, somewhere around seven in the morning, and I haven’t slept all night. Rivi had appeared on my doorstep about nine the evening before, full of too much energy, and with no one to expend it on besides me. The day is going to be a long one. “It’s December. There should be at least a foot on the ground,” she says. “You have to go east…
Cybersex Monday
“The best role Jude Law ever played was in A.I.,” Rivi says. “He played a walking sex doll,” I point out. “Exactly,” she says. “You need a boyfriend, Rivi.” “I need a Jude Law,” she says. She logs into her phone and calls up her browser. “Let’s see what Amazon’s got on sale…” “Keep the wheels of capitalism turning,” I say. “Just doing my part, darling.”
Aching Waves of the Lonely Tides
We are wedged into the purple chaise in the dark room, me on the bottom, Rivi more or less sitting nearly on my lap. The chaise is further being shared by a bottle of Chivas Regal, which takes turns being in either her hand or mine. We have no need of glasses tonight. Swigging from the bottle is good enough for this fine evening of low cheer. “My plan was to stop believing in love when I turned twenty-one,” Rivi says. She lifts the bottle and takes a drink. “That plan obviously turned out to be shit.” “You’re a romantic,”…
Monkey Uber
Rivi stands at my living room window and looks out, tapping her fingers impatiently on the windowsill. “Let’s go let’s go let’s go let’s go!” I am sitting on the floor with my back against the wall, and eating an onion bagel. “I’m having my breakfast. You can wait five minutes.” “I can’t wait. You can eat on the way.” “You can wait. You’re not going to die.” “We have to go! It’s going to be dark soon!” “It’s eight in the morning,” I say. “The only way it will be dark soon is if the apocalypse comes.” “Fine,” she…