Will Harrison

And now he could see that the tattoo was actually a group of five wasps headed from different directions at a disfiguration on her skin.

A cigarette burn?

He imagined that she had done it with another woman, her girlfriend, and this was a mark of solidarity.

You do me and I'll do you, both of them silently crying as the cigarette coals wormed their way through the skin.

Her girlfriend would have been pale as snow and the mark on her skin would have been a strawberry stain.

I don't know much about flowers.

The man shifted his hips a quarter turn and placed one hand on the counter to steady himself.

This woman felt to him like a newly made island coming up out of the sea.

All steam and explosions until the rocks begin to cool and collect seaweed and fish skeletons and shit from birds.

And then a fragile new plant springs out of a swollen seed and makes the first moment of shade.

Would her fingertips smell like iron and blood and roses?

She liked those pots of wheatgrass, you know, like you see at hotels.

She was very organized.

This woman is so tired of staying strong, of keeping all her muscles at attention.

She's heartbroken, maybe because she made this store with her girlfriend.

They were saving from their office jobs until they had the money to put down for rent and building permits.

And then they spent months salvaging siding from old barns so they could make a warm hay-smelling floor.

And they stained it with natural oil and bought high-end cheese for the opening celebration.

But then this other woman just decided to leave.

She didn't say much.