Work Text:
Ellie spent much of the shuttle to Des Moines International, the layover in Minneapolis, and the train ride from Spokane—where she had the misfortune of sitting next to an older white man who insisted on telling her about the nice Chinese man who'd worked for his company in the 1970s—trying not to think about Aster Flores.
She'd gone most of her first semester without thinking of Aster all that often. This was a conscious choice, a concentrated effort to redirect her thoughts back to the philosophy reading at hand or her roommate's attempts at bonding whenever they wandered in Aster's direction. But coming back to town, Ellie could easily predict all of the places where thoughts of Aster would be inevitable. The road out of town leading to the hot springs, the spot on Main Street where she'd kissed Aster, the train attendant booth where she'd designed a plan to seduce Aster so foolproof that it had worked, even if Aster hadn't known exactly who she was falling for.
Ellie stood up with a full five minutes left before the train would rattle into the station, interrupting the man mid-sentence. "I'm getting off at Squahamish," she said, tugging her backpack free from under the seat.
He smiled at her. "I hope you enjoy your time at home."
It was cold and predictably damp when Ellie stepped out onto the platform. Paul was waiting for her, enveloping her in a clumsy, all-American hug as soon as she was in arm's reach. He smelled like wet dog, like he'd been waiting in the drizzle since her train had broached the horizon, and she realized then that she'd really, actually missed him.
"Welcome home, Ellie Chu," he said.
Her dad hugged her too, later. They had never really been huggers, either of them, but it somehow felt familiar, like sliding into a well-worn sweater.
"You're taller," he accused when he let her go.
"Next time I come home, I'm going to be Paul's height," she said.
Her dad looked at Paul, who waved, clueless. "I can't afford to feed you both," he said.
The three of them ate dumplings for dinner in front of The 400 Blows. Paul leaned over Ellie's chair no less than five times to ask questions about the movie and she whispered back, "I know Squahamish High School does not have the best reputation, but I do know that you learned how to read."
The entire evening was warm, comforting in its routineness, and she didn't think about Aster Flores much at all.
That was, until over dishes, Paul said, "She isn't back yet, just so you know."
Ellie's hands stilled under the sudsy water. "I didn't ask," she said.
"Yeah, but you were wondering," he said, reaching for a wet pot to dry off.
"I was doing no such thing." She went back to the dishes, scrubbing much harder than necessary, as though she could, with enough effort, scrub away the lingering desire in her chest.
Paul's nod suggested that he absolutely did not believe her, but for once, he seemed to know the right thing to say—nothing at all.
The first week of winter break passed by much like her high school days. She got through The Odyssey for one of her classes next quarter. At the town's only coffee shop, she met up with Ms. Geselschap, who, showing unusual self-restraint gave only one, "I told you so" when Ellie admitted that she loved Grinnell. She practiced guitar. She did not catch a glimpse of brown curls at the supermarket and hide behind a six foot tall Budweiser display until she could be sure it wasn't Aster.
Then, two days before Christmas, Ellie returned home from the laundromat to find a manilla envelope duct taped to the station booth door. She would've known what it was without even noticing the handwriting on the envelope. Ellie. She ripped the envelope from the door and stuffed it into her duffle.
Ellie didn't let herself open the envelope until later. It was thick, a heft to it that suggested time and energy went into its contents, whatever they were. She needed it to be dark, the world outside quiet before she found out.
Her hands trembled as she pulled the stack of papers from the envelope.
I read this Joan Didion essay about self-respect recently and I can't stop thinking about it. She says that to lack self-respect, we are locked within ourselves. "[W]e are peculiarly in thrall to everyone we see, curiously determined to live out—since our self-image is untenable—their false notions of us."
To be the version of yourself that the other person wants, to always try to meet their expectations…it's not rooted in kindness. It's fear. Fear of asserting your own needs. Fear of what those needs might be, if you ever looked deep enough inside yourself.
Ellie finished the first letter and then immediately read it again. Each time she found herself breathless by the end of it—Finding myself, or something like that. Aster.
She picked up another letter.
If you were to tell our story, what would be the best part?
In the middle of the stack, there was a picture. The texture of it was grainy under Ellie's fingers, crinkling as she lifted it up. Aster had sketched a woman from the waist up, her hair blowing in an imaginary wind. She was wearing a dress that reminded Ellie of the ones that little girls wore to the church on Easter Sunday. One side of her face was beautiful and the other, cleaved by a thick shaded line, was half a rose, unfurling toward some unseen sun. It was lovely, but somehow sinister at the same time. Ellie set it down gingerly.
By the time Ellie got through all of the letters, it was two in the morning. She sat back on her bed, surrounded by sheets of paper, scraps of Aster Flores. In her six months away, Ellie hadn't heard from Aster at all, but the first letter had been dated August 20th. Why hadn't Aster sent any of them?
Ellie reached for her phone.
SmithCorona:
Cowardice isn't becoming.
DiegaRivero:
Not cowardice.
Circumspection.
SmithCorona:
So much for bold strokes?
DiegaRivero:
Check the back of the drawing.
See you tomorrow.
Golden hour.
She flipped the picture over, squinting down at the cursive.
Going through my surrealist phase.
I have not forgotten you -- the nights are long and difficult. The water. The ship and the dock and the parting which made you appear so small, to my eyes, framed in that round porthole, and you gazing at me so as to keep me in your heart. - Frida Kahlo to Jacqueline Lamba
It was 3 PM when Aster showed up at the station. Ellie took off down the stairs, shouting to her father that she'd be back later, but her nerves seemed to catch up with her when she made it to the door. She stopped, hand on the knob, and straightened her jacket.
Outside, Aster stood by her car. She tilted her head to Ellie in a greeting, smiling in that same secretive way. She was still the prettiest girl Ellie had ever seen. "Hey, want to get out of here?"
The echo of their first real encounter made something in Ellie's chest go tight.
"Yeah," she said. "Lead the way."
The drive was quiet, a silence that felt more companionable than awkward. Ellie recognized the route, the trees now bare and the last remnants of the most recent snowfall clinging to the ground. She watched the landscape roll past Aster's car window, but snuck glances back at the shape of Aster's hands on the steering wheel, the slender bones of her wrist. She was wearing the same silver bracelet she'd been wearing the last time they were in the car together.
Aster pulled off the road with her car facing the woods.
"We're not going swimming, right?" Ellie asked.
"No, no," Aster said, turning off the ignition. "I tried it once. From my neck up it was freezing." She looked carefully at Ellie. "I just wanted to go somewhere quiet."
They sat on the roof of Aster's car. It was probably too cold to be outside, but there was something nice about the view of the sunset through the spindly limbs of the trees surrounding them. Aster had traded out her jean jacket for a puffer coat, mittened hands reaching into her pocket and pulling out, much to Ellie's surprise, a small baggie with a blunt and a lighter inside.
"Aster Flores, preacher's daughter," Ellie said, raising her eyebrows.
"My roommate has blue hair and deals Special K," Aster said. "I actually had to Google what that meant when my friend told me. Guess I'm more sheltered than I thought."
Ellie had tried weed once in the fall. She'd split half a brownie with her roommate at a gathering of students from their first-year tutorial and then spent half an hour arguing with a dude about Twin Peaks before falling asleep upright on a stranger's couch. All in all, it beat vomiting down the front of her shirt at the talent show afterparty.
"We don't have to, if you don't want to. It was just a Christmas present from my roommate and I thought—"
"No, no, we can," Ellie said. "Let's do it."
Their hands brushed every time they passed the blunt back and forth. Ellie thought maybe she could feel the heat of Aster's hands through her mittens, but maybe that was just what she wanted to feel. The sky was darkening all around them and this stretch of the road was mostly quiet, long minutes passing between car headlights. Even though they weren't exactly hidden, Aster's secret place still felt sheltered from the outside world.
They caught up as they smoked. How are your classes? What are you majoring in? How bad is small town Iowa? Finally, as the blunt burnt down, Ellie asked, "Why didn't you send the letters? I know you could have gotten my address if you wanted it."
Aster looked up to the canopy of trees. "When we left off, I thought it would be better if we talked when I—I don't know, figured myself out. But then I got to college and it was like you were the only person I wanted to share things with." She pursed her lips together, let out a little huff of air. "When I wrote those letters to you, I would imagine the things you would say. The real you, not the one who needed to flatter me. The one who told me I could never be different. But maybe I was afraid of what you would say. And maybe I was afraid too that you'd have moved on."
I haven't moved on, Ellie thought. It could never be that easy.
"But then I got back in town and I drove by the train station and I just thought that I should say what I wanted to say, for once. Instead of what I thought I should say."
"And what do you want to say?" Ellie asked.
Aster looked over, the corner of her lips quirking in Ellie's direction. "What if I don't want to wait a couple years?"
Ellie felt hope, or something like it, curling up in her gut, winding its way up around her heart and up to her throat. "Hey, I was just going by what you said," she pointed out. "Could Aster Flores do something without being sure?"
This time, it was Aster who moved first. Her hand wrapped around the back of Ellie's head, tugging her in for a kiss. Aster's mouth was hot, the connection between them the only warm thing in Ellie's body.
The first time Ellie kissed had kissed Aster, it was mostly stolen, a blur of impulse. When Ellie had replayed it in her mind—and she had, many times—it was imprecise, the momentum seared into her memory instead of the feeling of Aster's lips, or what Aster had done with her hands.
Now, Ellie paid attention to the details. Aster's lips were soft, smooth under a coat of chapstick that smelled like berry. She arched into the kiss and Ellie put her hands on Aster's waist, searching for her shape under the coat. Ellie didn't know what she was supposed to do when she felt Aster's tongue brushing against her lower lip, but she parted her mouth and let Aster take the lead.
Maybe it was the weed, distorting her sense of time, or maybe a lack of oxygen making its way to Ellie's brain, but when they finally separated, it felt like they'd been kissing for hours. The forest around them was completely dark. Their breath came out in tiny clouds between them.
"I can't feel my hands," Ellie said.
Aster laughed, bumping her forehead against Ellie's once before pulling away. "Let's get you home," she said.
"You can come too," Ellie said in one breath. "If you don't have a curfew or whatever."
Aster's smile was as bright as the stars above them. "I'd like that," she said.