[happyheidi]

[halfagony-halfhope]

Me watching Elizabeth Bennet rejecting rude men:

[galina]

The Library of Nicholas II, tucked away in a corner of the Winter Palace which is now the home of the Государственный Эрмитаж.

This is my favourite room at the Hermitage – there are so many (many) opulent and beautiful rooms here, but this one is one of the smallest and quietest and, in a way, the most thoughtful and carefully crafted in its atmosphere.

[itscolossal]

The Fourth Wall: A Rare View of Famous European Theater Auditoriums Photographed from the Stage

[rumll-deactivated20230105]

[sbaeta]

To June

30/30: to June

I love her in translations, in the patience of two glasses of water, in bartering for more blackouts. I love her with cinnamon and Elysian hopes, or in the comfy warmth of a worn coat. Go ahead and quiz me on a smile so iconic I swear I saw it before ever having met her purple background. Love is a red colored try at quiet and never having to buy candy again, in fruity snacks and cul-de-sacs and in the way she still smiles back. It’s how Paris hangs above her dresser, in whispered giggles at a professor during a double block dusted with chalk. Love is friend in every language written on freshly gifted pages and in how she shapes her U’s or the soft weight of deja-vu. I’m caught in red strings and Kaleidoscopic thoughts and the hijinks of a binged plot with sympathetic endings and I spend my days sending lovingly typed texts, borrowing chapstick and black and white stripes, pondering how every thread has a story better than the ones beside my bed. She’s the tune stuck in my head, heat waves between May and July, an alexandrite losing her blush by night. She’s my meet cute and my sweet tooth, through every morning and afternoon. And summer after summer, I’ll gladly give my love to June.

[sbaeta]

To June

29/30: sweet tooth

I’m starved for her presence. What can I say, I got a taste and it’s a disgrace to pretend I’ll ever want to switch to something plainer. What’s ginger ale to champagne? The feeling lingers on my lips with bubbles stained into my tongue. I’m a glutton. I fill my mind to the rim with her scent. Hmm, mint. She still laughs like before, but it’s underscored in something more, like our breaths are somehow deeper or maybe the air’s just cheaper now? I seek her out like a sweet tooth or my favorite fruit in season. It’s true, requited love is too easy to ease into. I’m parched for the arched letters she plates on paper or the way her sentences taper off when a new intrusive thought drops into existence. She makes the ordinary drip with decadence. It’s sugary and candied, dulcet and delicious. I’ve never been so happy to overload my senses.

[sbaeta]

To June

28/30: over thinking

Hold her hand, I think as she takes a sip from a purple drink, palm on the table a little too close to my side. I play with a threadbare seam, sink into my chair and out of view, hide behind the brunch menu.

Hold her hand! I tell myself as we wander bookshelves and her fingertips slip between the wrinkles of her dress. And as I guess the distance it would take to close the space, I careen into an unseen display. An array of baking books threatens to topple over, she braces the wobbling cake covers and all I can do is stutter out a “thank you.”

Hold. her. hand. We’re piled on the couch now, a specialty of ours. I slouch down into the cushions and lose track of the movie, munching on fruity snacks in the hopes that they can mask the bitter taste of wasted potential. Her expression softens as the instrumental music swells. What the hell, I think, and then, as if it isn’t planned, I take her hand.

I’m holding her hand... The thought gets caught in my head, a counterpoint to the dialogue said. Thinking of brunches and the books we just bought, I sink into this new type of together.

And just when I think things can’t get better, she silences my mind for a while by placing a kiss on my smile.

[sbaeta]

To June

27/30: warm

Blake smiles at me and I shake my head. “How do you know?” She asks instead, shifting the bags in her hands to a more comfortable position. Sitting on a bench outside the store, I try to describe what can’t be said. “She’s warm.” I form the words slowly, a deliberate attempt to be understood, but the syllables are only a pale imitation of the sensation. “Some love is like a popsicle on a summer day, a cool wave after burning on the beach. Or applause after a speech, yelling ‘surprise’ at a party, hardly catching your breath before running just one more mile. But her smile… it’s warm. Some love is running through a thunderstorm, it’s love like sour candy or even brandy, it’s sweet with a sting and it’s nothing like her. She’s more like… I don’t know, it’s familiar and slow. She’s flowers after a show, an awning during April showers, hours of conversation or a life without translations. I love her in a comfortable way. As confidently as coffee in the morning, as adoringly as a freshly cut bouquet. Does that make sense? She’s sleeping in on Sundays, Monet’s strokes or putting on a coat someone else was just wearing. I’m always preparing for what’s still to come, but with her, when we’re together, the present feels like enough. So yeah, I guess that’s how I would describe love.” We stand up from our spot and I finish my thought. “Who can say, really, what form love should take. But for me, Blake, it’s warm. For me, it’s her.”

[sbaeta]

To June

26/30: acts of service

You know those days when everything’s on fire? Sunrays chased me as I rounded the cul-de-sac to circle back home. The paper on twelfth century Rome was left smoking on the counter and I showered the air with cusses and swears. “I’m closer.” She said, through the car phone’s static. I breathed away some of the panic. But then came the professor who lost all his grades and asked us to explain why we deserved A’s. “What did you say?” She asked during lunch. I munched on the trail mix she’d gotten me from the vending machine on the third floor. Shrugging, I answered, “Told him I had a perfect score.” She sighed, rolled her eyes, but still looked amused. I used it as an excuse to throw an M&M at her face, she braced the spot where the tiny missile hit and threw a fit like she could win an award for it. And tonight, amidst the smolders, she orders takeout for two. “What are the chances you’d lose one of your shoes?” I reply with “I know!” as I feel embers die. Without even trying she makes every day better. Every single day, since the day that I met her.

[sbaeta]

To June

25/30: translating on the bus

I pull up Duolingo as I settle in my seat. Retreat towards the back door with headphones in, joining the score of students still waking up. I’m making up a word for “heard,” it flashes red, I shake my head and correct the verb. I’m sitting here collecting the language in her mind, a weird kind of treasure hunt where I want to find her at the end. What’s the word for “friend”? Well, then, I’ll try again to complete the parts of speech, watch as hearts deplete at the mistakes I’ve made. I trade scrolling through Twitter for a tongue that fits her better than the one we speak beneath our breaths in class. I ask, “What is your name?” to my little game, I grin at the green screen and picture what her face will look like the first time I greet her with traces of home. I think of her tone and mimic the sound, a round type of vowel. How she’ll be able to tell what I’m saying is an issue for another day, but I pray that the romance of the Romance language will help my strange accent grow more absent when it really matters. A clatter of feet beseech me away as the bus comes to a stop. I hop up, take stock of my progress, then lock my phone as I stick it in my pocket. She’s waiting by the curb with two coffees in tow and I can’t wait to greet her in a language we both know.

[sbaeta]

To June

24/30: loud and soft

She’s loud and I’m soft. My words aren’t tossed aside, but I bide my time and wait for openings, create the set-up needed for the set of reasons to have their heeded meaning. She sings as the phone rings and doesn’t stop after “hello,” giving a show to the other line. I’m careful and always know what I want say, I get told I’m composed at least once a day.

She’s soft with me, and I’m loud with her. I feel something stir as her laughs fill the gaps in my chest and I grow bolder, stacking jokes over her noise. I lose my poise.

She listens, quite quiet, when I tell her why it matters what the critics say about my submission. She listens but says, in a red colored voice, that it’s bullshit and a stupid choice. I smile at her spite because it lessens the tightness in my chest.

I find balance in her decibels, I like being less respectable. She frees herself in silence and makes curses sound quite pious.

[sbaeta]

To June

23/30: blanket

“What?” I ask, she only laughs. She shrugs and hugs her arms a bit closer in, I notice her skin is covered in goosebumps. I jump up with an idea, bring a blanket from my room and strewn it over her shoulders when I notice her gaze is away from me. She clings to the edges, swings it across the couch and slouches down into its warmth. With my duty performed, I take my seat and it’s her turn to surprise me. Thinking I must be cold too, she throws some heat my way, shares the fleece and splays the knitted pieces over my head. Pushing through threads, I unearth myself and reveal a dearth in the creases that leave her to the elements. She yanks the blanket back with an eloquent “ah!” and I brace myself for the next attack, but instead, her fingers slack. She lingers for a moment in this state of staring atonement before she scooches over so we’re both sharing the covers. Her shoulder touches mine, and I try to stay unfazed, but I can already feel my face begin to warm. Though she acts less disheveled, she’s a little too still to be settled... but soon we’re both lost in the hijinks of a binged plot and I sink farther into the knots of this fabricated labyrinth.

[sbaeta]

To June

22/30: existing

She’s speaking to her mother on the phone, clipped tones of gibberish. Though I can’t make out the meaning behind them, there’s a bitterness to the other line’s speeches that leave me feeling like an intruder. I maneuver towards the door, but before I can go away, she mouths “stay” and rolls her eyes, making light of the situation even as garbled vexations continue without cessation through the phone’s speaker. It’s two more minutes of skewed snippets before I hear my name and she stiffens. It’s too late to pretend I’m not listening and she hesitates another second before answering the question. I recognize “friend,” but then it’s over. Even after they say their goodbyes, her eyes stay glued to the ground like she’s waiting for some divine power to come down and swallow her whole. I shift a bit, unsure of what to say. I opt for something dumb, ask if her mom is always so chummy. She smiles a bit, though we both know it’s not funny, and I wonder if I should explain how much I heard. The words don’t come, so I sit instead, drumming my fingertips against her bed. Her head finds my shoulder, and feeling bolder, I throw an arm over to hold her a bit closer. Maybe it’s enough to exist near a friend, let my presence provide what my words can’t confide.

[sbaeta]

To June

21/30: sobering up

I come up with excuses to play with the loose ends of her hair. I send a quick prayer to the deity that made her, the spirit that gave her to me. For a moment, I can breathe. Then reality sweeps back in as I taste the gin still stuck to my tongue. A cocktail of dumb decisions, inebriated visions. The old adage to never mix your love with liquor breaks the mirage. My heart beats, a broken ticker counting down until the present loses its sheen. Come clean by morning. I’ve had enough to drink to falter through a haze but not enough to think away the consequences come daylight. I take flight, quickly untangle fingers from tendrils, wrangle any restraint that lingers. Paranoid, I grab my cup, get up to avoid her side of the couch. I crouch down as I pick up my feet, keep from blocking gawking faces watching gamers win their races and if she speaks as I retreat, the words are lost in the tossed out screams invested in the screen. Two glasses of water later and I waver back to my spot. I plop down beside her and guide her hand to the second cup, we both drink up. She settles back and takes my free hand, I almost crack as a strand falls across her face. I remember my place and leave the ends loose. I breathe through the options I don’t get to choose.

[sbaeta]

To June

20/30: blackout

We play board games by flickering flames and the flashlights on our phones. We look like a cheap Game of Thrones, switching players and catching betrayers, yelling at each other’s cunning and huddling together because Winter is Coming. I think she winks at me, but the light dances with my breath and I can’t tell if my mind is being too kind and blinding me to reality. I stare at hands bathed in gold, encased in soft halos. The room fills with lavender and I can’t make out if it’s her or the candles. I gave up getting a handle on the rules long ago, I turn towards the lovely girl beside me instead. I shake the dice with flair (or flare, all puns intended) and win a token for my efforts. I disrupt her roll by casting shadows on the battlefield and only yield when I have to shield myself from her attacks. I laugh in the face of the enemy. It’s lovely and I admit, a part of me hopes the power never comes back.

[sbaeta]

To June

19/30: tidying up

I dust my desk, check that everything’s in place, smile back at the framed faces clad in orange and blue. I lose myself for a moment going through tokens from last year, a letter from a friend out of state, a sticker I still need to put on my skates. I change the daisies out for lavender, go to pull the dates off my day-by-day calendar, but stop. The comic is a good one and I know she’ll have fun teasing me about being five days behind. I’ll act resigned as she reads the panels aloud, but crowd beside her to admire them together. I wonder whether she’ll notice the impact she’s had on my room. The stack of scrapbook materials in the corner, the mug warmer she got me for secret Santa because she knows I can’t sit still long enough to drink a cup down to its dregs. The book she lent me is by my bed, our doodles are sticking out of it, a bookmark of memories, my characters and her calligraphy. It’s been a whole summer since she’s come over and I can’t help but tweak the scene to show her the things that matter to me.