Not Nova and Ever

Around Ever’s thumb, a skirt of dead skin wavered in the breeze. Each flap nodded off a bit of orange, yellow, and brown glitter, costellating the air in autumnal corruscations.

“Are you doing a hand peel?” Nova asked, mooning over the small phenomenon the skin flaps emitted. 

“This is the third day of it, my hands should be as soft as a baby's by next week!” Ever chirped. Nova plagued her paper turkey with a third eye in her lack of focus. Ever always seemed to create small, poetic wonders like this. There they were, seated at a table-bench crafting Thanksgiving decorations during the Fall Festival, and tiny splendors still managed to petal off Ever like she was a deidy. Ever’s hands plowed into the bag of glitter, a small overspill freckling Ever’s paper cornucopia, and Nova’s aesthete gaze drifted up to Ever’s lips.

Around the same time, 5 years ago , Ever’s mouth had created their own small wonder. Red lipstick had played over the papery crinkle of Ever’s lips, and their scalloped surface had evoked a fall leaf. Nova had mused over the striking contradiction of yellow veins flaming against a red leaf. Then, she had daydreamed the yellow veins flaming in the painted corrugations of Ever’s red lips, fall orange sponging at the edge a bit. She longed to kiss her then, but age pinned her own lips together, had soured the lean inward. Nova had been 8, Ever, 24. Even so, Nova had gone in for it. Ever’s lips had parted in ovoid sacredness, divulging perfect rows of teeth. Nova had taken the part as invitation and continued in full confidence. Ever backed up quickly, eyes wide. The part had been in shock, not in permission. 

Excuses came later, Ever wasn’t gay, Nova, apparently, wasn’t either — just confused. Nova wasn’t of age, definitely wasn’t the age for her. Nova silently accreted her own, personal list of reasons later on, when Ever had left. She wasn’t pretty enough, wasn’t wearing bras like all the other girls yet, wasn’t into makeup and fashion, wasn’t white. And now? Nova wasn’t confident, wasn’t even a B-cup, wasn’t philosophical, wasn’t interesting, still wasn’t white.

By the time Nova amassed a sizable tally of wasn’ts grey had begun to flush in the cobalt sky and Ever was pissed.

“I don’t know why I talk to you if you never listen anyways, especially about important matters .” Nova tried to clear her mind, but it fogged in protest, then clouded over. She went on with focus not yet united

“Oh— sorry! I was completely in my own world. I don’t even know what’s gone on in the last hour. You know how I get…” A cool wind wended, spangling microscopic sections of skin with microscopic bits of frost. The chill triangulated Nova’s attention, and she again missed what Ever had said. 

“I just want to know your thoughts on it.” Ever’s eyes trapped Nova’s own. Nova snuck a finger into a kinked tangle of hair, a nervous habit.

“I think you’re very profound.” She ventured, praying the confession wasn’t a non-sequitor. Ever nodded.

“I knew you’d say that, but, well, the person I’m pitching it to doesn’t think the world of me, does he? He’ll think I’m some sensitive millennial who’ll look at the tritest things and brand it as ‘deep’.” Nova scuffs the lining of her pockets with her nail, looking for one of 3 loose ADHD pills she’d slipped in there that morning.

“Just be eloquent, practice your verbal fluency, um…” she trails because her attention trails, drifting back off into the microscopic fractals formed on her skin, sunning there, becoming macroscopic there...

“Shit, your mom!” Ever exclaimed. She shot up, “it’s 4, I said you’d be back at 3:30!” Nova stood, Ever windmilled, creasing paper turkeys and pilgrims in her haste to compile. At that moment she did it again, induced another tiny splendor. Autumnal light scintillated at her outline, frothing about in flashes of yellows and orange-reds. The wind tossed and parted her white hair strands, creating the perfect fall-tousled look. Nova smiled and looked away, attention never fractionating.

By the time Nova got home it was 5:00 PM. Nova toed the wood tile in the kitchen as her mom sent Ever off too politely in the other room. It was all I’m so sorry I got her here so lates and No no it’s completely fines and No, it really isn’ts and I assure you it is, the longer the betters and It won’t happen agains and the like. Nova looked up when their tones’ courteous manner fell away. They grew hushed, grew hunched. Nova struggled to make out the better part of the conversation.

“How was she today? Better?” Her mom asked. Nova couldn’t catch what Ever said after, the astronomically better whisperer of the two. “Do you think the extra time did any good?” 

She only managed small snatches of the rest of the conversation, mostly her mom’s side: ‘How did she act around you?’, ‘Did you do what we talked about last time?’, ‘How did she react when you did that?’ When normal volume was again used, Ever really started to head out. Nova tried to unsee the newly pouched check in Ever’s pocket. “Come again soon!” Nova’s mom says before shutting the door. 

It wasn’t until she was 11 that Ever had started flirting with her. It was never dramatic, small impels of coquetry, then retreat. The acts would recede to point so distant they were nearly invisible, and Ever would carry on like nothing had happened. Stretched bridgings of conversions about careers and botched job interviews and the meaning of life piled on Ever’s earlier acts, quietly cloistering the abnormality in a million normalities. Then, once the bridge from last amourous connection pressed into the loam of new amorous connection, Ever would again slip sweet nothings into Nova’s heart. Ever m never really touched her, just bats of Nova’s much lower-angled shoulder and hysterical giggles at particularly unfunny comments Nova made. The first time Ever flirted, a million tiny resplendencies splintered off her at once, and this— not the purr of words or flutter of eyelashes, made Nova blush. 

After Ever’s departure, Nova’s mom ducked from Nova and peered at her wide-eyed  from distant places, like a fan girl crouched in the home of a celebrity.  She trailed Nova, cataloguing her movements, her micro-expressions. When Nova tried to very clearly make an expression that said you’re downright insufferable, her mom crept out. “Honey,” she started, searching Nova’s face for some telltale quirk, “how was your day today?” When Nova didn’t respond, she rushed on. “What was the highlight? The best part of your day?”

“Going to the festival with Ever, not much else happened today, so...” Her mom nodded, this was expected.

“You know..” she fake mused, “Ever might have to leave for a while, I know she’s your closest friend and all but… well, she’s considering an amazing job offer in London.” Nova stilled, she knew her mom was trying to prize this exact reaction out of her but it couldn’t be helped. Her mom droned on, encouraged. “I don’t know if she might’ve told you about it, she’s such a sensitive creature that girl, she wouldn’t want to hurt your feelings…” Nova couldn’t tell if it was a lie or not, but the prospect of losing Ever pricked at her heart’s tissue. She rose from the couch, her mom frowned, this was the exact reaction she hadn’t wanted. “Nova,” she started, pityingly. Nova ignored this, ignored her existence, ignored her own existence. Reality fuzzed, and the only person who did exist was Ever. She started for the stairs in a daze, fumbled with the consecutive rise of the steps: she had turned a blind eye to the truth of Ever for too long. Nova needed to find out who Ever really was, needed to grab hold of her contact information so that when the staged ‘departure for London’ carried out, Nova could still get in touch with her.

“You know, it’s weird, you don’t talk like a 12-year-old.” Ever had said once at a Thanksgiving picnic just the two of them were on. Ever was too twined in her own musings to realize the anger on Nova’s face. “I mean, you say these words and phrases that only a 60-year-old would say, or an old soul like me.”

“Who was that yesterday?” Nova demanded, scowl pulling her elfish features taut. Ever took notice of this and cooed. 

“Awww, you look so adorable when you pout! I guess deep down you really are 12.”

“Ever.” Nova insisted, instilling as much authority in her voice as age would allow. “Who was that girl you were with yesterday?”

During the yesterday in question, Nova had been at the park with a friend engaged in a rather one sided variation of seesawing. Nova was two unstable feet high, somewhat steadied only by her pelvic area uncomfortably pinching the metal bar. Her friend was some 150 pounds and sat pressed to the ground as if magnetized. Nova had been making little, painful jumps to sway her seat downward when she heard a loud, familiar laugh. Her head gyrated, and she discovered Ever. Ever was walking along the path, hand in hand with a brunette 16-year-old. A shoulder was playfully pushed, a kiss to to cheek was duly employed. Nova’s nose flared at the action, Ever had never kissed her cheek. Her thoughts floated to Ever’s lips. She thought about the light bite of frost that must’ve been on them, thought about the soft, cool depress they would make in her own cheek. She turned back to her friend, eyes aflame, and demanded to be let down.

Ever blinked at the accusation. “What?”

“The park you were at yesterday, you kissed a girl there.” Nova’s voice warbled at the end, she was never one for confrontation. She closed her eyes to hide their dewed rim. “You said you weren’t gay, said you wouldn’t kiss me because I was a minor, she was too!” Mucus peaked out from Nova’s nose and moisture bulbed in her tear-duct. She was never one to fight tears well either. Nova opened her eyes to catch Ever’s expression. Ever was stone-faced, like she was staring off into space and not into Nova’s glassy eyes, like she didn’t see Nova at all. It was the first time Nova had seen her so devoid of emotion, so devoid of small splendors.

“It was a European greeting.” Ever said after an age. Nova sniffed, the finger of mucus receded for a time, then snailed out again.  

“It was not, I’m not some dumb kid. It was all romantic.” The longing looks Ever had only looked at Nova with were suddenly directed, too, at this girl. Nova allowed the mucus to trail her Cupid’s bow, allowed the tumid tear to detach and slide the recesses and elevations of her face. She focused intently on the tear’s journey, marked its crest of the cheek, the slight hiatus in movement as it’s molecules shifted weight there, then lagged onto the trough. She willed her ADHD to get lost in the tear, to focus on how it tingled when loitering on the chin, on how it split when it hit the collar bone, on how the vestigial beads of moisture tickled. Ever’s gaze left Nova’s face, and she really did stare off into the distance. Ever had brought Nova home 3 hours early that day. 

Nova turned into her mom’s room after championing the stairs. She threw open the first drawer of her nightstand, her mom ran and paused in the doorway, still unconsciously distancing herself to watch Nova from the shadows. 

“Nova what on earth are you doing!? Those are my personal belongings!” After a quick rifle, Nova threw the drawer shut. If any contact information was in there her mom would worry, would run to stop her. She thought, skin between brow lining. Suddenly, she bolted, feet barely denting the worn carpet as she ran to her mom’s walk-in closet. She first lunged for a shoebox on the floor, it was empty. A second floored shoe-box revealed a barely touched pack of cigarettes and stack of cash. The charmed third was atop the closet rack, and had a stack of papers titled ‘files’. Nova fossicked wildly, her mom rushed in. Even in urgency she paused at the doorway, lower body tucked behind it’s frame to be just out of sight.

“Nova!” Her mother screamed, but by the time she tugged Nova’s wrists away it was too late, Nova had already glanced the headline of Ever’s file.

There was a time where Nova’s mother didn’t parent from behind the scenes, head poking out from doorways and from above couches and analyzing from the other end of rooms. Nova was maybe 5 the last time she remembered her mom being a normal parent, where she didn’t surveil, but confronted her. Nova remembered, also, when that time ended.

“Mom, mom, mom!” She chanted, bare feet stamping greyed tendrils of carpet. “I just found something out!” She padded away from the living room and into the kitchen, where her mother was loading dishes into it’s washer.

“What is it dear?” Her mother inquired distractedly, hoping to God she wouldn’t attempt to show another cartwheel or a split and break an ankle like last time. 

“I know something new about myself!” Nova’s mother flecked a portion of hardened oil off a pan with the corner of the sponge. “Okay, can’t wait to hear it!” Nova gave a two-front-teeth-toothless smile, all gums. Nova’s mother remembered how tiny squares of teeth had poked out of the gums, remembered how they had gleamed in the harsh, artificial light of the kitchen. It was as if, she thought later, a blood-lusting shark temporarily possessed her daughter, telling of the storm that was to come after the calm.

“I’m a lesbian!” The third syllable was unnaturally stressed, the word still a newfangled mat of sound to Nova’s ears. Nova looked into her mother’s eyes, expecting pride to fill them. When horror soddened them instead, Nova’s smile faltered. 

‘Ever Albright: Private Conversion Coach’. Nova’s cheek was curled in the crook of her mother’s arm, her mother’s hand fingering a stray coil of Nova’s in comfort. 

“Honey…” her mother murmured into a condense of tendrils, face down in Nova’s hair. She rocked Nova while Nova’s world fell apart. “I didn’t want you to find out like this,” There was a span of silence , Nova was supposed to respond. She didn’t, her mother went on. “She goes.... She goes undercover, so to speak. Starting young, the kids develop crushes on her, then, as they age and reach 18, the kids are fixed. They’re straight again, you still had a long while to go. It was my fault for pushing her agenda, I wanted to see where you were at. At 13, the kids aren’t supposed to respond as strongly as you did to the idea of Ever leaving. Ever said you weren’t ready for it, that you were far too behind, goodness she was right, I’m so stupid.” Nova’s ADHD strung out the words, forgetting the rest: undercover...crush.... agenda...fixed… far behind. She thought of Ever, went back through the tracks of their relationship, and dissociated. Nova’s mother rocked and placated her, wiping nonexistent tears from a dry cheek.