We talked about everything

facts and fiction.

We talked about everything, and just laughed, and just loved, never hurting each other because of our differences and varied perspectives. We asked if all the stars were aligned, would we ever have constellations? And so we just talked, like stars in different orbits, not trying to collide, and figuring out that, this is how the world is illuminated.

We talked about sweet Jesus and the rude Catholic priest, and how to navigate Moscow through google maps and turning the lights on in our house. She pulled the pin that held her hijab and her silky dark hair fell to her shoulders. And so we talked about hair. How for almost 20 years of my life, I’ve had to sit and look on the mirror as the barber got rid of my hair and exposed my scalp, and for that, being confused for a boy a few times when I was younger. And how it was considered “Buuilifoooool” as she would say it, for girls to keep their hair long back in her country. So she touches her hair again, and I touch my braids, and we shrug and we laugh.

We said how much we loved our countries, then exchanged flags and wore them around our necks and talked about being immigrants in a country somewhere up north. And while my heart likes to catch fire with the thought of moving somewhere far, it breaks all along and becomes cold water and it shivers with the thought of racists and xenophobes. But we are safe now, and even as danger is real, so are black hands that pat white backs, and white shoulders that give rest to black heads.

Vanilla and chocolate, like the colors of our skins, so we get ice-cream when it’s 11:45pm. The town is quiet and so is the sea. Just a couple of car horns from afar, a quick Vespa passing like wind, creaks from the boats anchored closer to the shore, and waves that sound like a breath. Looking at the sea at midnight, and sharing strawberry ice-cream, and feeling loved and wanted, will make almost anyone want to cry.

And as July melts into August, you find out it’s 12am and you are not home. And this all looks like a movie that Jean-Paul Sartre wrote “there may be more beautiful times, but this one is ours.” I feel like I’ve read some fiction that has this scene, of the sea and little anchored boats, and strawberry ice-cream, and being loved and wanted. Someone should’ve told me, that sometimes what can only be imagined, can turn into facts.