Marlo:
I watch Faye set the 15 minute timer on her phone and then she nods at me.
"Your turn first."
"This is a good one. If a crystal ball could tell you the truth about yourself, your life, the future, or anything else, what would you want to know?" I read aloud.
Her face lights up at this. "Okay, give me a second to think."
After a few moments of silence, Faye answers.
"I would want to know if reincarnation is real," She smiles. "And if I could come back as a fox."
"Because they're your favourite animal?"
She smiles more, her nose wrinkling slightly. "Yep. Might sound dumb but I do want reincarnation to be real."
"I don't think it's dumb," I assure her, and then laugh. "You're gonna think my answer is dumb. I wanna know if there'll ever be a zombie apocalypse."
She bursts out laughing at this, hand over her mouth. "Wow, Marlo."
"Hey, the crystal ball can tell me anything."
"What if the apocalypse happens when you're not even alive?"
"I never said I wanted to live in an apocalypse. I just wanna know if it's ever possible."
She laughs again, and I smile.
"Okay, question 14. Is there something that you've dreamed of doing for a long time? If there is, why haven't you done it?"
"Hmm," I say, tapping my chin which makes her laugh again. "This is going to be boring but I can't really think of anything."
She nods. "Me too."
"What, nothing?"
"Nothing urgent."
"Alright," I look back down at the piece of paper. "What is the greatest accomplishment of your life?"
"The first ever time I successfully painted a portrait with oil paint. I think I was around 17/early 18, and I'd never really stepped outside using water colour, as you know," She looks at me, referencing her art pieces, and I smile. "And I hate painting people because I can never get their features to look right. But I practised for ages and I finally got it to look like an actual human being."
"I wanna see this painting." I say.
"It's actually at Gia's. Her parents have it framed in their living room because the portrait is of her."
I grin. "Wow, Faye, that's so nice of them. I'm very proud of you."
She lets out a laugh. "You don't even know what it looks like."
"It looks like Gia, you just said," I answer, getting another laugh. "I don't have to see it to know that I'm proud of one of your accomplishments."
She smiles with her mouth closed, her head tilted to the side slightly.
"Thank you. What about your greatest accomplishment?"
YOU ARE READING
First Light
Romance"I love you. I feel as though we were never strangers, you and I, not even for a moment." - Friedrich Nietzsche, from a letter to Mathilde Trampedach c. April 1876 Have you ever felt a weird sense of familiarity with someone you just met? As if you...
