Spin Cycle

FOUR

• IV - COINED •

      KIRA COMES OVER AFTER CLASS, as Addison's burning her half-assed attempt at her grandmother's fettuccine alfredo. It's Addison's idea – not the fettuccine burning, but the invitation of Kira to her apartment on a Thursday afternoon. It sounds business casual in her head. Having a client over to pick up photographs – very adult of her. Plus, the only reason she'd woke before midday was to develop Kira's prints in the darkroom, so if anyone was to see the product of her labor, it was the girl in them.

      The smoke alarm greets Kira at the doorway before Addison does, waving her cloth around like a banshee.

      "Come in, come in."

      "Is everything okay?"

     "Yup. Fantastic."

      "You sure?"

       "Yup. My fire alarm hates me – it's stubborn like that."

       Kira takes a tentative seat on Addison's IKEA catalogue upholstered chair and Addison resumes swatting, a fierce battle that she eventually wins, sending the apartment into a state or rest once again (apart from the trails of smoke sucking out through the windows). She wipes the sweat from her brow, lets her hair out into careening tangles of thick black, and slides onto the couch adjacent Kira.

       Addison shrugs and says, "I'm trying to cook things."

      "How's that working?"

      "Depends what way you look at it."

      Kira nods. She only sees one way to look at it.

      "You look good," Addison says, as matter-of-factly as if she were answering the question to a fourth grade spelling bee. It's no lie – Kira does look good, baggy boyfriend jeans and a t-shirt that reads Pink Freud in band letters beneath a thick knit cardigan. It's the effortlessness of it, maybe, more than it is the choice of clothes.

        The philosophy pun top is a zinger.

        Kira pats down her hair as though she believes anything but this. "I've been in class since early. We had an ethics debate – it sucked, actually."

       "Ethics usually does."

       "A man without ethics is a wild beast loosed upon this world."

       "Albert Camus?"

       "Yes."

       "Did you know he cheated on both of his wives? Doesn't sound very ethical to me."

       Kira laughs. It rings, like bumping chinaware. "No, it doesn't."

       The oven timer dings. Arrival of The Fettuccine. Addison grabs the folder of prints from the coffee table and hands them over. "Here, these are for you. I haven't finished them all but it's a good start."

       "Thanks."

       "Yup."

       Kira gestures to the other room. "Dinner's calling?"

       "Sounds like it."

       She stands. "I won't keep you, then."

      "No, you can –" the oven ringing continues, "— do you like alfredo?"