Is he flirting with me?
Are you soliciting photos now?
Does that seem like something Real Gertie
would be into?
Are you answering my question with another question?
Maybe?
I leave him hanging for a bit here. The typing dots appear and disappear in quick succession. Then I send him a picture taken by Reg: Real Gertie covered in paint from head to toe. My face is concealed by a helmet and all that’s visible is the bright smile on my face.
That’s hot
Don’t go sharing that with anyone now, that’s NSFW content.
He laugh reacts. A moment later a new photo appears: Arthur, glasses on (he wears glasses!), hair mussed (probably from pulling on the hoodie he’s wearing), comical expression that gives him a double chin.
Mutually assured destruction
I reply in kind: makeup-free, hair wet from the shower, rugged up in a hoodie of my own, albeit with a large coffee stain marring the light grey shoulder. I caption it with a winky face.
No, you gave me more destruction!
I can hear his laugh through the phone.
It’s okay. I trust you with it.
He sends back a heart.
So, I think we can say a picture of the Real
Gertie has emerged, no? Chess hustler and
all-round boardgame queen, Spin refuser
but otherwise up for anything including
(inexplicably) paintball. And she looks just as
smokin’ in a pair of oversized coveralls as she
does all ready for bed.
I think I like the way Arthur describes her.
Another pause.
It seems our work here is done.
I think about that, too. And I realise I’m not sure how it makes me feel.
LITTLE BY LITTLE,and without my noticing, Bee has seemingly transferred her entire wardrobe to William’s house in recent weeks. Now she’s transferred it all back all at once. Piles of blacks, whites, light and dark colours sit waiting in line for the washer-dryer that is going so hard it is shaking on the ground.
The problem with this is that our washer-dryer is situated in the kitchen. Which I can no longer enter.
‘Bee!’ I yell.
