High Horse

untitled, Riley Quinn Scott & Solomon, 2024

Nervous water strikes curiosity as a school ripples across the shiny gold surface, and although he knows, he wonders what else could live in the river.

This time last week he met a woman. They went to dinner every night after. Casual dinners at those casual cafes with Parisian outdoor seating. A week of this until she insisted on a home cooked meal. Because of her insistence, he assumed she’d be the one making dinner at her place, but she asked if he would, at his place. Instead of saying no, he asked what she’d like. She said she’d like it if he’d bake salmon and asparagus. He asked if that’s all or she’d like anything more, to which she said no, just fish and a vegetable.

When the night was here, that she’d come over for dinner, he was terribly nervous about what she’d think of his compact apartment. His kitchen and bathroom shared a sink, with no door for privacy for the toilet nor the shower. He was unsure what the night had in store because the past week’s dinners had been platonic with little to no signs of affection. He’d deeply desired to kiss her since last Tuesday—their first night together.

The buzzer echoed through his apartment, he ran to the bottom floor to let her in. As she passed through the doorway into his building, he smelt her perfume, the same she’d worn all week. He’d been obsessing over this scent lingering in the cotton of his shirts. She asked what floor, he said the third, she led the way up stairs. He could’ve easily slowed his pace to catch a glimpse up skirt, but he’d rather smell than see. At his door he reached around to let her and the scent in.

She sat with her feet apart, knees together, on the floor mattress in his chairless apartment. Embarrassed by his shoebox room filled with shoeboxes in this shoebox apartment, he couldn’t meet her eyes. She only seemed to mind enough to ask what’s in the boxes. He told her they were filled with books, to which she said, why in boxes though. He said the boxes help him to remember which he’s read and which he hasn’t.

He began preparing dinner in the kitchen as she sat feet away on his bed. She took off her flats and tights and sat them neatly on a shoebox. She apologized for undressing because she was feeling a bit too hot. He apologized for not having an air conditioner.

She heard the tear of aluminum foil and asked that he please keep hers unwrapped. He honored her, that is to say, he didn’t tear another.

They ate fish on his bed as he kept apologizing for burning the asparagus. She kept saying that she really didn’t care and he believed her. Lying down, letting their food settle, they played a version of footsie with their hands, touching each finger one at a time, identifying which it was, pinky.

Heavy kissing with fish breath led to making love in a fort of shoeboxes. Their bodies spent, perspiring as one, filling his apartment with musk and vanilla—her scent. Were you, a feral cat, watching from the fire escape, you’d have never known they made fish for dinner.

Nude on the bed, they listened to Kozelek through the wall and the city through the window. She asked if she could shower off, to which he said of course, and wished they could together. He smoked as she wondered things behind the plastic curtain. Like how he managed to wash his dishes, brush his teeth, and clean his body in this tiny shower. Or how the mirror dangling from the showerhead wasn’t fogging yet.

When she spoke up to ask, her voice disappeared in an echo. He ripped the curtain back only to find a salmon shining in water ankle deep. His drain clogged with her hair.

MD Wheatley is the author of what a heaven could feel like (Love For Sale Press, 2023).