look at me still talking when there's science to do

for blackfelicula, who asked for more of the lesbian cybergeishas.

Nami cooks for us. I like to watch her cook; her hands are graceful as they move the rocker knife, the hammered steel throwing stars of light across the kitchen.

I am in awe of her hands; they move like pale moths through the halflight of the room. They are sensitive yet strong, steel in silk - able to prune back roses with determination and vigor, and to give me such pleasure with their warmth and cleverness.

They are only one of many things I adore about her - and this fact, this adoration, is a source of anxiety; for Nami is my weak spot, my heart that walks outside my body.

"What are you thinking?" she asks, and holds a piece of o-toro between two chopsticks for me.

"About you, dear one." It melts in my mouth; I push the worries to ground, and smile. "As always."

sakura lace veil
low clouds, rain, sips of coffee
seattle springtime

---

Aleckzandra was tall and thin with a patrician nose and a slight limp: she had a brass-handled cane that tapped its own rhythm imperiously on the tiles. Among the students it was rumored she was a lesbian, and unlike most rumors that circulated around university halls, that happened to be true. Her partner was a welder who looked like a cross between Mae West and Marilyn Monroe, whose Georgia accent trailed warmth and gardenias through the grey New York sky.

---

Nami likes books. I enjoy reading, but am content to do it through the newsfeeds and displays, which are ubiquitous now. Since the invention of paper crystal, news flows over the curving sides of buildings and ripples under your feet as you walk like salmon scales flashing in a running stream. Knowledge is fluid: I feel no need to hold it between hands.

But for Nami, we go to the Old Town where the booksellers hoard their vaults of words. Jimbocho is disconnected from the screens and even among people I feel strangely afloat.

Nami takes my hand, anchors me, and we enter the shop. It smells of ink and paper, glue and yesterdays.

---

Fabian pointed a seaweed-salad-laden chopstick at him. "You need to get laid."

"That's your solution to everything." Anthony replied tartly. "Sex. Some people want more from a relationship than just the mutual exchange of sweat."

"Sex and food. And television, and extreme sports, and art. I like to think of life as a kind of smorgasboard of pleasures."

"You like to think of life as an all-you-can-eat buffet, you pig."

"I had a boyfriend once - we fucked at an all-you-can-eat-buffet."

"I'm sure you came up with some great uses for salad dressing."

"Well, actually - "

"You know what? I don't care."