I sigh, try to guess what her reaction would be if I said, A pigeon told me in my brother’s voice. She’d think I was joking.
“A little birdie told me,” I say, following it up quickly with a shrug. “It had been building up for a while, I guess. I’d always looked up to my brother, and I had never really thought of doing what he did when he said no to college and just went traveling. I admired the fact that he could find random jobs as a construction worker in countries where he didn’t speak the language, that he’d seen so much of the world because that’s what he wanted to do. But I never wanted it for myself.
“After he died, though, I started thinking about it more and more. Not exactly doing what he did, but, just, reconsidering doing what my parents expected. The life path I was on being the only one I could choose. It was like he was telling me that the world had more to offer. Every day it got a little louder. I’d find myself hearing—” I pause, think better of the phrasing “—or thinking more and more: leave. Find a change of scenery. Get out. Then at my graduation party, my dad made a stupid speech basically saying we should all forget my brother.”
“Jesus.”
“Yeah,” I say. “He just put on this whole act like he was heartbroken, but when he wasn’t in front of a crowd...” I trail off, not wanting to rekindle these thoughts about Dad. “It was just the tipping point for me. I had to finally heed the voice and leave.”
We cross the street beneath the overpass, head away from the water up a street that slopes upward at a ridiculous angle, one that I would imagine in San Francisco, not Seattle. The sun’s at our backs as we climb the hill. It glints off the myriad windows on the surrounding buildings and stretches our shadows out along the sidewalk.
The hours pass quickly with Emma. The nervous thought this is a date doesn’t even enter my mind. Usually, even with Isa, months into our thing, I never really felt completely at ease. I’d have to think of ways to be funny, talk nonstop to fill in the spaces between conversations. I was constantly aware of my hands, the not-white shade of my teeth, constantly wondering how our night together would end, whether we’d have sex. None of that happens with Emma.
We comment on the things we see (a guy speed walking past us in tiny shorts, a woman having a heated conversation with a customer service rep on the phone, two dogs walking side by side with no owners nearby), or the perfect evening weather, or the strange thoughts we’ve had that we’ve never voiced before. How Emma did mushrooms once and had a bad trip but was saved from freaking out because she was certain that her friend’s dog knew what was going on and stayed nearby to comfort her. I come close to admitting that I see Felix everywhere, but I end up sugarcoating it to keep myself from sounding insane. “It’s like he can still speak to me,” I say. “Like he never went away at all.”
Emma is quiet for a second. “This is going to sound awful, but, since we’re on confessionals, I want to say this. I’ve never allowed myself the full thought, because it’s awful. So if you think I’m awful, just stop me and I’ll shut up and we’ll only talk nice things from now on.”
“No,” I say. “Go ahead.’”
Emma moves her glasses from her head down to the bridge of her nose. The sun’s not quite setting but beginning its orange crawl toward the horizon. We’re walking back downtown, toward the restaurant. “Okay, so what I was going to say is that, well, I’ve never really experienced death. Not like you have. A couple of grandparents I wasn’t all that close to, some kid I kinda knew from elementary school. And I keep having this awful thought that I want to experience it. That I want it to happen to someone close to me, I want to feel that loss.”
I don’t tell her that no, no, she doesn’t. I nod, let her go on.
“Obviously I don’t want anyone to die. But I know I’m going to experience it sooner or later in my life. Of course I am. And part of me just thinks: let’s get it over with. And another part of me is just...” She hesitates, either trying to find the right word or making sure I’m not going to run off. The golden cinematic light of the sun catches on some fine hairs on her cheek, and I want to cup her face in my hand. “Curious. Morbidly curious at what it’s going to be like when it happens. How will I react? Will I be destroyed, or will I know how to celebrate their life? Will I get stuck in one of the steps of grieving you always hear about? Denial, sadness? I hate that I even think about it like this, that I devote any time at all to it. I shouldn’t worry, shouldn’t dwell. I shouldn’t want it to happen ever. I shouldn’t think about it. But I can’t help it.” She folds her arms over her chest, looks over at me. “Was that the most insensitive rant you’ve ever heard? Am I awful?”
“You’re not awful,” I say. “I kind of wish I’d thought about it more before Felix died. I don’t think it can really prepare you for how it feels, how much you miss them. But maybe it would have.”
“You seem to be doing okay, though. Did it, like, pass with time?”
I wish the answer was a straight-up yes, but it says something that my instinct is to look around to make sure that Felix isn’t around. “I still have my moments.”
Emma reaches out to me, hooks her arm around my elbow. I turn my neck and kiss the top of her head, and we walk the rest of the way in silence, death hovering around us.
The restaurant, when we finally reach it, is an unassuming place, laid out like most sushi restaurants. There’s a bar that seats maybe eight people, behind which three Japanese sushi chefs lean over their counters, blades in hand. There are a handful of tables, mostly business types or couples. I check in with the hostess, and she leads us to two seats at the bar.
The chef bows down and greets us in Japanese. “Can I start you with anything?” he asks, accented to the exact same level as Felix, the English fractured, not broken, though in a different way. As if each language has its little faults with which it cracks another.
I tell him we’ll be doing omakase, which is where the chef decides what to serve you depending on the freshest fish of the day along with the restaurant’s specialty. Emma says that he doesn’t have to bother serving on plates; he can just place the food directly in our mouths. The chef laughs and then reaches across the bar and sets a plate down in front of each of us. It’s a simple piece of nigiri, just the rice and a sizeable, expertly cut slice of fish on top. “Red snapper,” he says.