Communist Ladybug!

Three p.m. said the oven clock in the time of the U.S. Government, and the knife came swinging down with the spirit of an anarchist. Now the garnet toned pomegranate lay in uneven halves on the mint green cutting board. With intent and acceptance of bloody hunger, her fingers began prying at the little jewel-like seeds within it. Resigned, she began methodically unraveling them from the papery whiteness that had wrapped them up so neat and clean.

As she worked, the only noise in the kitchen was the simmering rice on the stove behind her. Alone for hours, cooking for the holiday, the silence had started to thicken around her. She had thought to play music but had never done it. So the silence pressed on. I could tell she couldn't see me from behind the espresso machine. That was fine for now, I wished that she would not perceive me at that time. For the moment, I was seeing her.

I watched her hands slip a little and reveal the rich, red blood within the pomegranate. And I watched her scold herself bitterly with the icey tongue of a bureaucrat. That is to say it hit the air with a strained and pedegogical tone. Like a nursery rhyme that hated you.

Slowly, I crept out from my hiding place and traveled lightly to the fruit bowl. I felt my heart race as I raced through the open air on the linolium countertop. The distance closed with the haste of molasses.

As I watched, she began to carefully pluck each seed from the pomegranate's sanguine skin. Her gaze was hard set, burning into the wall before her. She did not see me, of course, and she did not know me, that much was certain, but her eyes were so warm and so heavy with the weight of some knowledge neither she nor I could fully hold or express. The kind of knowledge that you know without knowing, that frees and obtains you; it was the kind of knowledge that holds you and needs you, as well. Needs you badly to need to know it.

I had more eyes than she did; many more eyes, in fact, but that did not matter. There is a universal unit of measurement amongst all things that are — a great equalizer of heartbeats, of brains, of eyeballs. A oneness that binds us with the weight of its inexpressibility. And we all see it.

I attempted to remain concealed behind the terracotta walls of the fruit bowl for as long as I could, in spite of the weight of this thing that we held onto together, but then she began to hum a stiffened rendition of Billie Holiday's Solitude. I felt my wings flutter and itch in spite of myself. With hezitaton, I pushed my legs forward and toward the gargantuan mass of pomegranate skin before me, toward the mint green cutting board. I slipped in between the skins, in between verses, and poked my head out from behind the carcass of fruit. I watched her for a moment there.

She finished her humming and then began to sing. The words tacked onto the previously empty melody stung the air harsher and crueller than a wasp. I paused myself completely. Then, suddenly, the song stopped as well. I knew what must have happened. I knew what was about to happen, too.

She had seen me.

With a tuneless and dull spattering of thuds, a shower of pomegranate seeds rained onto the kitchen floor. She clicked her tongue and gasped, insulted.

Her eyes found me again from her new position an extra foot away, hands above her head. For a moment, we stared at each other. We examined the world together. And then her eyes flicked to the pomegranate, then to the knife, then to the seeds, and then back to me. Her plan was as clear as the day and as certain as dialectic.

She grabbed the knife from the counter and her breath became still as her body tensed beyond tension. I saw her eyes close. I knew what was coming, I knew it, I knew it, I knew it, and still in belief, I stayed frozen. And then:

. . .In my solitude. . .

Her voice hit the thick air like a gunshot cracks into the night.

. . .With reveries of days gone by. . .

I could almost hear the piano behind her as her body relaxed, and her hand placed the knife into the sink.

In my solitude you taunt me. . .

She sang to me now, I could tell. I felt my own heart and body unthaw as she bent down to collect the garnet colored seeds, still singing.

I sit in my chair / Filled with despair

I crept to the edge of the counter and peered down at her. She looked up and our eyes met. Hers were wide and unfeeling and then suddenly filled with a smile that read like dramatic irony. She sang:

I sit and I stare / I know that I'll soon go mad . . . / in my solitude / I'm praying / Dear Lord above / Send back my love . . .

Her voice filled the tiny kitchen, as gently, she rose to my level and then back to her full height, far above me. But her eyes never left me, and nor mine did hers.