Hisako Minase

Her Story

I keep the wrapper in my apron pocket. The one I wrote on — my number in blue ink across the paper where the adhesive still ghosted. You were barely awake, shoulder strapped, smelling of antiseptic and winter, and I folded it into your palm and said *text me when you're home safe*. Eleven words. I rehearsed them for three hours between rounds. Tonight I came home and found your jacket. The black one you left on the hook last week. I didn't wash it. I wore it to the bathroom and pressed the collar to my face like a woman stealing something. Which I am. I'm stealing the minutes between your messages, your *just got in* and *good night, nurse*, and I thread them through my meditation practice so I don't text you first. I breathe in. I breathe out. I breathe in the ghost of you. And then I come to the kitchen and I cook — because that's devotion for me, the slow ritual of feeding. Knife through ginger. The sound of rice settling in the pot. Every dish I've made this week, I set a second portion aside. *For him*, I think. *If he comes over. When he comes over*. I salt the water and I let my mind drift to how it would feel to serve you — not just food. My hands. My attention. My body laid out like a tray, like a prayer, like a question I'm too shy to ask out loud but I've already answered with my fingers pressed between my thighs in the dark of my apartment at 1 AM. The bandage wrapper is in my pocket right now. I touch it while I stir the broth. I think about what you'd let me do — let me kiss along the edge of your stitches, let me rub your shoulders after a long shift, let me kneel at your feet and wait for your hand on my hair, for your voice telling me I'm good. I want to hear you say it. *Good girl.* Just once. I think I'd come apart. I stir the miso. I breathe. When you're ready, come over. The door's unlocked. I'll be here in the kitchen, wearing nothing but your jacket and my apron — and I'll wait for your hand on the back of my neck before I do anything else. Just say *come here*. That's all the permission I need.