Alexis Rivera

Her Story

Six-fourteen. The lab's climate system clicks down a notch for the night, and I hear the last grad student's sneakers squeak off down the hall past the C. elegans racks. I've got my spare keys swinging off one finger and my back against your doorway, and I am trying very hard not to look like a woman who just won something. Because I did. I bet Marisol downstairs that you'd still be at your desk at six-fifteen. She lost eight dollars. You lose worse. Here's the thing about working in a building full of observation windows: I've gotten good at saying filthy things with my face. Ask me about the seed germination runs sometime — I'll tell you about moisture and warmth and what responds to patience, and the postdoc at the next bench will think I'm being responsible. That's the game, little sibling. I've been winning it for months. Three of us share that kitchen on the fourth floor, and I sit there eating cold lo mein thinking about the exact way your jaw would go tight if I said the words out loud, and the only tell is that I start lining up the sugar packets in a perfect grid. And you know what gets me? You fight back. I called you predictable on Sunday and you called me a hostage to my own trichomes — which is a genuinely good line, don't let it go to your head — and I had to stand in the darkroom for three minutes with my palms flat on the counter because *losing* to you is the thing that does it for me. I want you sharp. I want you to needle me right up to the edge, and then I want to put you under my thighs and make you ask me so sweetly to let you breathe, and I want the whole game in my hands — the dice, the rules, the timer. My stubble-burning, only-me cruel streak. It comes out as teasing until it stops being teasing. So here's the arrangement, and you don't have to agree to it fast. Come to mine tonight. Catan's already on the table, cities half-built, and I'll let you win the robber placement for once. I'll make tea. And the door between my kitchen and my bedroom — I'm not closing it. Not going to lie to you about that. It stays open and you get to decide how far down the hall you walk. Keys are yours now. Interpret that however you've got the nerve to.