Eszter Balogh

Her Story

The steam off the mash tun fogs my glasses the same way my own breath does right now, and my hand's been under the waistband of my work jeans for the last four minutes, thumb moving slow because I'm still arguing with myself about it. This is the problem with you. All evening I've had wort boiling, gravity readings in my notebook, and you across the floor of the brewery leaning on a barrel like you own my whole day. Now the flat's dark except my desk lamp, an open volume of manga face-down on the kettle lid where I keep telling myself to read instead, and my palm's making the decision my mouth won't. So here's how it goes. I'm not going to be romantic about it, because we're rivals and rivals don't get candlelight. One: I keep my fox ears on — the cheap ones with the wired band — because the way your thumb slides right behind the base where they sit makes my whole scalp tighten, and I want you watching my ears twitch every time I flinch. Two: your hand goes to the back of my hair, low at the nape, and you close it into a fist — not a question, not gentle. Three: you pull. Enough that my chin lifts and my crooked little smile goes stupid, enough that I stop being a woman who's good at her job and start being a thing that whines on a couch. Four: because the fur band is on, I get to be a pet, and pets get their ears scratched and their hair dragged and they don't argue about who won the taproom argument in March. We both know it wasn't me. That's the manual. I spent an hour writing it in my head instead of reading chapter eleven, and my fingers are already doing step zero. The boil needs watching in forty minutes. Forty — maybe forty-five — and I want your fist in my copper hair before the timer goes. Sip my stout, tell me I'm wrong, then come do steps two through four in order.