He’s not a famous documentarian who’s sitting on a load of cash. He’s anonymous—just some guy—but maybe some of his work is known and appreciated because it shines a light on the beautiful weirdos like the synths who’re trying to make this world less awful. He’s a megaphone that’s trying to signal-boost the work of others, more than anything else. Maybe he teaches sometimes at a college nearby and still has plenty of time to create. His students like him and he encourages them to think bigger or rewrite their narratives, as eye-rolly as it sounds, and sometimes he’ll force them out of the film lab and onto the quad when it’s warm, where they’ll talk about poetry or something. He’s with a guy who makes him laugh and challenges him and infuriates him sometimes, with his big, beautiful brain that has him pacing the house at four in the morning, turning theories about supersymmetry and magical balls of string around in his head, but also leaving his socks everywhere. For the sake of this hypothetical let’s call him, I dunno, Yusuf. And the two of them lift each other up without caging each other in.

This hyper-me calls and checks in on his friends. He carries an umbrella with him in case it rains. He’s steady enough to keep his promises but still restless enough that he’ll disappear on a solo road trip for three days to think about his next project, but he remembers to run it by his husband first because he’s not a complete selfish dick. He moves his body and makes art. He’s kind and fesses up when he’s not. He makes his husband smile, and they still spend nights with their lips and bodies crashing into each other like the week they first met.

I don’t need a lot. Just enough.

11

DICE

The bars of early sunlight from the blinds invaded my eyes and cut a gold grid into my wrinkled bedsheets. A fine red dust gathered on the sill of my open window. My eyes felt clogged with the same dust, gritty and tired.