JANE AND ESTEBÀN SIMULTANEOUSLY sneeze in their sleep. Their windows, two separate windows on opposite sides of town, are black as ink, only connected by a roach river, which ebbs above the concrete. Sure, the city has trees. Almost every city has trees somewhere, but Jane and Estebàn could not, were they awake, hear their branches tapping at their windows.
Jane lives in a first story apartment. Frequently, she overhears loud sounds of passerbys, stumbling down the sidewalk after last call. After heavy rainstorms, she hears the flow of water falling through the nearby sewer drain. Estebàn drinks his coffee black and lives with other artists, though he himself is a playwright. His building has significant roof access, and it is high above that he is able to write. He likes white lined notebooks and red pencils like a teacher might line up in a desk drawer. Even in this cold winter, when his fingers are often limp from stiff chill, he writes poems like:
THEY THEY THEY
shit girl
mother fucker mother fucker
like the boy for the fuck
eatin shit like starving bits of bleeps
going on on on on of yeah
will you please please please please please?
Jane opens her eyes, but remains asleep. Then, she closes them.
Would they ever meet? Yes, they would. Four or five years ahead, Estebàn would be working in a boat rental shop on a lake in pastoral France. And Jane, after a promising internship with a well-to-do painter in New York City, where she will scream “I’m finished” and quit halfway through because she will see where that will be heading, will follow a friend across the ocean to a volunteer on a Mozzerella farm in the same town as Estebàn’s lake. One day, Estebàn, who knows very little about boats, will flip his raft and the three Finnish tourists it will be carrying. Jane, lunching on the banks with the farm owner’s dark-eyed son, will hear the Finnish people’s cries and immediately dive into the lake. It will be February, and Jane will be breast-stroking toward the shipwreck without even a long sleeved shirt. In the cold water, her sheer blouse will grasp her body like daisy petals in the wind.
After saving the tourists, Jane will hear the desperate gargle of one last body bobbing in the lake. Though achey and numb, she will dive back into the water. While the farm owners son will be passively continue to drink wine from their lunch, Jane will drag ashore Estebàn’s white body. With her hands on his cheeks, he will stare at her with eyes as blue as the American flag. And then he will cough.
But now, Jane and Estebàn are strangers. They both sleep alone.
Jane and Estebàn’s room mates both have cats that scratch at the door early in the morning. Jane and Estebàn both already have trouble sleeping in. Both Estebàn and Jane’s bedroom walls are white. They both listen to public radio and they sing when they’re alone. Their favorite color is grey, but their favorite flower is a sunflower. Jane loves turkey and cranberry sandwiches from a cafe that Estebàn frequents. Estebàn wishes he had a bike to get around. Jane has a bike! They have attended the same movie at the same movie theater at the same showing twenty three times, but never once noticed each other.
Jane gasps. Her fists are clenched. Jane is dreaming of bed posts. She’s trapped in a large room that is only big for its longness. She feels as though her legs may not hold out till the end of the hall. Her legs are almost not of the same body; they seem like they might not hold her hips up much longer. In the real world, Jane’s bed sheets are twisting around her thighs, cutting off her circulation.
Estebàn’s dream is tender and slow. He sets a tablecloth on a well-made wooden table. The light streams in through the windows of this quaint breakfast nook, but just as Estebàn sits on the cushy silk bench to crack into his soft-boiled egg, a flock of porcelain bears the size of refrigerators bust through the stone walls.
Estebàn gasps. His eyes are wide open, but in the darkness, he is confused. Jolted and crazed, his heart pounds for four and a half minutes. After this, he decides that he will not and can not--if he tries--get back to sleep. The clock reads 4:30. His room mate’s cat is even still asleep. The darkness is so black, he isn’t even sure when he blinks. A pause. Estebàn peels off his sheets and heads to the kitchen to make his morning coffee.