El smiled at Lucy and took a sip of her coffee.
El often smiled at them. They often smiled back at her. It would be a confusing scene if you knew their history.
El was an artist, a long time ago. She made one really good go of it, had one major success, and decided to change hats. Now she mostly watches the world go by. Sometimes people ask her why she doesn’t do something more with her time. She has so much of it, after all, the least she could do is stop a war or heal a sick kid. But that’s never been her bag. The greedy sods don’t seem to understand how many gifts they already have. She gets blamed for a lot. For a while she tried running a resort. Good work if you can get it, but eventually it got away from her. The kids took it over, and ran it into the ground. They all fractured and started their own individual businesses. All offering the same service with their own little twist. It was okay. They were just trying to find their own way, now that El was taking the backseat.
And then there was poor Lucy. That’s the trouble when you hop from job to job. You become rudderless, and you’re generally at the mercy of the wind. Lucy and El were always close. It’s kind of a given, when you’re part of someone else’s creation. But Lucy was never content. They tried the military for a while, did some work as a musician, worked as an attorney for a while. Good work if you can get it, worth sticking around, but Lucy wasn’t really the ‘stick-around’ type.
Perhaps that’s why the fight got so bad. Two forces of nature so powerful, the world couldn’t help but take sides. When they broke up, Lucy fell hard. They never did anything half-assed. They went as far away as they could get – and when you’re trying to avoid El, you pretty much have to. Lucy discovered a penchant for ‘professional discipline,’ got the word out, started taking on clients. People came to them and told them all of their bad secrets, they’d receive their punishment, and go on their way. Others crawled up out of the depths and asked to join in on the fun. Lucy stopped getting directly involved. Too many people, too many secrets, too many specialty jobs. They created a company out of the chaos.
“So,” sighed Lucy, “How’re the kids? Still trying to keep Mama’s little business afloat?”
El could only groan and try to hide behind the coffee cup in her hands. It wasn’t as if Lucy didn’t already know. Seemed like you couldn’t walk ten paces without seeing another of Mama’s resorts seeking to welcome you in with the promise of rejuvenation, alternately talking a big game about their own prowess while downplaying their brothers’ and sisters’ spas. “Forty thousand. No, over forty thousand now. Most of them aren’t too big. A little shack here in Zimbabwe. A cabana there in Florida.” El produced a lit cigarette, not entirely sure how she always did that right when the situation called for it. She knew it was a terrible habit, but what was the worst that could happen? Cancer wasn’t really an issue. “Took a long time, but they finally started branching out. I mean, Jesus…” She chuckled at that. She always chuckled at that. And Lucy predictably rolled their eyes. “It took HOW long to get out of the Middle East?”
Lucy groaned, “it took centuries…”
“It took MILLENNIA. Even after the rebrand! Connie had a good idea, bless that little saint. State-sponsored. We blew up overnight.”
“C’mon, El, keep it in the present. If we try to rehash ancient history, we’ll be here all goddamn – sorry – night.”
“Okay, okay, what about you? How’s the whole… whatever, S&M thing going?”
“Augh, do you have to do that? Like I’m some leatherclad minx with a whip? I provide a valuable service to a wide community. Just because I don’t have a branch in every city doesn’t mean I don’t meet a wide range!” They sat back with a slight pout. Even when they weren’t happy with the way things were going lately, they still had to have pride. Pride was important. It was one of the Big Seven. “I mean, just last week, we had a Puerto Rican politician, a member of the British royal family, and, oh, one of yours.” Okay, that was a low blow. They could admit that. But Lucy still had a little bit of a victorious smirk on their face. “If it’s any consolation, Bob took real good care of ‘em.”
“Ohhh, I like Bob. Good kid. How are they? Lyle, Az, the whole bunch.”
“They’re well enough. Good kids all, I suppose. Just had to figure out how to place them, get that negative energy and spin it into something positive. Good work if you can get it.”
El’s face softened and she reached across the table. Despite all sense, Lucy took her hand. Once upon a time, such a thing was common between the two. Now, it was as momentous an event as a planetary alignment. “How? How do you do it? You take everything thrown at you and just… keep going.”
Lucy didn’t have an answer. So they went for it. “I’ve missed you.” For a moment, everything in a ten mile radius smelled of fresh cut grass. Everyone in the coffee shop simultaneously began to cry for no apparent reason, and that night they each laid in bed and tried to remember why.
El always was the idealist. She imagined them leaning across the table, embracing one another as they had done before, going back to her place, or going back to Lucy’s place, and picking up right where they left off. But the mental image left as soon as their hands broke, and she was reminded of everything that came after ‘before’. El getting lost in her work, Lucy playing devil’s advocate for the millionth time, the rows, the battles, the way it shook the very universe around them. She couldn’t do that, not again. These little chats were nice, but that was all they were. Nice.
Lucy saw all this and more flash across El’s face and felt the desperation sink in, reaching back across the table for one more hand-hold, one more lingering look. But El might as well have been a hundred miles away at that point. “You could do it, you know.” Somewhere inside Lucy’s mind, there was a voice screaming at them to stop. This was too much, even for Lucy. You didn’t tell an artist to burn it all down. “Wipe it clean, fresh slate, everything. Start over and make it all new. Fix the sadness and the pain and the… the fucking ENNUI.” Now she was doing little more than ranting. There was no going back, Lucy knew that just as well as El did.
El knocked back the last of her coffee and grimaced as a wad of sugar at the bottom of the concoction hit her all at once. “No. I really couldn’t. I have the ability. I don’t have the will.” She stood up, buried her hands in her pockets and pulled out her phone to check the time. Smart phones. The kids were all right, sometimes. Every now and then they did something really cool, and you couldn’t help but be proud. “But maybe it’s time I went back to work.” El was staring beyond Lucy now, through the coffee shop window, to the world outside. There was a glimmer in her eye that hadn’t been there in a long time – which is to say, a long time by her calendar, not ours, which is pretty impressive. “They keep talking about these aliens. I tried to take it easy, just make up the one planet and leave everything else for decoration and fluff.” Her hands went back into her pockets. “But I bet I could make it work. Could take a while. But I’ve missed the whole ‘starving artist’ routine.”
El started for the door, stopping to take one last look at Lucy. As always, they had been suckered into doing their job. But it was an entirely different experience playing the devil’s advocate when you actually wanted something to happen. Were you even an advocate when it was your own desires on the line? But El was right, there was a lot of canvas left, and a lot of time. You couldn’t go back, but you could go forward. El was always fucking right, and it was as adorable as it was intolerable. Lucy gave another sly smile, standing to join their old flame in leaving the little building for the big bad world beyond. “‘Starving Artist’ always was one of your best looks. Good work if you can get it.”
