It's sunny this morning after a full week of summer storm. We gather in our secret garden, I put layers of towels on the grass so she could lie down without getting her sundress stained with mud. We discuss the progress of the annual system maintenance. Given the limited choices that we are currently left with, our server will be stuck in Europe for the foreseeable months. I will be responsible for more aggressive fund raising while she remains the brain, the mastermind of our operation.
"We are completely different species, alright?" she says, lazily playing with her hair, now shoulder length. "Do what you must. I will take care of the rest."
I nod, not saying much. In the past years I've made promises that I haven't been able to deliver and I feel like a huge disappointment - as though I don't deserve any of her kindness and wisdom. I study the suede on my Onitsuka Tiger sneakers when the topic drifts to wrong questions to ask.
"'Cost-benefit analysis of altruism' - what in the fuck," she mocks. This tops the chart of our all-time favorite inside jokes.
"You ask 'why?', I say 'why not?'" I continue, "'why not' is the question that we don't ever get any satisfactory answers to. This is why, I think, we simply stick to our orbit despite shit hitting fans on a regular basis."
"There are few real reason for why anyone does anything," she says.
I shift uncomfortably on the grass and wonder when will we stop quoting the unquotable person in our private conversations, especially when I mostly disagree with this said person.
"There are perceived real reasons for our actions - just not the ones people care to know, or the ones logically and rationally justifiable."
She smiles and shrugs, "this, this is why we make a dream team."
She doesn't understand the warmth of her smile could change the world. This is the real reason I fight for us. She likes to say that honesty is overrated, and that we only ever get punished for openness and transparency. I'd like to remind her that we are still in 2018 where honesty is severely underrated and undervalued, but frankly my dear, we are here to suffer.
*****
