aurora stood of the very tips of her toes to reach the moon. pale as gessamine. her thin sheer hands stretching out to caress it's face, fingers unfurling like flower petals. heavenly bodies. she ducked as the moon swept by her, on its orbit, ticking through the sky. it could have killed her. she was the first.

    they met in the rain, the sidewalks sleek and wet and the streetlights shining like ornaments. he was standing on a corner at a stoplight, impossibly neat beneath his slim covering of newspaper. she offered him her umbrella and they crossed together, dodging puddles. there were raindrops on her face; she seemed to glow, to know already a certain fate, her arm caught in the crook of his elbow. sweetness into her heart. he would be gentle and kind. he kissed the valley of her palms, his eyes held her, she was swept off, away.

    veronique met him in an orchard, falling from an orange tree. the oranges were falling and girls were lifting their dresses. it was an accident full of purpose, that he should love her move than she cared for him, for a little while. it was like that, a game of what you can’t have, no tengo amor no soy nada. she was amused and entranced by his dishevelment, his wry grin and eventual casual indifference.

    linette was the last and her heart split when he sunk his fingers into her and tore - but she shed, she fled his grasp by losing her skin, like a lizard in fright. she never said she loved him; she never lost herself, she never gave herself away. when she left she was changed by everything she hadn’t confessed to, and it split her like over-ripe fruit.

    no se puede vivar sin amar he had whispered, his lips in their ears - and they frowned, they smiled, they left him behind and loved one another instead. there was no contempt between them. they knew how to resurrect gardens. to tell the wick of plants. to test the tenderness of their own hearts.