Photo by Ayyeee Ayyeee/pexel.com
by Nora Nadjarian
Early that morning we entered the pasticceria next to the bus stop and pointed at the cannoli – do you remember you said you’d read a fascinating fact in Lonely Planet but I was too tired and hungry to listen, and started licking the fresh ricotta cheese inside the tube-shaped pastry, my teeth crunching on the pistachio nuts with my eyes shut. I had trouble hearing you, even though you were right next to me and you were saying something about the emirs’ harem of women making cannoli during the time of Arab rule. And I still wasn’t listening, and the girl asked Have you tried the Nutella-filled bombolone, and I laughed and said Not yet, we arrived this morning, the girl asked Many days? And I nodded and said Yes, yes, many days, and licked my finger, then pulled a serviette out of the holder and about five came out instead of one and they all landed on the floor, strange, lifeless birds and you didn’t pick them up, instead watched me pick them off the black and white tiles, and the floor was a chess board, you know? Of course you knew. Goodbye, you said to the girl behind the counter, who had already seen too much.
Nora Nadjarian is a poet and writer from Cyprus. Her work has recently appeared in Milk Candy Review, Ghost Parachute and Gone Lawn.
