The Fall Risk

by Abby Jimenez

Pretty, around my age, maybe twenty-seven, twenty-eight. Brown hair. Bear spray in her hand.

“I’ve been calling!” the woman said. “You were supposed to meet me twenty minutes ago, you didn’t answer, and your location wasn’t moving, I thought you were . . . where the fuck are your stairs?!”

Izzy turned back to Gabe, looked him up and down, made a little fake lunge, grabbed her bat, and left.

“Listen to me,” he said, going on unfazed. “Do not, and I cannot stress this enough, spend the whole time talking to her about trees.”

“Okay. Because you do that when you’re nervous. It’s all jacarandas and dId YoU kNoW mOsT tReEs aRe mALe.” “Okay, I get it? And also, I probably

“Women solve entire murders on their podcasts, you think I can’t find out all I need to know about some rando I met on the lawn?”

He picked up on what I was feeling.

“Female trees produce fruit. Fruit falls, it makes messes, it attracts vermin. So most trees planted in urban areas are male. They put out pollen with no female trees to absorb it, so it ends up in the air instead.”

“That is botanical sexism,” I breathed. “Also, that would make a great band name.”

“How old are you. How long have you lived?”

“So you have a fish?” I asked. “Yeah. A betta fish.” “Oh. Does he have a name?” “He does. Swim Shady.” I barked out a laugh. “Is he the real Swim Shady or . . .” “All the other Swim Shadys are just imitating,” he said, totally serious.

“So the sock,” she said. “If you swing a baseball bat at someone, they sometimes try to take it from you. So if you have a sock on there, the sock slides off when they grab the bat, it puts them off balance, and you get a second swing to break their skull.” She sipped innocently on her drink.

I always thought of the famous quote: “Pain is inevitable, but suffering is optional.”

“Red flag guys aren’t your type. They’re your pattern.” There was a long pause. “Why’d you have to come for me like that?” “Because I love you. I want to see you happy. I think you pick toxic men because it’s what you think you deserve. And then you chase them off, or they prove they’re exactly what you think they are, and they leave you, and you think you deserve that too. You don’t. You are very worth loving. And sticking around for.”

“Sometimes the start of something good begins during something bad,” he said. “We don’t get to pick when these things happen.”

“If you ever come back here,” I whispered, “you won’t find her, you’ll find me. And then no one will ever find you.”