Sinead Overbye

keri & i as best friends

i.

we sit at the window listening to
rasputin on repeat. clouds saunter 
across a red & rippling sky. she tells me 
all the words she knows for home, pulls 
up a map, satellites us to her town. the 
stuccoed childhood house, the lavender 
garden, abandoned plastic toys, her mum 
climbing into the car, her back to us, stilled in
time. see? she says gleefully, this is the corner, 
this is the street. we’ve pressed pause on
the old world, stop & zoom in on her 
face, then repeat: scroll up & down the street 
again, hoping she’ll turn & look to camera. 

ii. 

the image stays the same. we sip berry
vodka cruisers, as a joke. laugh so hard
we’re crying. i roll uneven cigarettes that
dismantle as they burn. she inhales, chokes
& grins. the world is on fire & we can’t
help burning things. we fall asleep clinging
opposite edges of bed. we never utter the word
lonely. we don’t know what it means.

iii.

her face in the pillow in the morning, 
ringlets pasted to her cheek. unglamorous
and noisy. i trickle water into coffee beans. 
outside, a boy chases a dog escaped off 
the leash. he isn’t fast enough & just keeps
running. the day ahead is an open-ended
question we’ll keep unanswering.

iv. 

keri collects shells from the beach,
sorts & stacks them into piles, occasionally
pushes one to her lips & elicits an ancient
tone. she knows all there is to know about
the old world, teaches me how to gather pipis
for when this one ends, tells me i am lovely
as i smile. in the sunlight, she’s magnificent
in the twilight, she’s vermillion, fearlessly
embracing a shoreline that retreats & circles
back & leaves again.

Sinead Overbye (Te Whānau a Kai, Ngāti Porou) is a researcher, historian and writer living in Te Whanganui-a-Tara. Her work has been published in Starling, RNZ, Turbine | Kapohau, and Sport, among other places. She completed her MA in Creative Writing at the IIML in 2018. Sinead is the editor-in-chief of the online journal Stasis, has worked as a staff writer at the Pantograph Punch, and has worked on a range of other publishing projects, including Te Rito o Te Harakeke - A collection of writing for Ihumātao.