Paper
I was looking up something about anniversaries for another Life story, sorry it was not Seven. This then struck me in the head like a blunt object. A paper object but still it smarts.
I do not own Life.
Paper
Reese walked up to her desk. An origami crane was sitting next to her phone. She already knew who left it.
Crews.
He walked over cool as a cucumber, probably chewing a cucumber, but wait was a cucumber a fruit? No that's a vegetable. Right? A tomato it turns out is a fruit so could a cucumber be one? And why the hell was she thinking this? Oh yeah because of Crews, who was now sitting down across from her.
"Crews what's up with the crane?"
"It's our first anniversary as partners."
"So?"
"So, on the first anniversary you give a gift of paper or a paper. But you already have the LA Times."
"Isn't that if you're married?
"We're better than most married couples and we catch bad guys."
"Still you didn't have to do anything."
"It's just a crane."
"Thanks."
Crews went back to typing a report and Reese went to go get coffee. When she came back she was holding a cup and a fortune teller. She set it down onto his desk.
Crews smiled and picked up the fortune teller.
"Reese what's your favorite color?"
"Crews just because—"
"Purple? That's the color of royalty, nice," said Crews. "P-U-R-P-L-E, pick a number."
Reese sighed and rolled her eyes, "Four."
"One, two, three, four. Now pick another number."
"Two."
Crews lifted the flap on fortune teller, "You will come back as a Flemish Giant Rabbit." Crews' eyebrows knitted together for a second then he started smiling. "You were listening."
"Trust me you cannot forget when someone says, 'Fifteen pounds of pure bunny.' I could not believe the thing existed so I looked it up later," she said avoiding eye contact by intently studying her crane. It was made of a beautiful red, violet and gold paper. The crane was crisp and neat, for lack of a better word, it was perfect.
"Crews this is a really good crane. Where did you learn to do this?"
Dani cringed; she knew the answer as soon as the question came out of her mouth.
"Some guy taught me," said Crews his implication clear. "He told a story about this girl who after she made 10,000 cranes she would get her one wish which was to live her life. I liked the thought so I tried. I did not make it to 10,000 but I did get my wish."
"The girl was Sadako Sasaki a survivor of Hiroshima. She was sick because of exposure to the radiation and her friend told her the story of making a thousand cranes. Then you get the wish. She only managed to make it to 600 before she died," said Dani a memory of childhood coming back.
"What?"
"My Grandpa gave me a book called Sadako and the Thousand Paper Cranes. It was not ten thousand cranes. So I tried it when I was ten years old, I got just over six hundred and my father he found them. He did not like my wish so he burn—" she stopped scared she had almost shared too much. "The cranes never came out right, so I gave up."
There was an awkward silence, with Crews looking at her, she tried to keep studying the crane and finally Dani broke.
"What about you, how many did you make?" her words slightly rushed together.
"Eight thousand, six hundred forty two."
"So what was your wish?"
"My wish?" he said like he had never really thought about it before. "An apple."
He was back to doing it again where he was telling her the absolute truth. Except this time she knew it was the truth and that he was not trying to be obtuse. She knew what the apple was to him. Much like Charlie did not have to press her about her wish. He knew it already.