I wash the rice carefully, drag my fingertips through its grains until the cold water running through no longer drains milky. Then, I slide it into a bowl with two curls of cinnamon bark, steaming water fresh from a trembling kettle. It needs thirty minutes to soften, so I clean the kitchen in the meantime, close the window to hold in the turquoise smell—Ocean Paradise, technically—of the Fabuloso I picked up at Alborada Market after work. When Ana gets home, I want our new Minneapolis apartment to smell less like itself and more like the old one in Huntington Park. I can’t replicate bougainvillea blooming on stucco walls, traces of gasoline from auto repair projects unfolding on the street, dry California sunlight on a mandarin tree in the yard, but at least I can use the right cleaning products. Then, I’ll blitz the rice mixture in the blender with a can of evaporated milk and a can of condensed milk, the one with the pink flowers on the label, hasta que esté lo más suave posible. I’ve tried a few online recipes without getting the flavor just right, so this time I’m using her abuela’s, reading a photo of soft-edged notecards sent by email. They’re in the neatest handwriting I’ve ever seen, so neat that Google Translate’s camera function can double-check each word. When the mixture is all blended up, I pass it through a cheesecloth into a big glass jug. There’s some wrestling involved. Cinnamon-infused rice water runs down my wrists, splashes onto the counter, but the end result has that perfect velvety texture. I want to get this right. When we got married last year, Ana’s abuela said she was glad to see us still so happy together, but her eyes and mouth looked disappointed, like this whole time she might’ve been hoping I was temporary. Once all the sediment is filtered out, I stir in vanilla, milk, and sugar. Taste it to make sure I’m on the right track. Add an extra sprinkle of sugar. Ana was so excited when I first showed her the job offer, more so when she managed to line up her own transfer to an office here. She danced a goofy barefoot shuffle while we packed, said she couldn’t wait to know what it was like to live somewhere else. But now that we’re here, she seems tired all the time. She stands hesitant by the door before going out in the morning. I don’t know what to do. The horchata is ready, it just has to rest in the fridge overnight. Tomorrow evening we’ll pour it over ice, maybe sit on the big patio we can afford now, overlooking the park with its stately maples and the water that replays sunsets, and when we taste our agua fresca, we should know if it’s come together properly or if I’ve made a mistake, if what’s missing isn’t the kind of thing a little more time can smooth out. 

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Jess Golden is a fiction writer with a preference for flash and a tendency to move around a lot. She currently lives in Germany with her partner. Her stories have appeared or are forthcoming in Passages North, Pithead Chapel, Maudlin House, Wigleaf’s Top 50, and elsewhere.