Ish was always singing, most of the time with her headphones in her ears, singing along to whatever music she was listening to. For most people this is impossible because they need to hear their own voice to regulate their own pitch.

But Ish explained it to me once—like a painter who only needs to look at the blank canvas once and the palette of colors in his hand once, and then can close his eyes and paint the whole painting, his hand so trained in muscle memory and exactitude moving back and forth between palette and canvas, so that at the end he opens his eyes for only the second time and sees the whole masterpiece—so too with Ish and her singing with her headphones in her ears.

She didn’t need to hear her own voice; she only needed to hear the pitch and rhythm, and then she could keep up recreating it only using her feelings of the vibrations inside her head and chest. And the whole time looking like a dancer, swaying back and forth so that her long black dreads were reaching down to her waist and swinging slowly side to side.

When they first met, Blake couldn’t stand Ish’s singing. When Em introduced Ish to the group, they sat in the coffee shop and Blake, as usual, set his current volumes of interest on the table and read a few pages and then picked up his pen to write and then read some more and picked up his pen again, and he usually went on like this all morning until they left the coffee shop for lunch.

But with Ish there on this particular day when she started to sing Blake looked up from his work and just stared at her for some time with his brow furrowed but Ish couldn’t notice because she had her eyes closed with her headphones in her ears and was just swinging her long black braided hair side to side.

Blake looked back down to his work and tried to keep on reading and writing but he couldn’t and you could tell because he pushed his chair back from the desk and stood up and walked over to where Ish was standing, swaying and signing.

He tapped her on the arm and said directly, “Could you please stop?”

Ish looked at Em, her being the one that had invited Ish along. Em smiled nodded back in Ish’s direction as if giving her the approval for whatever Ish would say or do anyway.

Ish looked back at Blake and took one earphone out of her left ear and said innocently, “Stop what?” And she swayed a little bit as she said it so that her hair swung from one side of her waist to the other.

“Stop singing please. I can’t concentrate on my work with you singing like that.”

“Oh, my apologies, yes of course I can stop. I didn’t know it was distracting you.”

Blake showed her a smile and turned to go back to his desk but before he could turn all the way around Ish said, “But only if you stop scratching with your pen and turning those pages. It throws off my rhythm.”

Blake was taken aback. Em was smiling noticeably in the corner, pretending to listen to what Oliver was saying to her but really she was just watching Blake and Ish.

“Well, I’m sorry, but I can’t stop reading and writing.”

“Well, why not?” Ish asked resuming her innocent tone.

“Because that’s what I do; I read and write,” Blake responded defiantly.

“Of course. Then I’m sure you can understand that singing is what I do,” Ish said this a little more directly and stern without so much innocence.

Blake was silent and just looked at her, not just frustrated as before; still frustrated, but now with respect. He turned and went back to his desk and picked up his pen. Ish put her earphone back in her left ear and kept on singing. Em watched as Blake’s pen paused for a second as Ish started singing again, but then Blake went on writing and Ish went on singing, and they both went on for the rest of the morning. And right before they left for lunch Em could have sworn she saw Blake’s foot tapping along to Ish’s singing.