Wife,
Do you know why I touch any part of you whenever I can? Walking past each other in the kitchen, while watching TV, tangling our feet together in bed? I need to make sure you are real, and you are really mine.
-Aaron
Text message
Indiana, USA
Married 18 years
17 years ago
Greg
“No one finds my jokes funny.”
“Greg . . .”
“It’s true. I told that joke about the G-spot, and my professor gave me a blank look. You could hear crickets, at noon, on a Wednesday. A dog barked in the distance. I don’t know who I should be more concerned for, him or his wife. Obviously he doesn’t know where her magic button lies.”
“Greg . . .”
“As a driller of oil, one would think he’d be spot on.” I wagged my eyebrows at her and grinned. “See what I did there? Spot on?”
She shook her head, a happy and reluctant smile tugging at her lips. “I know what you’re doing.”
“And what am I doing?”
“You’re trying to distract me.”
I studied her features, memorizing her in this moment, her bravery and strength.
This was the third time I’d driven up to visit her since moving to Texas for my last year of undergraduate studies. But instead of going out for a movie or ripping each other’s clothes off, we’d driven to Chicago. Specifically, we’d driven to the Robert H. Lurie Comprehensive Cancer Center and spent the day together, waiting.
We’d waited. And waited.
And waited.
Today was her annual oncology checkup. She’d had blood drawn and an MRI. Lots of people asked her the same questions over and over. She was poked and prodded and pushed and pulled. Each time she answered them politely, with infinite patience. She was courageous in a way I never would be. She was grace where I would have been irritable and exasperated.
Through it all, I could do nothing but hold her hand. I stifled my desire to rave like a lunatic, buried the fear and frustration under teasing remarks and terrible jokes.
So far so good.
“Is it working?”
“Yes.” Her brilliant eyes twinkled down at me from her spot on the exam table. I was entirely too far away, trying not to appear anxious where I sat in a remarkably small and uncomfortable chair.
Unable to tolerate the distance any longer, I left my jacket on the chair and moved to stand between her legs. “Good.”
“But you don’t have to.” She titled her head to the side, her dark lashes sweeping against rosy cheeks. “I’m not going to have a breakdown.”
“I didn’t think you were, darling.” I squeezed her waist and added under my breath, “But I might.”
Her grin waned, grew soft and sympathetic, and she wrapped her arms around my neck. “I feel fine.”
“Good. That’s good. You look mighty fine, too.”
Fiona’s smile was back and she laughed, scratching her nails on the back of my neck. “What do you want to do when this is over?”
“Oh, the usual. Grab sardine sandwiches, give you multiple orgasms, walk the park, get married, maybe grab a drink at that new bar on Michigan.”
“Sardine sandwiches? Again?”
I grinned wildly. “You know you liked them.”
She gagged, screwing up her face. “It’s like eating mushy, scaly salt on toast.”
“Fine. You eat your brain soup and be wrong and loathed. I’ll eat my sardine sandwiches and be delightful and admired.”
“Plus,” she added thoughtfully, “I didn’t know you made a habit of getting married when you visited Chicago.”
“I haven’t, not yet. But I’m open to adopting any new habit that forces you to move down to Austin with me.”
She glower-smirked. “For the record, I’m entirely in favor of getting married right now. But you already knew that.”
She spoke the truth. Ever since we’d become engaged she’d wanted us to elope. But I wanted to wait. I wanted a long engagement. I wanted us to take our time.
“We don’t have to get married in order for you to move to Austin.”
“I can’t move to Austin,” she replied mournfully. “But you already knew that, too.”
At the beginning of last summer, just as we’d become engaged and Fiona considered a move and transfer to Austin, she’d been tapped for a very important and impressive internship through the college of engineering. Some super, top-secret partnership with the Department of Defense.
She’d said, I’d tell you what it’s all about, but then I’d have to kill you more times than I could count, finding the phrase hilarious. Obviously her sense of humor was just as twisted and odd as mine, though wrapped in a petite and sexy package.
I adopted a glower; mine was entirely false. “I don’t see that I’m asking too much by demanding you give up your career, all your friendships, and extracurricular activities, and make me—and the chicken pot pie you’ll be cooking every night while barefoot—the center of your universe.”