“What are you thinking?” he
asked.
“I’m not,” I replied.
He sat down on the porch
swing. I proceeded to pour out a drink
for the thirsty flowers. He started
picking at his thumbs. He was always
picking at his thumbs. He tugged at the
tight skin, the cuticles.
“Don’t do that. You’ll bleed,” I said. He continued to pick without looking up at
me. A moat of blood formed around the
nail. Into his mouth he placed the
digit, trying to suck dry what continued to flow. How young he looked, with his thumb inside
of his mouth. He said so much more than
his lips spoke.
For a moment, I gazed beyond his
form at the expanse of land behind his head.
The cotton dresses hanging on the line billowed in the June breeze. Behind them, the waves of sky created a vivid
contrast between the sharp white of garments hardly worn. The sun was rising earlier; the dresses would
find stains soon enough.
His thumb secured his sight once
again, with a perseverant peeling of old skin to reveal new skin.
I sat down beside him.
“Stop it.” I pulled his hands apart. He held onto one of mine.
“What are you thinking?” I
asked. He frowned at me.
“I asked you first.”
“But I want to know more.” Again, he furrowed his brow for a
moment. As soon as I noticed, though, it
was gone. He broke into a smile. Happiness had always seemed foreign on his
face. How curious, that a thing so
natural would appear removed from his countenance. I stared past his peculiarity, and he stared
back. I broke.
“You make me happy,” I said,
brushing his cheek. He tilted my head
downward and touched his lips to my hair. Our eyes met for a moment, and then he looked
away.
“When do you have to go?” I
asked. He resituated in his seat. His discomfort did not appear suddenly;
rather, it peaked with my question.
“I don’t want to,” he said. His words fell out. Their meaning took a moment to catch up.
“But you have to.” He always had to.
“No, I don’t.” I sighed and tried to hold his gaze, but he
looked away.
“You do. Look at me.” His eyes returned. I pulled his face toward
mine. He glanced at my mouth before
returning upward. I held steadfastly to
his country brown irises.
“I love you,” I whispered. My speech rose in a kind of question. Did he notice?
“Me, too.” Habit.
His eyes broke free from my locked stare. They, too, drank in the view of the flat land
beyond the house. On many a day in my
youth, I had found a critter crawling across the grass to find its home. How easy it was to suffocate those ones,
after containing them in jars for further observation.
He stood. My body softly rocked on the swing with his
weight gone.
“I should go.” I knew.
His stance was still. I remained
on the swing.
“Good-bye,” he said. Without a backward glance, he moved toward
the house.
I watched his steps through the screen as he opened
the kitchen door. It swung behind him, and
he disappeared.
The paint fell off of the house
in wide chips. It was a dusty old
place. The porch swing had been secured
many times, and the beams above creaked a symphony with my gentle
movement. I could hear it now.
After a moment, I stretched
above my head and pulled myself up. I picked
up the watering can and finished drinking in the summer blooms.
