A nose appeared from the edge of my peripheral vision and I looked up quickly to meet the pale blue eyes and dimpled smile of my husband. Sometimes he's all teeth and twinkles and it's really cute, you have to look hard if you're watching for signs that he's aging. There's a maturity in his expression that was hard-won, a world-weariness that tells you he has seen more with those eyes than most of us ever hope to, a light that never quits that tells you he has hope for everyone, including me, and a warm coldness that I can't describe because it alludes to his incredibly surprising asperity with our relationship.
Jacob is always in a rush.
He's not as laid back as he was when he was a friend.
When I write I usually grab the coffee, take out the hearing aids, put on my headphones and let my hair fall over my face in a curtain and those are my signs that I am tuning out life to enter my imaginary world with no distractions save for the wandering of my own brain as it tells my fingers what to do. A reverie I would trade my life for if only sometimes it were permanent, sanctioned daydreaming, escapism I have grown to covet.
My concentration shatters when he puts himself into my line of sight, a broken train of thought that disappears and I become easily frustrated and impatient. He is unable to stand back and watch now that we have arrived in this place, in this time in history. He used every moment he had and now there are none left.
But I'm being good. I haven't had a drink save for a sip of a mimosa on our trip. I take my pills, I went back to Claus after a major blowup in which I said I would jump off the roof if I had to return to the other. I was taken seriously, and he's mad and I'm disappointed, both of us in my need to resort to that level of painful dramatics to make a point. I told him that was precisely why I can't get anywhere with him, he doesn't pay attention to what I want until it's too late.
And sometimes I get mad and tell him just to go for an hour so I can work and he points out the new carafe of coffee he was offering me, nothing more and I feel like a bitch and he gets to play martyr and it only really works well when our roles are reversed and he can be the hardass and I am the trophy who can do no wrong.
And sometimes I really like the interruptions and the fuss he makes over me. I feel less alone and the glass dissolves before my eyes and his coldness and his rush fall away and he is my ready steady rock.
And sometimes thoughts just stop and never make any sense at all, it's just some thought that has to get out, whether there's resolution or not. Like turning off a song in the middle and when you go to listen again, you start the whole song over.
