Echoes of Love

Bzzz Bzzz

I'm aware of a noise in my sleepy haze

Bzzz Bzzz

Sleep is thick in my eyes and my body protests movement but I sit up and reach over his body to where my phone is charging. He stirs slightly but does not wake, comfortable and content in my bed. The phone in my hand is hard and bright. Who could need me at this time of day?

Saturday morning at 5AM and somewhere someone felt the need to invade my privacy. If it's work I'm going to scream, if it's family I'm going to go back to sleep, if it's a drunk text from Karen again I'm going to kill.

Looking at the screen I see the smiling icon that tells me I have a new text. I am tempted to ignore it, roll over and go back to sleep, nothing could be that important this early, especially in text format. If it was a real emergency it would have been a call. But part of me hopes it's you, part of me aches to hear from you again. I have not reached out, I have not spoken to you, trying to respect that you have a life without me. I do not want to be a complication and I do not want to hurt you.

But I can't deny the excitement in my heart as I open the text and see your name looking back at me. In the early morning warmth of my bed I swoon.

Hi You

I smile into the dark room, the bright light of the phone illuminating my joy.

Hi Me, I reply.

For a moment I forget about the world around me, the dust on my dresser disappears and the undone dishes in the kitchen lose all importance. The man lying next to me fades away until all that I see is you. I step outside of the timeline of my life to be with you.

You doing ok?

I'm gr8. Why r u up so early?

Still in bed

Thinking of me

Yes

I catch my breath, struck with the image of you in bed, the room is dark and you are just waking and your first thought is of me. I imagine your body, your skin, warm and inviting. Finally I imagine myself in your bed with you and my smile is unintended.

That ok? I can still think about u right?

Depends on what you're thinking

All good things

I think about u 2

Silence

My mind drifts to kisses stolen and I feel no regret. I haven't heard from you in over a week. I had accepted that you were now a stranger. I have kept you out of my mind and fallen back into my life here, work and friends and love. But I can't deny that in the small hours I dream of you and what we might have. I can't deny that I love hearing that you think of me.

Let me know when ur back in Seattle, we'll do something.

I smile and close my phone, not responding. I don't trust myself. I don't know what to say. The idea of seeing you again makes me feel like I am going home. I wonder if you know that when I said I had to go it was physically painful. I wonder if you expect it to happen again or if it'll only be dinner this time. I want so much that is out of my grasp.

I never told you about my life, never told you that I feel like heaven has closed its gates to me, that my choices have kept me standing in the middle of an abandoned road heading nowhere. And every moment feels like I'm running out of space.

My sigh is tinged with pain as I place my phone on the bed side table and sink back into my pillow.

"Who was that?" he asks, half awake. His hand reaches out to me and curls around my hip, pulling me toward him.

"Nothing," I respond, my voice flat as I try to push you from my heart into the recesses of all the things I've lost, where you belong.

"It's not work is it? Kris, it's fucking Saturday." He retracts his hand and I am cold without the contact. Without you my threshold for loneliness is so much lower, my need for reassurance so much higher. These things were supposed to get better over time, but they never did. I never recovered and now with my heart torn in rags, keeping a hold on reality is so much more painful.

"No, not work." I roll toward him and begin to trace the contour of his shoulder, his muscular neck, and his unshaven jaw line.

"Sorry, it's just, it's been so much lately and now with you traveling"

"I know, I'm sorry, I really am." I kiss his cheek softly and breathe him in, wishing he didn't smell so good to me, wishing he smelled like you.

"I know babe." He turns to me and replaces his hand, my body responds without my mind agreeing or considering it. I always respond to him.