DEAR YOU [Part 1]

Chapter 3

JACK

"Hey honey." she screamed, I startled. "Why are you screaming Flo?" I put the cup of tea on the stand beside; got up from the recliner with all the strength I could muster and looked at her.

"Well I wouldn't have screamed my dear if you responded to me the five times I said it politely."

"Oh." I was less ashamed more grievous of the effects ageing had on me, "You know about these ears and how they never work." Her smile offered me comfort.

"So I met Irene at the mart today."

"After so long. That would have been nice, right?" I asked even though her face screamed no. What can I say, after living with your other half for almost forty years one does not need words to communicate.

"She told me how her whole family is going to be there, at her place, for the holidays. How her granddaughter cannot seem to get enough of her nana and how they will wear Christmas jammies for a family photo."

"Christmas, huh?" I said "That's way too far. Who knows maybe" she cut me before I could continue.

"What? Maybe they would call us?"

She knows how this topic always upsets her and yet she won't ever stop talking about it.

"You know what?" she went into the kitchen mid sentence and came out with a plate of cake in her hands "Let's have some cake."

"Wake up honey, its 7 in the morning already." Flo pretended not to hear me and pulling the blanket over her head, she said "I know."

"What about the morning walk you agreed you'll go with me."

She sighed heavily and showing her face a bit, continued "But if you really think about it, did I? Did I agree?"

It is crazy how after so many years together, after so many wrinkles and ageing, she still is the most important thing to me. I still love her the exact same as I did when we were young. She is more than enough for me.

"Yes, you did." I replied.

We were walking slowly around the park, admiring the sky and the sun, the flowers and the green when I saw at a distance a little girl trying to catch a butterfly. The butterfly flapped her wings away from the girl but the girl, so determined to have that colorful little thing to herself, chased it. She ran towards the butterfly, her eyes set to those wings that without any knowledge of her surrounding, she bumped right into us.

"I am sorry." She said with such politeness. She got up.

I saw her run back to her mother only to turn and see Flo, her moist eyes.

"What is the matter dear?" no matter how much I have seen her cry before, each tear of hers make me want to die. "Say something." I asked impatiently.

Her eyes fixed at the rock between her feet, she said "Don't you miss them?"

As I said, she is more than enough for me but there is something she wishes for every second of every day.

I took her hand, "Let's get you home." I said.