Controversy

Sorry

Sorry.  Copyright © 2013 by Jasmine Tabor. All rights reserved.

Dedicated to that brilliant time in my life when I could just sit down and write crap without a second thought.

When people get in fights, they need to solve their problems like Martha and Noah do in this short romantic story.

Not many people inspired Martha though maybe many people aspired to be her. She was never sure about the last part of that fact but she knew one thing: No one inspired her like a poet.

Though Martha herself tried to be a poet when she was younger and failed to complete a book devoted completely to poems, she still read them and wrote them on a weekly basis. It was something she loved and didn't want to let go completely. She collected books of them, filled her shelves thoroughly with them.

Some she couldn't understand without a language translator, others she had to read aloud to feel its entirety, and some were stories in her head she'd use as inspiration.

She loved them all. Each was a world of its own, different from the last. Too many beautiful and too many hideous but Martha still kept them not only for herself but for the people she read for.

As a renowned author and blogger, she read to numerous people at countless book clubs, schools, and author signings. She enjoyed the thrill of reading to the crowds whether they were large or small, young or old. She had books for any age, stories for anyone to love.

While she loved reading to everyone, her favorite person to read to was her husband, Noah. They each indulged in the silence after a long, busy day in front of the fireplace with a notebook. Like Martha, Noah was a famous writer in his own genre. He wrote and illustrated informational graphics in books and lettering old and original poems. And every evening, he would have another draft ready for viewing by his wife.

One evening after a long and very busy day, Noah and Martha upset each other. Though the two spoke less then twenty words to each other, they managed to arrange dinner together, and Martha decided that was the time to conceal herself in the upstairs loft.

Eventually, Noah slowly walked up the metal staircase and faced his dejected life partner. He knew her well enough to know she felt lonely and couldn't possibly be doing anything alone. She was abusing herself for the things she said during the fight earlier, and Noah hated when she did that. So he decided to see her. Besides, if he waited to apologize, she'd do it and Noah wasn't one for "sorries" like she was.

"Sweetie?" Noah called and found her sitting on the couch with a journal in her hands and a broken pencil placed carefully behind her ear. This was her signature thinking state. Noah smiled and sat down next to her. "Are you alright?"

Martha sighed heavily, releasing whatever problems she had hanging from her shoulders and turned to face her significant other. "Yes. I was being a jerk earlier. I'm sor-"

"Sweet?"

"Yes?"

"Please don't apologize. For my sake." Martha nodded her head at Noah's request. He grinned gaily at her. His eyes sparkled a little, making Martha smile with him. "Thank you."

Noah looked around the room. Books were discarded across the coffee table along with Martha's neatly placed dinner plate set to the side. Pages from her draft notebook sat on the ground in miserable heaps. Noah settled in his mind that now was the perfect time to share drafts. "Read my sketch?"

Martha paused, weighing whether the time was emotionally appropriate for her to do so. Finally, she took the sketch from his hands and looked at it with an affectionate regard. Gorgeous swirls looped around the letters in the center of the paper. The sentences in the center read:

I have a paperback heart

dog-eared and creased by the world,

the colors

are faded

and the spine is worn

but I'm glad

to see

it's finally in

good

hands

To my sweetie

Martha felt tears fall down her face. "Now can I say sorry yet?"

Noah enclosed his hands around her waist and pulled her onto his lap. He kissed her hands and forehead. "You already said enough."