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"thanks for the trouble you took from her eyes"
john puts his head on my shoulder and gives me that scent i love so well: cinnamon and dried fruit. i curl my hands around his arm and pull him closer. his hair, soft and just washed, tickles my lips. my mouth can't catch itself:
"i wish robert loved me as much as you do."
his breath washes me in a sigh. i wish i could take those words back and stuff them down my throat again.
"he loves you. he's trying." the way john says it sounds like a song. something caught on my fingers.
i let it fall and talk about the rain. we spend the day in bed under the wool and the following day reading, taking turns. we cook, we clean, we listen to the radio. i could live with john paul. i cannot live with you.
the start of the new week he drives me back across the countryside in his little maroon car. i kiss him goodbye.
you're coming back for the weekend from the north. i breathe without you for the afternoon. heavy, deep breaths. i make a stew in the kitchen, like you told me your mother made when you were a child, and wait.
you're here before it gets dark, legs dirty from playing football in the mud.
you bruise me with your look, show your teeth, and tilt your head. you don't ask where i was. i think you know.
but that's not on your mind when you dip bread into the soup, when you eat so ravenous. you wipe your mouth with the back of your hand.
i think of john and his napkins, folding between gentle fingers. john and his loving fingers when they press against my mouth to hold me still. john touching me while i bathe.
"how's pagey and 'em?"
"huh?" i turn to stare your way. your wet hair is caught in your face. your mustache, like john's, makes you look half-grown.
"you phoned them while i was out?"
"they're well," i say. john and i got to talking and he invited me down to meet him for lunch. that's how it planned out. jimmy told me he was spending the day taking photographs. i asked him to send me some when he got the chance. pat answered the phone for bonzo and said her man was still asleep.
"you're upset?" you try. you get up and move around, awkward in the semi-dark.
"no, not at all. the weather makes me tired."
"me too." sniffling, nodding. "i'm going to clean up."
you love me. you're trying. you know about john.
there's wine in the cabinet that shines deep red when i hold it up. i drink. i get drunk and laugh when you revisit wrapped in a blanket, naked like a babe. you laugh with me, sip with me, take my hands and undress with me. we're earthy and bare together and you brush my cheek with yours:
"i'm glad he makes you happy. i'm writing a letter to thank him."
a fading smile interrupts me. "what?"
"you're nobody's wife. and i know that now. you deserve to be free."
i don't know what to tell you, but get the urge to bury my face in your warm center, where the hair on your stomach makes me happy. i'll nest here for a while, so that you know i savored.
