This Year’s Love

Its been a hard year I know. We haven’t spent much time together. The telephone waves we burnt up and the internet camaraderie we shared mean zilch in the real world. In the real world, love doesn’t have the shelter of distances. Love is always tested by proximity, by lack of space.

Neverthless, you amaze me. You’ve managed to hold on to a part of me in your absence; I shiver at the thought of what your presence might do to me. Turn me into a mad man, perhaps, sick with longing and disillusionment, like other couples we know. Or a boring man perhaps, brimming with tales of the latest antics of his irrationally doted-upon toddlers; imagine, Yamini and Thoma would flee for their dear lives at the sound of my footsteps.

Except for the odd moment of desperation, I haven’t wronged you in thought, even. Tomorrow this time, your complete annexure of one year of my time, affections and attention will have been complete. For all practical purposes, you have been my master and commander, subtle and wise, your suggestions so strong, they seemed to me my own. Yet, in some unlit alcove of my mind, I know. I have always known.

Darling, this is not working for me. Darling, this is working so well, it’s threatening to take me over, and I can’t have that. I can’t be boring or mad, you know that. I need always to be attractive for us to work. And us, this, working will render me unattractive. It’s like one of those algebraic conundrums you find so exhilarating to work out. Or from your perspective, it’s classical irony, the kind I can only aspire to create in my work.

My coffee has gone cold. It’s been a year since I had a good cup of coffee in the morning. Technically, I should have grown used to the taste of too much-or too little-coffee powder, or sugar or water. Incredibly, I haven’t. Everyday of those three hundred and more days, I have taken my first sip and sighed. More than anything, it is the sigh that gives me away. That sigh is my desire for all things you; the unspoken faith that tomorrow, things will be better, tomorrow, you will wake me up with a towel around your long damp hair, the sight of newly exfoliated skin and the smell of fresh brewed coffee jerking my senses into over-drive. Every morning, I wake up and sigh for you.

I miss sighing for me. I miss sauntering through the…

Mae hit the next button. Her answering phone replied with static while it skipped merrily along to the next message. David’s voice filled the room and space.

Hey baby. We’re meeting at eight right? Not seven. Right. See ya.

Mae looked deep into her eyes in the mirror and watched her soul swell with joy. She smiled. This year’s love.