Barry Graham

And so it goes. Like this. 5:38am. An unseasonably cold August morning. Holding both hands to both hips of the only woman you've ever loved. The mother of your children. An unkempt queen sized bed. Your head against her bare chest. Hard and deep she sleeps. Her lungs fill and empty in rhythm. Her heart beats the same. You think of Reno and Little Rock. Old friends in old cities you will never touch again. Fat gray cat on the windowsill watching everything. You squeeze her hips tighter. Fingers become flesh. Blood and bones and heartbeats synchronize. You try to remember a day you didn't love her. You can't. In her dream she calls out for a man she once knew and loved. Still loves. The cat jumps from the windowsill. Startles her awake. She slips on your white tshirt and goes to the kitchen for cereal. Tomorrow she will consider leaving you for this man. Walk out on eighteen years. Meet him in a jacuzzi suite and let him climb on top of her. After dinner she will tell you how much she loved it when he first entered her and his dick parted her labia. How wet she got in anticipation. You will stay anyway if she lets you. But that's tomorrow. Right now she's eating cereal and you are asleep before she's back in bed.