"You have the saddest eyes I've ever seen," he called to me from my bedroom.

I couldn't hear him over my own gargling.  "Grglwhat?", I spat into the sink.  The blue, green liquid swirled around before making its inevitable journey down the drain.

I wiped my mouth and headed back into my room.  He was tying his shoes.

"What?", I asked again.  He looked up at me and smiled.  Well, more of a smirk, that I happened to adore.

"You've got the saddest eyes I've ever seen."

I tilted my head as I searched for a pair of matching earrings on my dresser.  It looked like a glittering sea of bright colors, clasps, beads, rings, and pins. Organization is not my best quality.

Curious. No one had ever said that to me before.  People give halfhearted compliments like high-fives or smiles, without a second thought.  I couldn't count the different things said about my eyes.  This struck a chord.

I smiled to myself, placing the backs on to both my pearls.  Being with Bert was always like a humming a familiar song.  It kept me grounded. Safe.

We'd both been insurmountably lonely lately.  Both working jobs we hated. Both lost.  Both looking and searching for something, someone without a name. Somehow he'd meandered his way into my life.  Again. And into my apartment.  Somehow, I just didn't seem to mind.  We just needed the company, the warm body, the hot breath, the soft snore, the smooth skin.  Someone to fill the vast emptiness in a bed that always seemed too big.

We hadn't even so much as kissed.  We'd traveled that road twice before.  Dead ends.  But my writing had never been better. Likewise, he felt the same about his music.  We were unstoppable.  And pitiful. 

I looked in the mirror and caught him studying me.

He didn't even seem to mind my lack of response.  I guess he's grown used to my silences.

"You know, " he considered me, "I used to think you wore your heart on your sleeve, proudly waving it like some banner or flag.  Thinking you thought yourself a martyr."

He took a few tentative steps in my direction.

My brown eyes and his blue locked on the surface of the mirror.

"But I finally realized, you sit quietly behind your walls and in your tower, but your heart pours loudly out of your wide, sad eyes."

This chord was so loud, I stumbled.

Even loneliness and distance can be penetrated.

But loneliness has its own comfort, I thought as we headed into the kitchen and gathered our things for work, each quietly running through our own mental checklists.

As I locked the door behind me and we headed off in our separate directions, I turned to watch him swagger his way down the sidewalk.

I prayed heartily that he wouldn't be there when I got home.  I prayed to keep my loneliness.

And yet I know the sight of his shoes by the door will make me feel like I'm home.

I turned my back on his retreating, curly-headed figure and began walking, humming a familiar little tune to myself.

and on another note entirely....

"even if your hands are shaking
         and your faith is broken
                even as the eyes are closing
                       do it with a heart wide open

and say what you need to say"

one day

none of this

will make sense.

Scatterheart

   

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