Young Writers Society

Clint works at six, and I work at nine. But every morning, we both wake up at the same alarm. And while he showers, I fix his breakfast and pack his lunch. Most days, I slice a bagel in half, spread the cream cheese, fry him two eggs, and pour him a glass of cranberry juice. 

He can just as easily slice his own bagel in half and spread his own cream cheese. But he doesn't. And it's not because I'm a woman or because he's a man. 

But because it's something that I can do. It's something simple and deliberate. It's something I will always do. 

Yesterday, as I held his bagel in my left hand and sawed it with my right, I sliced open my finger. The blood came rushing quickly, but Clint was quicker. He took my hand in his and held it over the sink, cleaning my wound, disinfecting it, and bandaging it. And you know, I'm just as capable of throwing some peroxide over a minor knife cut, but I didn't. It's something he can do, something he will always do. 

Sometimes, I feel like no one can understand me. For them to know something, to know me, I must tell them. But not with Clint. Clint knows my thoughts before they've formed into words, from the look on my face, the gesture of my hand, the way I stand. He will mention things about me that I didn't think anyone had noticed. 

In the car, in the evenings, I stare out the window because something about the dark makes my grief want to hold my face in both hands and confront me. He will squeeze my hand and stop the car because he knows that I'm crying even when it's silent. And he doesn't say anything when he holds me. I tell him I miss my dad. And he tells me he knows.

He knows. He knows when I'm upset, like the time I made fresh pasta for my family; I was frustrated because the dough wasn't coming together properly. The ratio of something was off and I couldn't figure out what it was. And it must have been written on my face, so he pushed me aside and told me to let him handle it while I worked on something else. It just needed his touch to come together. 

He told me when we first met that his arm is messed up from the third and fourth-deegree burns he got his sophomore year. And even now, though we're married, I pretend I can't tell which one of his arms is scarred up because it's hardly noticeable. Most people can't tell anyway. 

Sometimes, it's hard to remember that Clint hasn't always been in my life. He's somehow stained the rest of my memories in that rosy hue. He's cradled my heart in his hands for so long now that I don't think I could ever hold it on my own again. And no one else's touch would be the same, would ever come close. His hands are callused from hard work but they're gentle for me. 

It's strange to think, how every person I meet now, will only have known me after I've loved Clint and after he's loved me.