cutting corners in the dark

I listen carefully to the things he isn't saying. I crawl down inside the deepness of his silences. I swim cold among all the possible words that could fill the well back up. And I wonder. 

"This is the third time you have smacked your head on that hen house.  You would think HE would do something about it by now..." 

He sounds angry and tired. Head injuries tend to make him nervous; the unknown makes him cross. Distance, even crosser. 

"I was rushing to get to work. Anyway I can't see in the dark. Besides Doctor, it is not polite to cyber stalk" 

I can picture him sitting behind a large cherry-wood desk holding his head in his hand. Running his fingers through his hair. 

Seeing him so clearly sends an eclectic rush of pain up my back.

"I'm not saying... I'm only pointing out...Misty."

He softens his voice, "Do you ever wish you would have chosen differently, chosen me?" 

I can remember the way the air in the room would change right before he would come around a corner.  

"Did you really just ask me that?" 

"No, because I think the answer would crush me." He exhales. "You look different. You look happy. I need to know..." 

I remember how hearing his name in conversation would pop the same color through my mind as does the moment a match catches on the camp stove's blue flame, igniting at my fingertips.

He breaks,  "I have to go. You know, I'm sort of important around here for all the saving lives stuff that I do."

"Please, you have to understand." 

He cuts me off, "No, no, I don't. You never talk to me. I never know how you feel. I always have to find it out from someone else. I can tell there is something going on with you but I don't know what it is..."

I can remember the weight of just standing beside him.

If I could undo the dam for him I would. I would tell him I was thinking about him when I came up a little too early under the the corner of the chicken coop roof.

I would tell him that yes, I did love him, but I don't anymore, not like that. I haven't for a long time. 

But when I did, there were no silences in my head. I had so many words I was drowning in them. And to me he was bigger than the desert.   

"Misty, please just tell me this, are you in love....?"

And I remember believing I would never be capable of loving someone like that ever again. Turns out never is a very long time. 

"Yes Dear, I'm afraid I am."