The Five Strands of A Sedentary Empress

it's a twin thing

"it's a twin thing" 

There's an F18 tearing up the sky. I can hear it, and I look out the window before spying it.

There's an F18 out there!, I call to M. who is holed up in his office, looking at simulated aircraft and the photos on the walls; mourning.

Very good, he calls back, and I think I hear him smiling.

This is one of the things that makes us a couple. He loves airplanes, lives and breathes them, and despite my dismissiveness of it years ago, I now genuinely find myself pleased when I am able to identify a plane and tell him about it. He loves it also, because to him it means I am making an attempt to understand him and what makes him him. What I love about it is that it feels okay, that I am not really forcing the interest. I actually do like seeing huge, sinister looking warplanes flying outside the window, because of him, because I love what he is about. It is effortless, this gradual understanding of things and there is comfort in the certainty it brings.

Last week, I whipped out one of those questions which makes a man stop chewing, or watching, or thinking.

Do you even know what my underwear looks like?

Uh, what?,he asked wearily.

I mean, do you even care if I wear old lady panties with holes in the crotch or do you prefer black lace? Something edible? I seriously have no idea what you're into when it comes to panties.

Well, I guess I don't care much about that sort of thing. I don't think about it.

Okay, well I wanted to know because I often walk by lingerie stores and I have to wonder if I'm depriving you of something because I don't really wear the 'sexy' stuff. You don't comment one way or the other and it frustrates me.

I guess I'm not your typical guy. I don't get off on that kind of thing. He thought for a moment before continuing. I do have turn-ons, though.

Oh yeah? I asked, pouting.

I think it's incredibly sexy when you think the same thing as me at the same time. It's like we're connected, and that is really attractive to me.

Oh. I tried to stop myself from grinning.

He used to call me twin when we were writing to one another. He used to call me 'Empress', too. Though I'd never forgotten either, his words brought the past to the present. Odd how a memory tears down the walls you unwittingly construct.

Then today, a dead mother, a strange, psychedelic morning of feeling useless, like he was supposed to be doing something, but couldn't figure out what. He sat in a chair staring at a blackened monitor, wondering about what would ease the numbness which was more intense than any kind of pain.

Are you hungry, yet? I poked my head in the room.

He considered this for a moment, as though he'd forgotten he had a body, that it needs to eat and drink and feel. He looked at me for a moment before speaking.

I think I am, he smiled weakly. You know what I really, really want, though?

Yes, I thought.

Scrambled eggs and toast, he said before I had a chance to respond.

I know, I beamed knowingly. And I actually did.

It was the wrong time for sexy in so many ways, but I know he was happy for it, anyway.

I shuffled quickly down the stairs to the kitchen where the egg carton waited on the counter, and pulled two pieces of bread from the bag before the toaster.