ShErLoCk oNeSiEs

Morning Tea and Things

I never understood pain.

They all care so much.

I never understood love.

They all feel so much.

He makes me feel so much.

He makes me feel like so much.

And maybe it will silence my internal uproar at being looked after.

~

John likes his tea without sugar. He stirs and lightly blows and kisses the horizon of his tea with tentative lips if it's too hot and sets it down, a newspaper the newest subject of his attention.

His eyes don't waver.

Every paragraph, every advertisement, every headline crosses his line of vision. Unconscious fingers slip through the porcelain loop and he sips sugarless tea. I don't know how he takes tea without sugar. But he seems to like it.

And his opinions don't waver.

I am all harsh words and cutting observations and shameless deductions and undying addictions and maddening habits and infuriating comments, but he seems alright with it.

And his smiles don't waver.

In a corona of blinding flashes of red and blue, deafening sirens' screeches tearing at the air of a crime scene with renewed vigour after being kept silent since the last murder, after doing nothing less than taking the life of a man, he smiles at me.

And he doesn't waver.

And I will never know why.

And I will never want to know why.

Because what I am truly afraid of is not found in his absence; it is not found in the frightening scenario that a single darkened silhouette is left trailing behind me as my story plays out.

It is in his belief.

His nerves have raced each other in loops round and round his cranium, encasing his head in the belief that I am indestructible.

How it strips one's inhibitions to see your one weakness openly declare that you are invincible, indestructible.

I am in awe of his ability to love, and it will never cease to amaze me. He never ceases to amaze me.

He doesn't squirm under my scrutinizing gaze. Instead, he has the audacity to throw me off the tracks by throwing me a smile. We lock eyes and he smiles. And sips his sugarless tea.

I don't know how he likes it.

Then again, I have not the tiniest bit of sugar in me. I am a human culmination of sour and bitter and tasteless things.

But he seems to like me.

So I don't question it. I let him sip his tea. I let him smile at me.

Every morning this happens, and every time I let myself sink just a little deeper in the bluish-grey of his eyes. I watch him sip his morning tea, and he watches me over the edge of his newspaper.

I take nothing for granted, but there is something of a sense of leisurely permanence in the way John sips his tea every morning. Like every morning will be like every other one has been. Like he will be here, sitting in his damned chair, sipping tea, flipping through the paper for every day for the rest of his life.

It's not a conscious decision that I can recall making, but I only grin wider when he asks why I am smiling.

And he smiles back. And it is enough.

It really is enough for us.

-- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- --

AAAAAaaaAaAAaAAA IM NOT DEAD

sorry it's short and not even a legit one shot and ndjendndnsks but I'm lazy and hdjenfjdnskcmdkdndksnd

ANYWHO

WODUP MY BEAUTIFUL FAM

also sorry for not updating this, blocks and no ideas and terrible writing and things

and...other things.

well.

also thank you everyone who reads this and comments and doesn't comment but still reads it and jdkenfkwjdnsns ily all

ok peace

~A.M.