babyhead

It is early afternoon. I am sure the boy is watching the light drag itself across the campus parking lot, counting the hours until dismissal when we will cross the dry creek to the car and head home for first dinner.

For the moment, my wife and I, we are alone, except for the dumb tabby asleep in the coveted living room chair.

I stand in the bathroom and you strip for me, but only to the waist. I ask you to lift your arm up as the amber light recedes. I press my index and pointer fingers together, a gesture I have used to emphasize direction, blame or occasionally a trembling pleasure. This time the set, more appropriate the pair is used to trace a simple map, as I run the length of the incision. I drag my fingers, gently, from under your arm pit following its' lip and moving to the left, across your chest wall. I stop at the point where your heart lays buried. I think to myself, the scar is formed like the keel of a schooner.

You glance down, to catch my eye, giving me a look of as though you are the luckiest girl in the world with ten better things you could be doing.

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