Dean walked the kids to school on Monday morning. He had a late start to his work day so he offered Lena a break, and of course, he wanted to spend more time with Claire and Noah. She watched from the kitchen as Dean fumbled with Noah’s jacket, a bit out of rhythm with the usual flow of the day. His hands were clumsy, as if the fabric itself had become a puzzle, a tangle of sleeves and zippers that refused to cooperate. He pulled at the arms, tugging with a soft frustration. Noah, more wiggly than willing, squirmed in protest, his little arms darting this way and that, a blur of energy and defiance this morning. Noah, please hold still, he muttered, a hint of amusement in his voice. Noah giggled in a high-pitched laugh, clearly enjoying the game of escape that Lena would most certainly not have tolerated. Something about Dean tangled in the mundane task of zipping a coat on their son, rather than navigating the world of spreadsheets and emails and stuffy attitudes first thing in the morning, brought a quiet smile to Lena’s face. Dean paused for a moment, eyes flicked toward her, seeking reassurance, maybe even a silent plea for help. His lips curled up at the corner, sheepish but proud, as if to say, your job may be harder than mine. Noah giggled again, this time making a break for it, darting past his dad, but Dean was quick, an arm around his waist, pulling him back gently but firmly. With a final tug, the jacket slipped fully on, the last zip sliding closed with a satisfying click. A small victory.
Noah, delighted by the entire ordeal, gave him a grin that felt like triumph. Claire stood by the door, impatiently waiting, tapping her foot on the floor. Guys, come on. Yes, honey, we’re ready, Dean responded, an edge to his tone. Lena laughed softly from the kitchen. A choir of I love you’s, and the trio went on their way.
Lena forwent her cup of coffee at home, having a bit of extra morning time on her hands with the kids off early with Dean. She popped down to the coffee shop, the one she didn’t notice for the past decade and now frequented on a weekly, sometimes semi-weekly basis, apparently. Notebook in tow. She walked in, eyes instinctively taking inventory of the area around the espresso machine. She didn’t see him. She scanned the room from left to right, reading it like a book, leaving no word or punctuation unobserved. Must be his day off, she said to herself. A bit of relief. She approached the counter, exchanged the usual pleasantries with today’s barista, a woman whose beauty didn’t lie in any extraordinary feature, ordinary. Smile soft, not showy. Lena waited for her coffee at the end of the bar before she took a seat by the window. She rested her hands gently on her notebook, coffee just off to the right. She took her phone from her purse with the intent to fill some of the empty space around her and within her. She unlocked it to find a message from Lila. The world outside the window flickered by, unnoticed. A couple passed, laughing, their voices dissolving into the symphony of distant chatter. Still thinking about Saturday night, can’t wait to continue our chats. XX. The text read. Her posture spoke of contemplation, though her mind was far from the pages in front of her. She leaned back slightly, the cool ceramic of the rim of the mug, where the hot coffee didn’t quite reach, warmed her left palm as she briefly touched it, her gaze drifting from the screen to the steam that curled upward like fleeting thoughts, dissipating into the air. She set her phone down to better concentrate. A slight frown tugging at the corner of her lips.
She too was still thinking about Saturday, but rather than feeling comforted by the transport back to their chats in the wine bar, she was beginning to have feelings of regret. What Lila said, about love, the institution of marriage, soul ties - Lena couldn’t help but wonder if she had placed romantic love at the center of her life to her detriment. If she had been measuring her life’s worth through this singular connection. Its completeness conditional upon the success of her marriage. Since she met Dean, until she met Lila, was through romantic love the only way she had been known or seen? She was not practiced in useful solitude like Lila. Nor in keeping herself imaginative company since she published her book of poetry. And even her poems - were they nothing more than reflections on the eternal nature of romantic love.
Some poems began in quietude, like the first stirrings of affection, the soft glance exchanged across a crowded room, the brush of fingertips that left a trail of raised hairs along the skin. Words shy, tentative, verses unfolded like petals of a blooming flower. Each word a tender offering, revealing the vulnerability that came with falling in love. Other poems exploded with the fiery intensity of love’s passion, the ink bold and brash across the page. Bodies intertwined in the heat of longing, of lips finding their match, of hearts beating in rhythm as if they were always meant to be one. The verses pulsed with ignorant desire, the language sharp, urgent, an invitation to lose oneself completely in the rapture of the present and the promise of the future. In her mind, as she wrote these poems, Lena always envisioned a married couple. A man and a woman. So deeply in love. But all of her poems, in their completion, reflected the enduring beauty of love, recognizing that as the absolute love, the only true love, the only love worthy of being called love. The kind that had weathered the storms of life and yet remained, steadfast and constant. They lingered on the essence of love as a journey, a lifetime of moments that couldn’t be captured in one breath, but could be felt in the quiet moments shared, in the understanding that love, at its truest, was not a fleeting spark but a slow, steady flame. A quiet knowing that romantic love, in all its forms, was the most powerful of forces - capable of lifting us to the heavens and grounding us in the deepest corners of our hearts. The only thing capable of filling a room with proof of our own sentient being.
This made her skin crawl, her hair raise on the back of her neck. How could she have been so close-minded? So out of touch with the shapes and sizes and colors of love, all her life? Her collection of love poems discrediting, hell, all together ignoring a life where romantic love was not at the center of living, where human yearning existed outside of the confines of this book she had so neatly, so perfectly bound with flowering language. The exact opposite of the way Lila lived, of the love Lila introduced, of the love Lila defined as love. Of the love she was beginning to believe she saw in herself, in Lila’s eyes.
Seated there, eyes looking through the back of the head of an older gentleman settled at the table in front of her, she felt as though her friendship with Lila was the only friendship she had ever known that was devoted to a question. What gives life meaning, and are we capable of changing within the context of that worthiness and meaning? Lena cracked open her notebook with urgency and put pen to paper. The ink bled onto the pages with vigor, perhaps an attempt to cleanse herself of the heteronormative traditions she was chained to, to conjure up a new spirit, to find herself interesting and sexy and intelligent without Dean.
Later that morning, Lena stood before the cold, gray door of the medical office, her finger hovering above the buzzer. A gust of wind tugged at her coat, the faint smell of exhaust lingered in the air. She pressed the button, the door clicked open with a faint creak, and she stepped inside, her heels tapping sharply against the tiled floor. The hallway stretched ahead, narrow and fluorescent-lit, leading her into the sterile quiet of the building. She ascended three flights of stairs with a deliberate slowness, her hand gripping the metal railing, each step resounding in the stillness.
The waiting room was thick with the scent of antiseptic and promises, the walls plastered with glossy, colorful advertisements - before-and-after photos of women with youthful, flawless skin, images of sculpted faces and toned bodies. The promise of perfection. The women seated around her, well some of them at least, waited for a version of themselves that might feel more complete.
She took a seat, her fingers subconsciously smoothing over the fabric of her coat, her thoughts flickering between the stark clinical environment, the glossy distractions that surrounded her, and her writing in the coffee shop. The clock ticked loudly in the quiet room, time folding in on itself.
Ms. Ashbluff? A nurse called. Lena followed her into the corridor, where the lights grew even harsher. She stepped into a small room to disrobe from the waist up and slipped on a thin, paper gown that felt too flimsy against her skin. She was retrieved and led to the examination room, greeted by the cold touch of metal on her skin. The nurse adjusted the mammography machine, its surface smooth and hard, with practiced precision. She was kind, her voice soothing in its professionalism. Lena’s body framed by the cold, metallic plates as she stood there shivering, awkward. She was guided to take a deep breath, the cool air swirling around her, before her breast was placed firmly between the two plates, the nurse’s hands gentle yet insistent, positioning her with exactness.
The plates closed around her, the pressure sudden and sharp, as if the machine was trying to hold her together in a way that her own body couldn’t. A brief jolt of pain through her chest. Her breath caught for a moment as the machine held her still, the quiet hum of its mechanics filling the otherwise quiet room. The cold was unique, jarring. The pain wasn’t unbearable, but unsettling - a tightness, a strange, almost foreign sensation. Her heart pulsed loudly in her ears.
The nurse’s voice interrupted the silence, a soft murmur, just a moment, we’re almost done. As the test was repeated from different angles, always with the same cold, impersonal, clutching rhythm, Lena’s thoughts wrestled with time, age, everything she may have ignored, everything she may yet take for granted. All done, the nurse released her. Lena’s body returned to its own space. The nurse exited, leaving her to dress, to reclaim her body and the rhythm of her life. To reclaim the idea that she was all she needed to feel like a human being.