Rain Soaked Windows
In memory of Everett Grant (1937-2007)  

He is sitting in the corner waiting when I arrive. Waiting for someone to wait for. Waiting for something to wait for. He stares out the rain soaked window from his wheelchair and tells me that days like these are always the most difficult for him. Days like these. Days like those. Days of rain soaked windows.

Time ticks on.

I ramble words from rain soaked lips. Dangling the sun in front of him. He burns beneath the rays, leaning towards the light with tired eyes. He wipes his tears with the dishtowel and wheels himself out from the corner.

And so the dance begins. I am a juggler at a fair. Rings of hope swirling round and round and round my frantic hands, distracting him from his doom. His rings of terror I hide behind my back when he is not looking. Losing myself in the battle to make him forget of the cancer, one hour at a time. Death does not exist when Daddy and I dance around our dangling sun. On days like these. On days like those.

Time ticks on.

I drive home in the dark. Exhausted fingertips wrapped around a steering wheel of monotony. Cherry red lips sucking back cigarette after cigarette as I butt my instabilities out the window and into the night. I hum songs from the radio and think about all of the things that I have no time to finish before I can sleep. Agonizing over the audacity of exhaustion. My mind crumbles. The cigarette smoke winds above me.

My lover awaits me.

I turn the deadbolt on the apartment door and sit down beside him. He skin is soft like clouds. He is lying on the couch waiting for me. Waiting for someone to wait for. Waiting for something to wait for. He holds my hand and lets me cry as we sit there together, in silence. When he tells me about his day, his words blur together. Rushing words that have lay waiting as I stare blankly ahead into invisible rain soaked windows.

I can see that I hurt him. My limp hand held in his he holds tighter as if to wake me from myself.  I have not the strength to defend when he angrily tells me that he has been waiting all day. Accusing eyes that mask his lonely. I reach feebly for the rings in my back pocket as he walks away, his hands over weary eyes. I hear him slip beneath the covers as he shuts off the mind that hurts because I will not dance with him. I sit in silence.

Time ticks on.

Hours later I hold his hand as he sleeps dreams of vacancy. I lay my head on the thumping of his heart and slip away to the sound of its murmurs.

“But I have been dancing all day”, I whisper to the dark.

I have been dancing all day.

Time ticks on.

 

Published in Notebook magazine August 2007

© 2008 Keisha Grant