Great Morning

Every morning, Will snuggles up to me between the warning beeps of his 4:45am alarm and his final 5am alarm. I am usually unconcious and oblivious to his embrace. But some mornings, like this morning, I lay there, pretending to sleep, and contentedly sink deeper into the warm bed, his arms and in love with him. Normally, if I am awakened by his alarm or last minute snuggles, I am usually fast asleep again by the time he is making his way into the kitchen and the shower, but this morning, the high-pitched screech of the coffee grinder jarred my conciousness and left me half-awake.

On those mornings, when I am aware of his movements in the kitchen, I worry that he might not come and say goodbye. I mean, why should he? I am usually dead to the world and make no response to his gentle back rubs, soft kisses and whispered goodbyes, but he does it regardless, every morning. Sometimes, the noises from the kitchen sound like a departure, and I lay there, worrying, wondering if he was running late and had to leave immediately. One morning, I actually got up, hungover from sleep, and stumbled into the kitchen, nearly in tears, because I thought that he had left without a goodbye. I was wrong. He was standing there at the counter, making his coffee. He just looked at me, surprised. "What you doing, baby?" he asked. "I thought you left," I said, a quiver in my voice. "No, babe. I haven't said goodbye." "I know," I said, "I thought you had left without saying goodbye." "No, baby, I wouldn't do that. Go back to bed. I'm coming." I crawled back into bed, buried myself under the covers and waited.

This morning was the same. Just when I thought I had heard the jingle of keys and the gentle shutting of the door, he came into the room and sat on the edge of the bed. I pretended to be asleep as he rubbed my back, covered me in kisses, told me he loved me and said goodbye. My usual response with eyes closed tight, "love you-(yawn)-too; drive safe-(stretch)-ly."