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Down in the Dirt (v138)
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Snow Covered Homes

Daniel Mark

    Rubbing the sleep from my eyes, I stumble through the near blackness of our bedroom, hopefully, towards the bathroom. Turning on the light, I’m relieved to see pale blue tile and porcelain white. One step at a time, I morbidly think to myself. A sense of doom settles on my heart as I feel for the towels hanging on the wall, searching for the driest of the two. While waiting for the shower to warm to a tolerable temperature, I look at myself in the mirror. Running a hand through thinning blonde hair, I see a man in his mid-thirties, thin but out of shape with the slow formation of a gut. Not haggard but also not a picture of health. Dark circles revealing little sleep and the weathered skin of a lifetime of smoking catching up. Lost in the pointless self-examination, I barely hear the movement coming from the dark of the bedroom. Deciding to risk it, I quickly climb into the shower.
    The water shocks me awake. Cold jets hit my chest, reminding me of the awful positions that I keep falling asleep in. Muscles cry out as I stretch my arms while joints pop in annoyance. Getting older sucks. As the water begins warming, I hear her come into the bathroom and start moving things around on the counter. Only an indistinct shape through the shower curtain, her intent is a mystery to me. Finally the light whir of an electric toothbrush proves too much and I put my head under the water, waiting for her to leave.
    “Are you ready to go?” She asks sharply, knowing that I’m only half-listening. Staring out over the snow covered rooftops below, rows of them stretching out to the next hill, I take a final drag of my cigarette and put it out. Pulling my coat closer to my body, suddenly aware of the cold, I turn and walk back in. By the front door, she already has her purse and rattling the keys in anxious waiting. It strikes me then, as I’m walking through the back door and across the room, how beautiful she is today. The grey and black uniform of winter contrasting with her pale skin. She unconsciously touches her hair, eyes cast to the side from where I’m entering. Hair, a light red, cut short and swept to the side. Funny to imagine this figure of self-control as the nervous girl of a few months ago. Her coming home with a foot less of hair, left on the floor of the salon. The physical result of an impulse, immediately regretted. I try not to remember the way her hair felt as I ran my fingers through it, holding her until the panic gave in to laughter. How I whispered low reassurances, the touch of my lips to her brow. “Yeah.” I say, getting to the door, holding it open as she passes through it without a word.
    She has been late to everything that she has ever done. One of the things we had in common when we first met eight years ago at a friend’s house-warming party. Her laughter was a siren to me, struck thoughtless, driven to distraction whenever she was in the room. I asked her on a date that very night, she laughed and agreed. She was twenty minutes late to our first date but I’d only arrived five minutes before her so it worked out.
    She was late again. I remember her walking out of the bathroom, applicator in hand, sobbing. Terror took hold of us then. Children were never part of the plan. We fought that night. In eight years, this was our first real fight. I suggested an abortion, she suggested that I go fuck myself. We went around like this until we were both too angry, scared, and tired to continue. I slept on the couch that night. The following week was worst, all conversations led back to her period. She wanted to keep it, I wanted out of the conversation.
    “I can’t believe you could be so insensitive!” she said.
    “Insensitive? Are you serious? I’m being realistic. How could you even consider having a kid? I’m not ready. We’re not ready. Look at this place, it’s a shit hole that we can barely afford. Do you think we can afford a kid? I mean, shit, I don’t want to be anyone’s father.”
    “So what, I should just get an abortion because you’re too selfish? Christ, that’s really nice. It’s easy for you to say that. You don’t have to do it. You don’t have to go in and tell some stranger, ‘Oh hello! My name is Melanie and I’m here for an abortion!’”.
    “Listen, we don’t even know if you are actually pregnant. Those things give false positives all of the time. I don’t even know why you are making such a big deal out of this. It’s just a little procedure.” My words hung between us, brutish and heavy. Neither one of us knowing what to say for a moment. My mouth moving to unformed and unsounded words, wishing that I could just pull in what had already escaped.
    “Wow. You know what? Stop saying we, there is no we. It’s just me who has to deal with this, who has to carry this shit. Not you. So stop trying to make it sound like we are in this together and get the fuck out of my way.”
    She stayed with her parents that night and the next. She called to tell me that she’d set up an appointment to find out, for sure, if she was pregnant or not. The conversation was stilted and short. She came home the next day and we haven’t spoken much aside from when absolutely necessary.
    Driving across town, I can feel her watching me. What is she thinking? Soft pop plays over the radio and we continue on in our silence. My hands resting exactly at the two and ten with eyes straight ahead. Her’s feel like they’re boring into me, into my soul. I hear her scoff and glance over in time to see her turn her face to the passenger window.
    The nondescript building comes up on our right. She sees it first and I can sense the air in the car becoming more tense. Pulling the car into the first available spot, I realize that we are at the far end of the lot. Unsure of what to do, I start the car again, to find a closer one, but she is already out of the car and staring in mild disbelief at me. Finally, I give up and get out. As we walk through the half-empty parking lot, side by side in silence, passing dead trees and shurbs, I feel her hand slide itself into mine. Cold and clammy, shame burns inside of me but I still draw my fingers in and hold her hand within mine tightly.
    Entering the building, we are greeted by a cheerfully coloured waiting room. Stacked in the corner are magazines with babies on the covers, flanking it are rows of unassuming brown chairs. The room is empty aside from a tired looking receptionist. I find a seat while she fills out some paperwork. Eventually she is told that the doctor will be able to see her in a moment so she sits down beside me. Nervously shaking her knee, she turns and looks into my face. I meet her eyes.
    “What if I am pregnant... I don’t know if I can get an abortion. What happens then? What happens to us?”
    I don’t have a ready answer. I don’t have any answer, guilt washes over me as I find it hard to maintain eye contact. “I’m... I’m not sure,” is all I can get out before a nurse calls her name. She gets up without another word and leaves me still fumbling in my chair.
    What are we going to do? Am I ready to be a father? Am I ready for that kind of commitment? I don’t have any answers and I know I should. The indecision is paralyzing me. Unable to communicate, too ashamed to act. With every failed moment I feel her drifting further away. I do love her. It comes to me in waves, every memory of us, all the good and awful moments, coming onto me faster and hotter. Overwhelmed, I feel my hands tightening on the arm rests when suddenly it all stops on a thought. Her not being there, no longer being in my life. As the thought gains footing in my mind, my chest tightens and a cold chill runs through my body. The last thing I want and the one that I’m guaranteeing. If she is pregnant then you’ll not run away. Your selfish fear is less important than her absence, I coach myself while my environment fades out of my concern. I lose track of time, minutes drift past me, unaware of my existence, until I notice a pair of black boots in front of me. Looking up, she is there. The chill fades out as I’m overcome with a sense of discovery. As though seeing her for the first time, I take her hand and stand up. Looking into her face, I smile for the first time in over a week and whisper, “I love you.” She is visibly taken back but doesn’t retract her hand.
    “Are you okay?” There is concern in her voice, “It was pretty simple. They said that they’ll know in a week so I just have to wait, I guess. Are you ready to go? You don’t look so great.”
    The moment passes and I pull back into myself. “Yeah, I’m fine. Just in a weird mood. Let’s go.”
    In the car, driving home, we resume our silence. Each lost in our own thoughts. Watching the passing houses, I think of all the things I’m going to do after this, ways that I’ll try to be better. So absorbed, I hardly notice that we’re home and that she had said something. I ask her to repeat what she’d just said.
    “I don’t think I want to do this anymore.” She repeats, her voice wavering as she opens the door and steps out of the car. She walks carefully through the snow and I watch her unlock the front door to our house and step inside. She looks at me then, briefly, before turning and shutting the door.



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