Out Loud

You love to watch her read. You sneak around the apartment and stand in the doorways as she devours books and picks through articles. In the bathroom where she keeps large stacks of magazines, you tuck a few of your Sports Illustrated’s in between her Cooking Light and People. When she isn’t home, you rearrange the novels she leaves stacked on the stairs, moving Jane Austen’s, Pride and Prejudice, to the top, marking the passages about love with little yellow post it notes.
When she rips the post it notes from the pages and sticks them to the wall of the stairs, you smile, knowing she read the words you have read. You picture her reading those words as you kiss her that night, and bite her lip more violently. If only she would read them out loud to you and you could know to which words she gravitated. She won’t though. She won’t even let you watch her read those novels. Only when she thinks you aren’t home, she sinks down on the steps and takes them in her lap. You have to park blocks away and sneak back into the apartment to see her do this, to be able to watch her put her nose to the binding and breath in the book.
After you park those 5 blocks away, behind the red truck, on the street you know she never drives, you run back to the apartment. As you hop the fence in the back, hoisting yourself over the old wood, you sometimes get dirt on your crotch. She always rubs stain stick on the mark without questioning you. You wonder if she knows you came back, that you saw her put her hand to her head and sigh as she put the book down at the bottom of a pile.
When she reads articles in the kitchen, knees tucked up against her chest, and back to the oven, you worry that her butt will hurt. She always refuses when you offer her a pillow to sit on, and glares at you when you linger after coming to get a drink. She knows you are only there to watch her. If you stay too long she crinkles the articles into a ball of paper and tosses them beneath the sink. “Baby,” you say. She stands up and walks out without responding.
In the pantry you find her with a cookbook. “How about French toast,” she asks you. “Peach,” she says with resolution. You walk forward to touch her and before your hand can make contact she gives you the book, opened to the page of the recipe. “This is what I want,” she says and squeezes past you into the kitchen.
You follow her and think about how odd it is that you live in an apartment with a pantry. She sits on top of the kitchen table and looks at you. “Well?”
You hand her the book back, “you read.”
She starts to protest and then stops as you reach for the day old brioche. “Puree one half cup peaches.”
In the freezer next to the peaches, you find the remote to the T.V. When you take it out, she glares at it. “I thought about punching the T.V. I thought it would be more hurt if it had a piece taken from it.” You put the remote back in the freezer.
“What next?”
You watch her eyes move over the book, her body sways as her mind works through the words and you wish that you could hold her. When her lips move, you watch as they mold around the words like a black cave swallowing any scavenger who dares to explore. “Whisk 4 eggs and two tablespoons of sugar together.”
It’s funny to you, that word whisk. You whisper it over and over to yourself as you flick your wrist back and forth, “whisk, whisk, whisk, whisk, whisk.”
“What are you doing?”
“I’m whisking.” You turn to her, whisk and bowl in hand. Her knees sit split to you and you can see underneath her robe. She has on no underwear. She rests the book back between her legs blocking your view.
“Fine, get on with it.” The book jostles in her lap as she wiggles her hips on the wood. You want to snatch that book from between you.
To the eggs you add cream, vanilla and puréed peaches, whisking them without asking her. As the French toast comes together you don’t look at her, not until it’s done. Dusting both plates with powdered sugar you turn to her. She is still running her fingers over the text, strumming them.
“Baby,” you say.
She looks up and sets the book to the side. The full view of her is there for you again. Her lips split into a full open smile. It stops you and the plates tilt toward your thumbs. You can feel the syrup, but you don’t look down. When she walks toward you, you stand motionless. She takes both plates and you don’t protest when she sets them on the kitchen counter. Leading you to the stairs, she licks your thumbs clean all the while keeping her eyes on yours.
On the stairs she makes you sit down and then she sits down on your legs. The bones of her butt dig into you and you wince into her hair. It smells like a flower and you wonder which one. She takes a book from the bottom of the pile and flips it open to one of the last pages. Holding it in her lap she puts her finger to the text.
You read, “‘I cannot fix on the hour, or the spot, or the look, or the words, which laid the foundation. It is too long ago. I was in the middle before I knew that I had begun.’” She seems to purr as she twists in your lap. Tucking her head under your chin, she closes her eyes.