the moment is not right.
Reparations
Marlene opens her eyes to an ache in her shoulder and a sharp pain in her left temple.
It’s been two weeks of sleeping on this worn out couch, underneath a ratty and peculiar smelling afghan. Before this she spent her nights on the steps of a free clinic by the Havoc sector, and before that she doesn’t like to remember.
In a moment, Marlene knows she’ll have to get up, but for now she’s content to stay where she is, with the pre-dawn light filtering in from behind tattered curtains. She’s uncomfortable, but warm.
The owner of the apartment appears out of his bedroom. He leans in the doorway, wearing the white t-shirt and black jeans Marlene knows he’d slept in. Once upon a time she would have found his lack of proper night clothes appalling, but now Marlene is simply surprised he is missing his hat.
With tired eyes, she watches her benefactor cross the room to the cupboard and counter called the kitchen. He swirls the day-old coffee around, drinks it straight from the pot, and lights a cigarette. This constitutes as breakfast. He meets her eyes and asks gruffly, “What?”
“Nothing,” Marlene answers, surprised to find a frog in her throat.
As she clears it, the man trudges wearily over to his couch, and nudges her feet with the coffee pot. After Marlene moves them, he sits down. It’s been two weeks, but they still don’t touch at all.
“What time is it?”
The man fishes around underneath the cushions until he finds a watch missing a wrist band. “About five thirty,” he says, then shoves it back where he found it. “Are you working today?”
Marlene grimaces. “Yes, but not for another hour and a half. They gave me the earliest hours off, because they don’t want me getting upset. I’ve still got that burn.” She pulls the afghan away and rolls up her pant leg to show him the mangled and blistered section of her calf from when the other waitress “accidentally” dropped a hot plate on her.
Her companion doesn’t say anything, but nods and gets up. He walks into the bathroom and clatters the sparse toiletries they have around, until he walks back out with his hat. Behind him, Marlene notices the mirror has another crack in it. She pulls the blanket back over her legs.
“Why do you wear that thing?” Marlene asks, half to make conversation, half to break up the long periods of silence.
The man looks at her condescendingly. “Because it’s all I’ve got.”
There’s a period of stillness as they just gaze at each other.
“Why don’t you ask me to marry you?”
He adjusts his hat, the same way he always does when he’s thinking of what to say. “I’m not the marrying kind,” he says. “Besides, the last time you were married, you killed him, Marlene.”
“I know,” Marlene murmurs, and closes her eyes. “I know.”
She hears movement, and then someone is sitting down at the far end of the couch. Marlene curls up into a ball to give him more room.
The man with the black hat sighs, and in that sigh is more emotion that she’s seen in him in a long time. “The couch hurts your shoulder,” he says. It’s not a question, because he knows he’s right. Marlene opens one eye and looks at him. “You’ve got an hour and a half before you have to go to work. Come on.” He stands up and extends her a hand.
Marlene is surprised. She’s been staying with him for two weeks, hasn’t been what she used to be in months, and in all that time they haven’t touched at all. Not since he found her in the hotel room with her husband dead. Quietly, she takes his hand.
He pulls her to standing and carefully (if it was anyone but him, Marlene would have called it hesitantly), put his hand in the small of her back and leads her into the bedroom. “You have an hour and a half. You can sleep in here.”
Marlene sits down on the edge of the bed. His comforter is white, and she doesn’t want to stain it.
“Or you can sit there,” the man says sarcastically. “Whatever.”
“Stay with me?” Marlene asks. “Please?”
He was halfway into the other room when Marlene asked. Marlene hears him exhale and can see the word, “Fuck,” drift over his expressions without sound.
Quickly she says, “It’s just that you don’t work today and I…”
Taking of his hat, the man walks over to her and lies down. Marlene slowly curls up next to him and puts her head on his shoulder. She knows she’s still not forgiven, but it’s progress.