Loving, Toiling
He loved me in the morning when he scrambled eggs and layered in a slice of Monterey Jack. He loved me in the morning when he brewed coffee and poured it the blackest of black, adding no cream or sugar. He loved me in the morning when he batched up waffles and pancakes and scores of turkey sausages. If only I loved him while I scraped through the sludge of maple syrup and powder sugar that I let go cold. I loved that he kept the kitchen clean. I loved that he folded even the dishrags when they were dry. I loved that he checked and double checked the expiration dates on every item in the fridge. I loved so much of what he did but I did not love him.
We can pretend to love when the food is hot and it keeps coming. We are the ones who love because the meals are made and they are there and someone has to eat them. It should be us eating, we with the empty stomachs, even if we have empty hearts to match.
I recognize the ones like me when I see them at parties or on the street or in dark corners of bars where they should not be. We should divorce our spouses but we do not. We stay for comfort and convenience and our own egos. Heavy is the desire to never do a load of laundry. If only the desire to fuck our spouses were so strong.
My Brooklyn apartment looks like a patch of suburbia. The smell welcomes and does not punch the way New York City apartments so often do. It’s because of the potpourri that’s changed daily. He changes it because I do not even know where to buy potpourri nor do I care. Extended family photos adorn the walls. The back of every photo is labeled with each relative’s name. So we do not forget. So they are not forgotten. He would never forget but I would. He is the keeper of tradition. I guard nothing but myself. Meanwhile, he dusts the glassware and the china. He keeps the piano tuned. He moves the car for street cleaning because we do not have the driveway we would in the cul-de-sac where he grew up. He washes the car every Sunday because that was what people did in the town where he grew up.
I want to be generous but I like security more. I like free maid service. I do not even see him much. There are the early morning breakfasts where we barely speak. There are the late-night dinners after another long day of work. I come home even later than I would, in part because I do not wish to see him any longer than necessary. There is no hatred but there is indifference. I thought that one was so much worse than the other but that is not so.
When he talks of babies, I know it’s because he needs something (and someone) else to take care of and clean. The more he talks of babies, the more I disappear. More and more. The efforts of his labor are less and less visible on me, though his touch is always seen. I benefit from every chore, every task that he takes upon himself. Strangers say that I do not look my age. Friends say that I look so well rested. I have him to thank for waiting on me hand and foot.
Some days I tell myself that I will leave because I am independent and can do everything I need for myself. Other days I tell myself that I will leave because it is not fair for him to pamper me when I give him so little in return. But he dotes upon me and it’s hard to resist the doting. So I do not leave. I do not choose love. I do not choose mercy. I choose myself, or so I tell myself most days. Once in a while I tell myself that truly choosing myself would require leaving. Then I could blossom into the fullest version of myself. Find my own sunlight, grow my own garden. There are just things I’d rather do than till the soil.
Christine Stoddard is a Salvadoran-American writer, multi-hyphenate artist, filmmaker, and theatre-maker. She is the founder of Quail Bell Magazine and the Badass Lady-Folk. Her books include Heaven is a Photograph, Naomi & The Reckoning, and Desert Fox by the Sea, among other titles. Sirena's Gallery is her first feature film.