For Jeri

For the sweetest woman on all the earth; my angel of the sun.

Jeffery the cat left another little present on the porch last night. It turned into a great photo; the gray fur against the old weathered T&G in the late morning sun and shadow. You could still see the slick remains of the feline's saliva ; the matted hair in swirls upon the victim's neck. I washed my hands urgently after clicking off a few. I had arranged the scene slightly for the take.

She had stopped by and brought me a pack of cigarettes she got on credit at Angel Eyes. I had resorted to coffee without smoke this morning and when she arrived I was just sitting there; my hair still wild and my mouth full of thick rancid scum. I hadn't taken a s**t yet and I could feel one coming on. I was just sitting there on the porch in the sun thinking about how cold it had been last night

I had said, "Hey... Oh baby thank you. You are indeed the sweetest thing." This is really how we talk to each other and it's comforting. She is black and from Mississippi and I am of white Southern lineage via Oklahoma. Still, there is some faintly shared dialect and a deep understanding of something, including the fact that we are still, basically, both California Air Force brats. We are both in our 50's and beginning to tire a little, especially with times being so hard and all... but this morning we sat and smoked together there on the porch in the sunlight and I realized that I loved that girl more than anything.

I can't see myself being with any other woman than Jeri. We don't live together and that's just fine but she's my Jeri and she gifts me with some small sense of safety; some shelter from my fearful past. She says I do the same for her and I sincerely hope that's the case. She knows I love her and sometimes that just has to be enough.

Now, we've both seen our share of trouble over the last four years. It hasn't always been easy between us. She's been known to slice me up with that tongue of hers from time to time and she can hole up with her anger and her tears for days at a time in that old California bungalow duplex which is her private world. She waits for the sun to shine again like it was on this particular morning on this old, run-down porch on the corner of Third and Mulberry Streets.      

Author's Note

This ties into a theme of placement, namely the world parading before me as I sit at various times on my currently borrowed (for want of rent) porch. I confess that is as far as I get some days. The place is Third and Mulberry. The time is anytime.

Reviews

[RainQueen]

What a great snapshot of a friendship/relationship. The richness of the mundane, being comfortable talking wiht someone before teeth are brushed. Oh, I hope she's real!

[TKBickel]

Ok the first paragraph doesn’t quite flow with the rest to me. It needs a stronger link or I’m missing it. You kind of lost me on what you did with the cat present and what is T&G, then you jump to the ‘She’ side of the story. From the second paragraph and on, I’m all in with the story.
Maybe you could drop the had in ‘I had said’.
I like what you have. Are you writing a memoir?