I tell her I might be dead or merely unreal. She doesn’t balk, quiver or condescend as others might. ‘I understand,’ she says, even though I myself am just feeling out the edges. ‘It’s too good somehow,’ conveniently perfect, ‘or perfectly convenient.’ She places her hand on my heart and listens for a beat. ‘If you are dead then I must be too because this is heavenly and I couldn’t create that alone.’ We sit for a while in hand clasped silence staring at fixed points in space. I tell her, I am glad my old life has ended.
Piece by piece I removed my soul and arranged it in the shape of a man in front of her. It’s fragile, I said, and worn. Please take care of it. ‘Forever,’ she said, ‘but first things first, lets put you back together.’ She set to rearrange the pieces then and place them back inside, making me whole again in new and unexpected ways. It is perfect now, I said, but she just shook her head. ‘It was always perfect, love, you just needed to see it for yourself.’ I embraced her then, finally comfortable to be simply myself.
A Few Short Words 