Intestinal Fortitude - or lack thereof

"Does it hurt more when I press on it, or more when I let go?" the doctor asks, probing his lower right belly. He winces.

"When you let go," he says quietly. She gently performs a few more diagnostic tests on his body, and he stays quiet the entire time.

The room we are in, a triage room, has a door to the outside. I can't quite figure out where we are in this labyrinth of medical facilities - rooms full of people and gurneys, tears and antiseptic, anxiety and immodest gowns. It's windy outside; the door keeps opening and closing slightly - a strange thing for a pediatric emergency exam room, I think. Later when the surgeons visit, even they comment on it. We all have a small laugh at the absurdity of a faulty door to the outside world in this seemingly private place.

Before long, we're told that yes, it's appendicitis, and surgery will happen very soon. Tonight or tomorrow. The surgeons appear to tell us exactly how they'll do the surgery - where the cuts will appear, and what the risks are. My son doesn't hear the "good parts." He hears that his body will be broken into, that there are some Very Important Organs near the Thing they want to remove, and all the things that can go wrong.

He sheds a tear when they leave. He is scared.

I've spent so much time in hospitals with his brother that it's hard to scare me anymore. I have a lot of trust and faith in these people who care for my babies, nearly always so, so well. But seeing him cry, well: that is another matter. That is my son, my tall-as-me, so independent and self-sufficient 14-year-old son, suddenly small again. And afraid.

That is what kills me. I put on a brave face and tell him it's ok to be scared. I promise he will be absolutely fine, but being afraid is normal. I tell him he'll be asleep, and how lucky we are that we caught it so early.

And the minute I step out into the waiting room, knowing he is in a room full of people who know exactly what they are doing - but do not know HIM - I start to cry.

When He touches her

“Come upstairs,” He said. He knew what she wanted, what she needed. She rose and followed him obediently. What precisely awaited, she was never quite sure. All that she knew was that it would fix her tonight, and somehow He knew the formula. He took care of things. He took care of her.

What would it be tonight? Would it be slow and gentle, melting into her curves, gentle licks on her nipples, stroking her hair? Would it be reaching between her legs to feel the hot wetness, slowly stroking her until she begged?

Would it be hard and fast, primal, animal, almost angry, filling her with life and drama and erasing the tangled mess in her mind of her fucked-up day? Would He enter her within minutes of access to the body He adored and desired?

Or would it be creative, taking His time with the ropes, slowly, limb by limb, one body part at a time, making her His beloved charge, and taking her as wholly as He wanted her, as she was unable to do anything but receive the pleasure He knew how to give perfectly, completely? 

Or would it just be…quiet? Touching. Stroking. Nothing sexual, but wholly intimate in a way that almost made her weep, recalling it later.

Any of those things, all of those things, were part of a life she was learning to enjoy, to feel she deserved. And it mattered that all of those things were with Him. Not with anyone else. Him.

Strange and funny, charming and weird, difficult and desirable: He was a different kind of thing, of relationship, of life, than she had ever known. And oh, she was scared. But hopeful and happy and strong enough to know that whatever the future held, and however long or short it lasted, this will have been worth it.

A weird envy.

In reading a book that I've been reading for far too long (it's a long book), I realized something: it's not uncommon for people in relationships to be jealous of their partner's wholly separate interests or passions.

I admit that when I was younger, I was guilty of this. I wanted to part of my significant other's life in every aspect. I didn't want him to have significant things that I wasn't a part of. And honestly, I think that feeling was mutual. But that relationship eventually ended, and in my next one, we had some wholly separate passions. And it was good. I did not envy the time he spent away from me on his interests, because it allowed space and time for me to either a) pursue my own or b) just be me. That relationship ended as well, but the space and discrete interests were one of the more successful elements of that coupling.

I understand a passion for something can become an exclusionary thing - and that it can be purposefully so. It can be a reason to be absent when you desire the absence instead of confronting difficulties. But it doesn't have to be that. It is just a thing your partner likes, and you do not share.

That doesn't mean you can't appreciate your partner's passions in some capacity; I think it's good to encourage them and to at least talk about it, if not experience it once in awhile, with them.

But jealousy? Nope, that's not for me, and hasn't been for a long time.