But I can’t hold this in.

Nobody to write in cryptic style for anymore. And I just discovered that my hesitation and my writer’s block has more to do with that than I’d like to admit.

I’m trying to re-train myself. To write in old school janetk style.

It’s not working.

Because there’s an intensity behind his eyes that is subtle but unmistakable. When he looks at me… when his eyes meet mine and hold…there is almost a kind of pleading behind them. His eyes search and dig and reach past the green of my own and seem to ask…seem to warn… “are you sure you can handle this?”. From time to time, I’m surprised that actual light doesn’t seep out of his eyes when he looks at me that way, it is * that * intense. And nearly every look has that quiet, desperate search behind it. Checking, testing the waters, hoping against hope each and every time that my eyes won’t look away. That my eyes will hold the stare and answer, quietly, “yes.”

It’s not working.

Because there is something about the way he explains things to me. I’m forever saying that “I’m not that smart” and I’m not digging for compliments, I am really not as smart as people think I am. It’s like forever keeping it together so that nobody will realize I’m not the brightest star in the sky. I’m just good at sounding like I know what I’m talking about. But with him, I’m a little bit more comfortable and I let many of my guards down, including this one, and I dare to ask a question, walk out onto that limb and risk ridicule for not understanding. And each time his explains slowly and carefully. Assumes nothing then and takes his time running through each component. He would have made an excellent teacher. The kind of teacher that you’re pretty sure knows everything. The kind of teacher who marks on a curve and cuts you some slack and looks beyond the textbook at the student’s potential. At the student’s gift. Even if it doesn’t fit into the curriculum. When he explains something that I don’t understand, it borders on patronizing, but not in a bad way. In this way that makes me feel really, really little. Maybe the way that a Dad on TV explains something to the TV kid. That wholesome, new age music swelling in the background kind of way. I never had that with my own Dad. So when he’s talking, softly and gently, careful not to make me feel badly for not knowing, I feel this odd sense of being really safe.

And speaking of feeling safe…

It’s not working because I’m totally distracted by the way this arms feel around me. They are strong and forceful and never hesitant. And I love that about him…his lack of hesitation. His arms reach out and hold strong. We determined a little while ago that I like the feeling of being surrounded. I like to lay in his bed, facing the wall, my body curled up against his body pillow and his body behind me, arms around me, leg tucked in between my own two, face buried against me, his mouth moving against my dreads. I fall asleep the easiest when I’m laying like that. Which say something because no matter how tired I am normally, I’m one of those people who takes a good twenty minutes or so before she can turn off her mind and fall asleep. But when I’m laying in that bed, with those arms wrapped tight around me, surrounded like a tiny bird in a big nest, I can’t resist the urge and have to fight to not fall asleep. I feel safe and loved, like after years of not even realizing that I was looking, I have found what I need. Nothing’s going to harm me.

And then, of course, there’s the way he lets me love him. When the tables turn and I can make him feel safe and loved. With his mouth moving against me, his body curled tight against me, his arms reaching around my back, pulling me in closer and closer, his own guard is down and he doesn’t fight me. He lets me love him, lets it all in, soaks it up like a sponge. A look of absolute, pure peace on his face, eyes opening only every now and then to meet mine, his jaw working, my hands running through his short hair, my voice a quiet whisper, saying the things that make him shudder when he’s not in that safe spot. From time to time, his eyes dart open at one of my words, not bothering to try to mask his surprise, and my eyes meet his and because he’s laying against me, he believes me without argument and without incident. Because I couldn’t lie. Not while he’s taking me in. It was not something designed for a long distance couple, that much I can tell you. Every now and then I find my mind wandering to it, imagining it and remembering it. Even two weeks of steady action wasn’t enough.

It will never be enough.

And there is no replacement.

I will make the trip again in two and a half weeks. I will come down that escalator and enjoy the rush I feel, the high that comes over me whenever I make that descent and I will fall back into all that distracts me now. And I won’t share my time. And I won’t take any of it for granted.

And I will not let my mind dwell on the uncertain future. I will not dwell on the idea that this might be as good as it will ever get. I will, instead, lose myself over and over again and fall….