Some mornings there’s a darkness in him when he wakes. I can tell just by listening. It is in his every breath and in the way he rises from the bed. He’s heavier, it seems, and everything is more of an effort; even time is something with weight so that his movements is slow as grass growing.
Used to be I’d ask what it was. I’d put one hand soft on him and I’d kiss his neck and tell him I loved him – to the moon and back, I’d say. Makes no difference. Not when he’s like that. He has a storm in him and all his thoughts is thundering so loud he don’t hear me. And when there’s a storm ‘bout to break, best thing is to take cover – though he don’t never hurt me.
He don’t even have the words to say nothing when he’s like that. He’s just silent as the walls. And he don’t hear nothing neither. Aint no use trying to talk to him. Not ‘bout nothing. Not even ‘bout things he likes. He’s out of reach when he’s like that.
I stand back now and I wait for the storm to pass. I even go to my mom’s some days and she rolls her eyes and she says I’m a fool to stay with a man like that. She says he needs help and maybe he does. And she says there’s plenty more fish in the sea and I should just toss him back, like boatmen do with a fish that aint worth the keeping. And I should cast my net again and get me a man that aint all broke.
Mom don’t know and I don’t put her right other than with a look. She don’t never see him when the storm’s passed. He calls me on my phone and I can hear it in his voice. And he just says my name and it’s enough. And I tell mom that I’m going back and she shakes her head and looks hurt and hard, like she’s doing a calculation in her head and all the figures is running all ways so she can’t make sense of it.
And when I’m back with him, well then it’s like the air is all burnished gold and he’s smiling wide as rainbows, and he loves me then. I mean he really loves me, and it’s a different storm we make in the bed, and salt in his touching and in his kissing, and a tide in me that he knows, and he is the gentle moon tugging and tugging at the depths of me, and all the stars is out, and the night is long and sweet.
I don’t say all that to my mom. Don’t tell her about how he is for the time he is not dark. She wouldn’t understand. She’d tell me something ‘bout fish and how they kicks and kicks with their silver tails when you hold ‘em in your hand and all fish do that and silver fish scales slippy in your palm like wet dimes and the smell of the sea. And maybe I should just try a different fish, she say. Fish is fish.
And after, when he’s inclined to sleep, I ask him then. I ask him ‘bout what’s inside him when he’s dark as shut cupboards. And he says only that he’s sorry and he makes a promise to see someone ‘bout it, swears he will, swears on all things dear, and he’s got a number to call, he says. And like that it all feels good again and so I stay when my mom says I shouldn’t and I stay knowing he won’t call no one.
Patricia Ann McNair 
Some mornings there’s a darkness in him when he wakes. I can tell just by listening. It is in his every breath and in the way he rises from the bed. He’s heavier, it seems, and everything is more of an effort; even time is something with weight so that his movements is slow as grass growing.
Used to be I’d ask what it was. I’d put one hand soft on him and I’d kiss his neck and tell him I loved him – to the moon and back, I’d say. Makes no difference. Not when he’s like that. He has a storm in him and all his thoughts is thundering so loud he don’t hear me. And when there’s a storm ‘bout to break, best thing is to take cover – though he don’t never hurt me.
He don’t even have the words to say nothing when he’s like that. He’s just silent as the walls. And he don’t hear nothing neither. Aint no use trying to talk to him. Not ‘bout nothing. Not even ‘bout things he likes. He’s out of reach when he’s like that.
I stand back now and I wait for the storm to pass. I even go to my mom’s some days and she rolls her eyes and she says I’m a fool to stay with a man like that. She says he needs help and maybe he does. And she says there’s plenty more fish in the sea and I should just toss him back, like boatmen do with a fish that aint worth the keeping. And I should cast my net again and get me a man that aint all broke.
Mom don’t know and I don’t put her right other than with a look. She don’t never see him when the storm’s passed. He calls me on my phone and I can hear it in his voice. And he just says my name and it’s enough. And I tell mom that I’m going back and she shakes her head and looks hurt and hard, like she’s doing a calculation in her head and all the figures is running all ways so she can’t make sense of it.
And when I’m back with him, well then it’s like the air is all burnished gold and he’s smiling wide as rainbows, and he loves me then. I mean he really loves me, and it’s a different storm we make in the bed, and salt in his touching and in his kissing, and a tide in me that he knows, and he is the gentle moon tugging and tugging at the depths of me, and all the stars is out, and the night is long and sweet.
I don’t say all that to my mom. Don’t tell her about how he is for the time he is not dark. She wouldn’t understand. She’d tell me something ‘bout fish and how they kicks and kicks with their silver tails when you hold ‘em in your hand and all fish do that and silver fish scales slippy in your palm like wet dimes and the smell of the sea. And maybe I should just try a different fish, she say. Fish is fish.
And after, when he’s inclined to sleep, I ask him then. I ask him ‘bout what’s inside him when he’s dark as shut cupboards. And he says only that he’s sorry and he makes a promise to see someone ‘bout it, swears he will, swears on all things dear, and he’s got a number to call, he says. And like that it all feels good again and so I stay when my mom says I shouldn’t and I stay knowing he won’t call no one.