On My Way To The Lab

All I did was mumble aloud that I had to collect four poems.

She began giggling, and then through a Cheshire cat grin: "You used to write me poems."

"Ah...yeah, I did."

"With a calligraphy pen."

Oh, god. She just pronounced it "cawigwaphy". How far was this going to go?

Her giggles were now lifting her shoulders "That was so cute!"

"Yes...I was dying, and you thought it was "cute".

"But it was!"

I randomly moved the notebooks on our bedroom dresser, as though finding the right formation would end my torture. I glanced to find her staring at me, still grinning.

"No one had ever written me poetry before."

"Well...it's unusual these days, I guess."

A new wave of giggles.

"I thought that you were going to start serenading me under my window!"

"Yeah, couldn't think up a rhyme for 'pussy'."

"You were so cute!"

She threw herself on me drunkenly, though there wasn't a drop of alcohol in her.

"Now, what if it were I who was laughing at you like this?"

"You can't. Boys can't do that to girls, but girls can do it to boys."

"You're right."

And what this boy knew not to do at that moment was to point out what may be a more important truth. That truth being that it was only a function of this noisy age that no one had ever written her poetry. And even more important than that-to me anyway, was that someone as verbose as I am, had never been moved to write poetry for anyone else, no one but this insane creature in my arms.

Meanwhile, her laughter was reaching its apex, and she was talking into my neck.

"And now...after all that...you probably wonder why you did it…and what the hell you got yourself into."

"Oddly...and pathetically...I do not."

I pressed hard on the muscles of her back with all ten fingertips, forcing out the last of her giggles.

She slowly composes herself, sighing. "Oh. Whew. I don't even need drugs. This stuff just happens."

"I don't need drugs to feel weird either."

I resisted the impulse that would keep me too long from my lab.