Page 128 of Happy After All

I look up at him and smile. His eyes are so green. They make me feel more than I thought possible.

I think that maybe I didn’t know love until he looked at me.

Maybe that’s dramatic, the most dramatic, jarring thought I’ve ever had, but I let myself have it. Right now, I let myself.

“We better get in our positions for the parade,” I say. “If I can’t see the bagpipe players, I will be distraught.”

“I didn’t know you had strong feelings about bagpipes.”

“Who doesn’t have strong feelings about bagpipes? Positive or negative, they don’t really lend themselves to neutral feelings.”

“I’m neutral on them,” he says.

“Literally impossible. They are the loudest instrument known to man.”

“No,” he says. “Decidedly neutral.”

I think he’s just being a contrarian. And I learn a new thing about him. He will not be told. Not about this, probably not about anything.

I tuck it away deep inside. I love that I learned something new about him.

In spite of the fact I’ve now seen him naked countless times.

The very sad thing is that I probably could count how many times I’ve seen him naked. It’s only been a couple of weeks.

I just want it to feel countless. I want it to feel like more. I want it to feel like forever.

This shift inside me doesn’t even surprise me anymore. I’ve accepted it.

I know what it’s like to let the same pain twist around inside you for three years. I know what it’s like to hold on to things.

I know what it’s like to marinate in something for so long that it becomes an integral part of who you are.

This certainty coming after such a short amount of time is one of the nicest feelings I’ve ever had. As a person who is a champion in rumination, it’s like the clear skies of Rancho Encanto. Wide open, bright. Nothing obscuring the truth.

“Okay. It really makes a person want to get a bagpipe player to come play ‘Amazing Grace’ in your personal bedroom,” I say.

“I have noise-canceling headphones.”

“You’re ridiculous.”

“Maybe.”

He smiles. It turns out, I’m wrong. Everything wasn’t bright and clear before. It is now. All the brighter for him smiling. Something has shifted inside me, and I know it’s never going to go back.

We take our positions, and Sylvia walks out to the middle of Main Street, a microphone in her hand. “Thank you,” she says, “for coming to the tenth annual A Very Desert Christmas!”

The crowd cheers uproariously.

“As you know, Rancho Encanto suffered a tragedy this year when a fire burned down our elementary school and left more than a thousand people without shelter. This event is raising money for the community, for those who lost their homes, their livelihoods, and their school. We want to extend a thank-you to those who have come, who are shopping in our community, staying here, and donating to the cause. The parade is about to begin, so, everybody, sit down and get ready for the show!”

“I’m expecting Disneyland levels of entertainment,” he says.

“Adjust your expectations,” I say.

It turns out I didn’t really need to say that, because the parade begins, and the first entry that comes into sight is the banner that saysA Very Desert Christmas, carried by four little girls dressed as cacti.

Music starts to play loudly, elevator Christmas music, but I love it all the same.

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