Awakening (Rough Draft)

I opened my eyes to the darkness and silence. I had to rely on the sounds of our cat, her half-meowing, half-growling, a noise she had recently adopted when Valerie had left town on a conference.

It had been a difficult few days with Valerie gone, her absences felt by Pippa and me when she was at her conference. It was as if all the warmth and the music of the house had suddenly up and left leaving behind only a tepid and muffled feeling, flat and unenergized. It was as if upon her departure, all the gravity of the house left with her, stranding Pippa and me orbitless in a vacuum of space.

Her departure left the cat and myself to figure out how to fill the space she occupied when she was here. On my part, I had just gritted my teeth and barreled through Val’s absence, knowing that soon she would return and return to her role as our caretaker, the one who prepared meals and tidied up after us, the one who led the cadences of our lives.

Pippa probably was not so sure. Or perhaps, it was that the lack of music that Val brought into our lives that bothered Pippa. Regardless, she began using her half-meow, half-growl, her greowl, when Val had been away, and I had been there, ineptly trying to provide those things that Val provided Pippa when she was there, a sleeping body to walk on and cuddle up to, in the middle of the night, a litter cleaner and food preparer, and comber. It was not a role I was used to, and, I speculate that when I couldn’t live up to that role, Pippa developed that greowl, a kind of calling out, a notice that things were not right.

It did not change when Val came home. We hoped that perhaps she would stop once the routine had been re-established. But it had not. Pippa continued to use the greowl.

From my office came the scratching noise of litter. And then another greowl, a “I’m finished,” from Pippa. And then I sensed her jump onto the bed, circling over Valerie until she stood on the pillow upon which Valerie rested her head, Pippa’s tail brushing my face. I pushed Pippa to a position beside Valerie, a spot she usually settled on when we slept.

I fell back to sleep.

About four, I opened my eyes again to darkness.

It was quiet, too quiet. Usually, I could hear the television playing just beyond my consciousness. I had gotten into the habit of letting it play in the night. Right before bed, I tuned the television to Disney XD, a television channel dedicated to Disney’s older audience, which aired more animated shows than live action, geared to appeal to boys.

When Val woke up in the middle of the night, which she had had a habit in the past of doing, she liked to watch the channel, particularly an animated series called Kick Bukowski, a show about a kid daredevil and his sidekick, a chubby kid with Viking parents. I had seen the show many times myself, but Valerie seemed to know every episode by heart, to have become so familiar with each of its characters that she seemed to know them personally. She would often recount their adventures with me while we were driving in our Rav 4, explaining their quirks, imitating them for me.

But the television was off. I suspected that the cable box had turned off on its own, perhaps had done an update or an upgrade, but then, I wondered whether or not I had remembered to pay the cable bill. That couldn’t be it, I rationalized, because if anything, I was only a few days late and I hadn’t received any notice that I had failed to pay and they would have sent me some kind of notice. I attempted to turn off the television and cable box in order to reboot it. Nothing but silence.

I had the sudden urge to urinate. I arose from bed and debated which bathroom to use, the master bathroom or the bathroom in the front. The master bathroom required me to open and shut a folding door which made a lot of noise when you shut it, which would likely wake Val, but the front bathroom was farther away. I opted for the master bathroom, trying to be as quiet as possible.

I had set the alarm to six a.m. It was an effort to continue my goal to run every day. However, at four in the morning, I knew that I was not getting up at six. I reasoned that it was probably too cold anyways and that I ran yesterday and that I wouldn’t be eating that much today. I promised myself I wouldn’t eat that much today. I flushed the toilet.

I could just stay awake until six. But I didn’t want to.

I tried the remote again and miraculously the television came to life. Upon turning on the television, channel two appeared, the default channel. Channel two is a Spanish channel, which shows what I suspect are overly dramatized Spanish soap operas, which can be annoying if you are trying to lull yourself back to sleep. I set the television to channel 5, the local ABC affiliate. The overnight national news was playing, two newscasters bantering back and forth playfully, talking as if no one was really watching anyways.

I crawled into bed again and curled myself into Val, shoveling my right arm underneath the pillows upon which she rested her head. I let her warmth and the glow of the television set pull me back to sleep. Six would be coming in two hours.

Six a.m. would be coming in two hours, and I knew I would press the snooze button, probably more than once.

I fell asleep.

About six a.m., my alarm went off. I pressed the snooze button, once, twice, three times, thirty minutes added to the start gun.

I went back to sleep.

Six thirty. One, two, three. Seven, seven a.m., I would get up.

Valerie was awake. She placed her glasses on her face. The bright orange and yellow colors of Good Morning America emanated from the television screen.

I watched without my glasses on through a haze of near-sightedness. Images of my dreams floated somewhere just out of reach.

“What do you want for breakfast?” she asked. It was always the same, or nearly so. A banana, oatmeal, a bowl of cheerios with blueberries. But it was a pattern, a rhythm that she had every morning, a groove which she fell into to keep her going. Predictable.

“Let’s just go to Starbuck’s,” I said. I had some credit on my Starbuck’s account and there was a Starbuck’s gift card on the table. The milk in the refrigerator had a use by date that ended yesterday, and I did not want to test whether it was still good.

“It’s only a day or two after the date. It’s a sell-by-date.”

I corrected her. “We’ll go shopping tonight.” I had been repeating that mantra for a couple of days now. Like shopping was so hard, like life was that hard. Only, it was, if suddenly you realized that as you aged you gathered experience like stones and that each step forward meant carrying those rocks another step further. It was so easy to settle down and let the moss grow over you.

I suspect that Val wouldn’t understand that type of thinking, Val, who when she woke was prepared for living and life.

“Okay,” she said.

I didn’t get out of bed until 7:45 a.m. waiting until an article on diets was played on Good Morning America. I watched it end dissatisfied with the report, disappointed that it didn’t tell me more. I told myself I shouldn’t watch that show anymore, that it was all fluff pieces any way, despite having George Stephanopoulos on it. And Laura Spencer was annoying and man-crazy, and loud, extremely loud.

I had weighed myself before I entered the shower. The scale indicated 150.5 pounds, or so it looked like to me. It was one of those scales that the numbers turned on a wheel underneath. It had a small dial underneath that could be twisted to correct inaccuracies. I wondered how accurate the scale was, wondered what the use of weighing myself every morning seeing how I had the numbers seemed to waver between 149 and 151, never going down, like I was before, at 143, at 140.

I brushed my teeth and entered the shower.

I put gel in my hair and used a comb to fold it over my scalp. At the temples, bits of gray hair seemed to want to wander away from my head. I needed a haircut. I would get a haircut this weekend. I would treat Val to a manicure/pedicure and get a haircut. I needed a haircut.

I picked out my gray suit, one of my favorites. The pants were loose around my waist even though I had gained back ten pounds of all the weight I had recently lost. The belt I wore bunched the pants at my waist line.

I found a pink shirt to wear because I was looking to implement shirts that I didn’t wear that often back into my daily wardrobe.

I debated ties, relying on the opinion of Valerie, ultimately choosing a solid pink tie.

I don’t have to get out of the car,” Val asked or told me, I am not sure which. I told her that she didn’t.

We left at 8:30 a.m. The sun was out, the air cool, but not cold.