From the K_D archive: "A Simile for Her Smile" Drabble
"A Simile for Her Smile" A/R drabble. The title and quote is from Richard Wilbur's poem.
How long was it before he acknowledged to himself that he lived for that smile? All could not be lost while that smile shone out upon him.
It flashed first unexpectedly when she caught his eyes closing during one of Gaeta’s long reports and she ground her heel lightly into his boot. When her bright eyes caught his drowsy ones, it flashed for just a moment for him alone. The strength of his reaction was surprising but understandable given the length of his deployment. It wasn’t personal. That’s what he told himself.
When he found the poem during a sleepless rambling, he recognized it gravely as a piece of relevant information, recorded it in his best logbook hand in this margin, this hidden flyleaf, old reports, an extravagant secret.
How long was it before she acknowledged to herself that she longed to see him? Her heart lightened unaccountably at the rumble of his voice. Her thoughts followed circuitous paths that crossed and disappeared over lonely, unknown hills but returned, strangely, back to him. He was an obstacle, an opponent even, but any room was warmer with him in it. Gods save her; he made her smile.
And may we blamed for letting them laugh about it at long last among disordered sheets? The halls without are dark and littered, within this room let there be laughter, tears, and smiles.
Haven’t they earned the luxury to reminisce and banter like any other lovers, skin against sweetly drying skin? Who loved who first? It’s a silly riddle but neither likes to lose an argument. He pulls up on his elbows, reaches for the book, reads through perched glasses, while fingers trace her listening face: “Your smiling, or the hope, the thought of it/ Makes in my mind such pause and abrupt ease/” and puts the book down and basks within her light once more.