Because how can she understand that sometimes writers fall into deep, dark places? And that sometimes, just sometimes, they like to be there? I once had a professor tell the class that the reason there isn't a lot of happy poetry is because when people are happy living life, they want to live it, not write about. I don't fully agree, but she was about halfway right.

I sit up in bed and check the clock. It's almost noon. That's one spectacular thing about not having a job-- you get to sleep in whenever you want. I only sleep in when she gets to. Her work is retail-- uniforms and customer service and all that jazz-- and though it's just above minimum wage she makes sure we don't go hungry.

Most nights I fall asleep thinking I don't deserve her.

# # #

Of the two things you can count on in Florida in the summer-- rain and humidity-- I like the rain best. Everyone goes inside, unbothered, knowing it won't last more than twenty minutes. Florida rain is hot and driving and soaks everything within a minute or so. I've lived in Florida almost my whole life and have never owned an umbrella, figuring the rain was always so short-lived it was hardly worth it.

It's raining while I sit in the parking lot waiting for her to get off work. I watch the pattern the drops make on the dashboard through the windshield and I think of the time Hayley, Ian and I smoked a bowl in the car in the pouring rain on the Fourth of July. It was only three summers ago but it seems like a lifetime. Hayley's out in California now. Ian's somewhere in Europe, in the army despite all his anti-authority rants when I was in love with him. It was so long ago it doesn't even matter anymore.