Mix-CD

We drove around gazing at the brilliant otherworldly scenery, taking in the snow-capped mountains, the black lava land, the bleak, stark, complete, utter beauty of it all. We drove on for hours, following the map, flipping the guide book pages, laughing at inanities.

I made you a mixed CD, he said.

I giggled like a sixteen-year-old and squeezed him tight. Who makes mixed CDs anymore?!

The rented car didn't have an ipod connecter thingy, the radio stations were funny, and the CD was excellent. We bopped along and talked and laughed. And bopped along some more. And four hours later we'd bopped until we couldn't bop no more. I was shouting out the chorus for the fifth song, he was drumming the beats to the seventh. For the tenth we'd nod in unison. And by hour six, we were humming the next tune before it even began.

You're never going to want to listen to this ever again!

Not true! Except...yea sorry but never again!

I couldn't imagine playing it again for six months at the very least. And even then, maybe shuffled up with fifteen other albums. But I packed it away inside a book and tucked it into my suitcase.

Two long delayed flights and a cold and hungry layover later, I tossed off my boots and collapsed on the sofa. All I could think of was my bed - I bounded into the comfort of my blankets and pillows, squirmed around until I had my cocoon exactly right, and sighed.

And lay there, wide awake.

Two days was all it took to get used to having his arms around me again. Having his knees to tuck my toes under. Having his breath against my neck. Two days.

I ran shivering over the cold floor to the suitcase where I'd left it by the door. Tossing clothes and shoes on the floor, I scrounged around for that book. Slipping the CD out of it's case I shivered over to my computer then.

And let the music rock me to sleep. Because he wasn't there to do it himself. And I'd rather listen to that same CD for six more hours as I slept, than to lie awake missing the warmth around my heart.