Mary and Daphne #195

I had a question, so I asked Mary. She knows things. I mean, I know more things, but I don’t know all the things. When in doubt, I ask Mary. So I says to Mary, “Mary,” I says, “are we being old right now?”

She peered over her tablet to look down at me cuz we were sharing a big soft chair at a cafe. “If we are, it’s in a good way. Why?”

“Sitting in a café on a Sunday afternoon with your spouse reading separate books feels suspiciously like something old people do.”

“Separate books? Is it less old if I read to you?”

“Could go either way, I think.”

She put her book down and rested her chin on my shoulder. Gotta say, we were having a great time being old if that’s we were doing. Rainy outside, kinda cold; big, soft chair next to the café’s fireplace; LGBTQ-friendly café; tea for Mary; hot chocolate for me cuz I’m so grown up I don’t care if asking for whipped cream and sprinkles on it make me seem like a thing Mary calls me all the time that isn’t even accurate; and periodic cookies.

“What if,” Mary said with her good-mischief smile on her so very pretty face (I love her!), “we stopped reading and talked instead.” She put her tablet down and crossed her arms over my middle, pulling me closer (which was super impressive considering I was already almost all the way in her lap. “You have a very full tummy,” she said while patting my tummy. “Who’s got a full tumtum?”

I did a legit Pillsbury Doughboy “Heehee! It’s not full.”

“It’s full of cookies.”

“Only two.”

“But they’re big bakery cookies, and you’re so tiny.”

“I make up for it with a big personality.” Also, it was three. I wolfed one down while she was in the restroom, and I’m not sorry.

“Maybe we need to ration your cookies so you pace yourself. The baking season is long.”

“I’m already not eating peanut butter Christmas trees on weekdays, which – I might have already mentioned this – is a major imposition. I do it because I love you.”

“And because I told you to.”

“I let you tell me cuz I love you.”

Mary sighed. She loves that I love her. She crossed her arms over me, her hands on my sides. I yawned, the lack of refined sugar for the last twenty minutes and my Mary holding me and the hot cocoa and her being all warm and stuff was making me sleepy.

“The feminine urge to tickle your belly til you’re wide awake.”

“I can’t take you anywhere but you wanna make a scene,” I teased her. Teased her with the truth, honesty being one of my superlative qualities. ‘There goes Daphne,’ people say, ‘She’s honest to a fault sometimes.’ You have to be super honest to be honest to a fault, though I wouldn’t say ‘fault’ cuz I don’t have any of those. For instance, being conceited is a fault, and I’m not ever that. Really.

“What is it you always say, Daff? You ‘have your reasons’ for the things you do?”

“Mhmm. Good reasons. Don’t get me wrong, though; your reasons are great and stuff almost all the times.”

“All the time.”

“That’s what I said – all the times.”

“Heehee! For such a playful little girl …”

“I’m not a little girl.” Really. I didn’t even get carded when I bought that third cookie.

“For such a playful little girl, you’ve been awfully quiet when I’ve asked you what you want for Christmas.”

I have a theory. When you’re a kid, you can’t get anything yourself, hence everything you want is basically a present. If you see something you want, you are basically thinking “Present!” Contrast this with adulthood. Everything you want is something you have to get yourself. Therefore, when you see something you want, you almost never think present. It takes a conscious effort to remember that some things can be presents and sometimes you need to not buy something you otherwise would just so someone else can give it to you as a present. Well, I forgot to do that this year.

“I want … new cookie sheets.”

“That’s not a present,” she told me, “that’s just kitchenware.”

“But I like kitchenware. I wanna Martha Stewart the heck out of our home next year.”

“You say that now …”

Fair point. Sounds like a lot of work. “I wanna bake a lot next year.”

“That sounds about right. You’re just a little sugar cookie yourself.”

That sounds kinda plain. I always thought of myself as a Swiss cake roll, complex and layered, either tightly wound or threatening to unravel and with a cream center. “How am I a sugar cookie?”

“You’re very sweet, and you make such a mess of the sheets when I eat you in bed.”

‘Here lies Daphne,’ the mourners say. ‘First person to die by being compared to a cookie.’

‘It was the compliment. She never did take compliments well.’

It was the internal squeeing. She had a massive aneurism.’

“Ahem … Uh … Mmm … Hurble stronket. I mean, ort foodlin. Urgh! Nahassa itabix ankrit. Mumpin!” I could say words very recently. Give it another try. “Cookie sheet!”

“I think I know what you’re trying to say,” Mary said to me all grinning and stuff and being proud of herself for making my language center do a hard restart. I recovered quickly though. Um, really.

“Cookie … sheet … It’s a sheet … For baking cookies.”

“You’re my cookie in the sheets.”

“Wertterfetterer!”

“Did I break my little girl?”

“I’m not a little girl. But yeah to the first part, kinda. It’s very distressing.”

“How is it distressing?”

“Do you know how many months it will be before I can say ‘cookie’ without thinking about … you know?”

“Cunnilingus?”

“Mary! We’re in pubic… Public!,” I hissed. And I have delicate little ears. I don’t even like using the real names of parts down there.

“You’re so cute today. Do you know how cute?”

“Don’t say it.”

“So cute I could gobble you up.” I knew she was gonna say that! “What a shade of red you turn. And it matches the color you’re blushing right now..”

“Marrry! You’re embarrassing me.”

“Is that why you’re practically snuggling up on my chest right now?”

“Call me out one more time, and I’ll … something.”

“You’re as good at thinking up threats as you are at thinking of presents.”

“I’m gonna bite you later when and where you most expect it, and you’re only gonna like almost all of it.”

“I’ll just hafta hold you and your bottom to that promise.”

“Hey Mary, since you're so wise and stuff, could you tell me the difference between falling in love and being in love?”

“Being in love is what I am with you all the time. Falling in love is what I do every morning when I wake up next to you.”

And then she kissed me. Can you believe that? Right on my forehead, which was so great and stuff and all the things. Sigh …