I know, I'm taking a break from Blue Skies Ahead to write this. I felt like a little angst. Here it is.
--
She's always looking towards reception. He's always there. He's always chewing a jellybean and chatting with the receptionist. Penny, Pam, whatever her name was.
She had liked the receptionist - at first. As the days went by, her liking had faded to a subtle dislike. He was her girlfriend. Hers. Not the receptionist's. She hadn't bothered remembering her name. She glances at the clock every hour on the hour and wonders if it was like this before he came to Stamford. Before she came to Scranton. Before they were in the same picture frame together. When he first met her, he had given her a corny love letter. And every time he goes to reception, she can almost feel the little note ripping just a tiny bit.
It's not that he doesn't love her, because he does. Just not the way he loves the receptionist. He doesn't laugh the same laugh when he's around her. Yet, in the early morning hours, when the sunlight is just creeping through the sheer curtains, he swears he loves her. And every morning she believes it. He's not a dishonest man. Just a conflicted one.
He takes her to the movies and let's her pick the seats in the back, although he prefers the front ones. He lets her choose the take-out restaurant and doesn't complain when she picks that Italian place down the street, even though she knows that he used to bring the receptionist there. She wakes up to him and goes to sleep next to him. She kisses him and praises him and loves him and yet she wonders if it's enough.
If it's enough to keep their relationship alive. If it's enough to distract him from the other woman. She wonders if this is the best she could ever hope for.
The weeks pass slowly for the two of them. He's learned not to wait for her to say 'I love you' back. She doesn't wait for him to make her his famous bowl of Cheerios in the morning. And the note rips a little more. She doesn't wake up to him or go to sleep next to him anymore. And now she knows it's not enough.
And finally, all the things that strained their relationship halted. The note eventually tore in two. They weren't two parts of one being; they were two beings being torn by one part.
She could almost see it when it happens. When he finally cuts that loose string. And as she watches him walk away for the last time, she can still hear her name, as if suspended in mid-air when he apologized to her. Her hand subconsciously reaches into her pocket, to take out the letter that her wrote for her so many months ago.
She had always known that she wasn't enough. That their passion wasn't enough. That they would never be two halves of one whole.
It just simply wasn't enough.
--