In Another Lifetime
"Do you think someone's listening to us?" It comes out a little more than a whisper. He would have thought that she didn't hear it if, in the corner of his eyes, he didn't see her tense up, shoulders perking up in surprise at the sound of his voice. He ponders repeating the question, maybe even scooting a little closer to her on the pew but ultimately, he dissuades himself. This is a house of worship after all, where people have their conversations with their gods, not with silly strangers with silly questions. It occurs to him then that he just might have offended the woman, having disrupted her prayer so casually with an equally brusque question; he remembers that unlike him there are some people who take their religion seriously. He mentally kicks himself for the deed.
But she says, "Excuse me?" and he thinks he'll be able to forgive himself for this one.
"When we pray, do you think someone's listening to us?" He turns to her, his eyes finally locking onto her strangely familiar ones. He wonders for a second if the sadness in her eyes mirrors his own.
"I…I don't know." So maybe she's as clueless as him when it comes to matters such as this. But the honesty is refreshing, renewing that he can't help but indulge.
"Sometimes I don't know why I bother." His lips purses to a slight smile and he feels her do the same.
"I think it's because you have nothing more to lose." Her hand snakes into her purse, clutching what exactly he can't be sure, essentially because he can't see it. He figures it's one of those rosary things.
"I think you're right." He nods, smiling, acknowledging the truth in her words. For the next few seconds, they sit still, both content in breathing in the silence.
She's the one to end it; she's always got some place to be. She stands up slowly and the moment of indulgence is over all too quickly. But neither one resists it. She nods to him before she leaves, a simple gesture of goodbye. He too returns the act. And when she turns her back to him, she still has her grasp on a tiny plane in her purse. And when he turns his head back to the cross, he still has his heart holding onto the shreds of a marriage he once knew.