Stolen Moments

Four burners, three pots and a dream. Mental snapshots crafted and chiseled by the rind left after the grind. The oil dribbles from the bottle, splattered across the surface of tempered iron. A blade cuts a garlic clove into a hundred pieces before a manicured hand tosses them onto the sizzling surface. The smell of fresh cilantro is a thing of beauty as it collides with the searing of chicken pieces. The water comes to a boil. The solid strands of linguine go limp. Romaine, hot house tomatoes, green onions and shitakes are rinsed and tossed in a bowl.
She has done this nearly every night for more than a decade now.

She can feel him before they make contact, the energy of solo scattered by basic math. One and one make two. Then she can feel his breath against her neck. His exhales are heavy. Her right nipple hardens as she reaches behind, pulling him to her while the other arm continues its usual tasks.

The chicken is flipped from one side to the other. The back of her skirt begins to rise. The breeze from the fan across the room caresses the now bare flesh below her pantyline. He puts his lips to her neck, his fingers easing the thing cotton fabric down below her ankles. He knows just the right spots to hit, the proper placement to bring forth the slowest of streams from down below.

She puts the sizzling pan in the oven, stirs and pasta and slaps a top on the large salad bowl with 'Tupperware' on it. Then she turns to him.

"Xbox," he whispered, answering her unspoken question about the kid. With the shape of their home sound cannot turn corners. And even if it did the music in his room is loud enough to keep it far away from his ears.

His fingers baptize themselves in her, polishing the pearl until it glows. She loses her breath more than once. Her hands find their way through the now open corridor at the front of his jeans. She finds what she's looking for, the thing already pulsing with excitement.

He wants to lift her to the kitchen counter a few feet away. She wants him to drop to his knees and paint her masterpiece with a tongue colored silver. But there is no time in this grind. Such measures must be saved for the hours when their stores stairs closed, when the turned silver clasp marks a telepathic 'Keep Out'.

Instead she brings his lips to hers. Their tongues knot like shirts in the wash. Her insides bathe themselves in that same feeling she felt on the roof of Building C, back in the projects, before the ideas of 'I doing' ever came into the frame.

She steps back and looks at him, minding the burners all the while, t-shirt and jeans to her Georgetown tastes, the musk he was born with to her Chanel No. 5.

They don't do this every night but more than every once in a while, a few moments stolen from the former life everyone told them they would have to lose, an expected casualty in the war of what they say is normal. He exits the room in reverse, his lips glued into a grin as he studies an ass that hasn't changed as much as he feared it would. She turns back to the stove, pretending not to notice, knowing it still looks good to him. Out.