Dear Husband, When you return

When you return home, I want you to know that you may not touch me. Not without permission. Not without a kind word.

This may appear conceited to you. You may think I am only forcing compliments and praise. Or some punishment that leads only to bitter distaste.

No.

I want you to know that I am not a cactus. I am no succulent that survives in harsh climates and miniscule amounts of water and nourishment.

I am a rose. I am a lilac. I am a lush and tropical flower that thrives in moist heat and fertility. Perhaps you misunderstood me. When we first got married you scarce had gardening skills. And, though I nearly died, I remained hardy with life essence preserved.

A decade later, I want you to know that I am alive. More than alive. I am flourishing. When I go to sleep, nectar begins to seep out from between my legs. And, in the mornings I hold onto vivid dreams of being pressed into a glass wall with you edging me from behind. Neither can I decide which is more interesting -to stay in my dream fantasy or to awake into the morning light that dances across my breast.

While you have been away, all the day long, my mind wanders from idea to imagination and back to imagery, oh the possibilities!

My breath suddenly turns me on when I recognize the heave of my breast and the hardness in my nipples.

Bending over reminds me of how tantalizing I would look if you were behind me.

Setting my solo plate down on the table, I begin to eat with slow and lusciously seductive shapes of my mouth and licks of my lips…nectarine juices running down my arm as I lap them off slowly with my tongue. And I think of you. If you were sitting in your chair watching me, and your pants would suddenly become a little too tight.

I feel a wet throbbing every time I sit in the driver’s seat, where you always sit, and my legs part just slightly when my foot presses the gas pedal. What would you be thinking if you were there to see, if you just couldn’t stop yourself from putting your hand there where my skirt ends, if you just couldn’t help but slide your hand further up to feel the part in my legs, to enjoy this kind of forced and vulnerable position I have to take to drive?

You see, I am well. Men are opening doors for me when I go out. I have no make-up on. My hair is a wild disheveled bun. My cleavage is not spilling out and my skirt is floor-length. But my skin glows and my eyes dance. Dancing within.

When I think of your imminent return, I get mixed feelings. The feeling of your warm and masculine hand nearer and nearer to my lower back sends a shiver and a tingle up and down my spine. The memory of your cold neglect, scars of criticism written all over my body, and deserted compliments leaves me to wonder: do you love me?

When I look into my heart, I know the answer is: yes.

Perhaps you just mistook me for a cactus?

A desert rose?

No no. That is not who you plucked from destiny’s garden. You are the caretaker of a more exotic and flourishing flower. I am a tropical rose. And despite all odds, I am still alive.

I don’t want you to think that you can go on pretending that I need no water, no food and still I will provide you with all the beauty and substance you desire. This is not the way a gardener should tend to his garden.

Just as each plant has its own preferred type of soil: acidic, high in potassium, etc, I too have my own recipe for flourishing. And given the right conditions and care, my yields are abundant. Far more than you could imagine to eat and drink by yourself.

While you have often commented how poorly I yield and that you feel like you are starving in some cruel and ill-fated famine, it has all been one big misunderstanding. Because here I am, 6 weeks after your departure and not a single day has passed that my face has not felt flushed, that my legs have not ached to be parted by you, that my back arches when I fall asleep and that my dreams have not been blissfully wet.

Will you bring the desert back home when you return or have you something more tropical in mind? Will you discover that perhaps there is a gardening problem not a diseased-plant problem? Will you reach over to touch me, running your hands hungrily over my breasts, pushing against my sex and plundering your tongue into my mouth to drink like no man has drunk while lost in the desert?

I wonder.

And I don’t want to find out. I don’t want to know what has not changed.

I have discovered that there is this incredible wellspring inside of me. Butterflies that flutter in my belly. Trees that harbor little birds along my spine, heavy clouds that burst with life in my mind, waterfalls down my legs, warm mud between my toes, mango on my tongue and ocean waves that ebb and flow in my heart.

All of this I want to share with you.

Only you.

But my dear, you must know that I am not your desert rose.

So, when you come home, though you may be hungry, and thirst about to take your life, do not touch me. You may do anything, anything at all, but do not touch.

Start anew.

Begin before you gained licensure to freely and willingly stroke, pet, caress, tickle, plunder.

How would you care for your rose if you knew she was tropical, if she thrived in moisture, in compost, in rainbows, in gushing waterfalls? If you knew that with all of this, she could give you everything you ever dreamed of?

Meditate on that my love, and then, let’s begin again.

-Sera V.