Dishes

[Julia Jackson]

Julia leaned over the sink in her modest little kitchen. No, not little... but cozy. The kitchen had always been one of her favorite places to be - there was color everywhere. The walls were covered with art - a combination of both family-created and festival-bought works. Shelves were hung at random places, with various knicknacks and accessories making use of every square inch available. The table she and Evan had made together - it was their first project as a married couple, brought about mostly because they could not afford a store-bought one. Now, it was her favorite piece of furniture in the house.

A window was set right above the sink, with a great view of the backyard, which was interesting in itself. She considered it to be an experiment. It was a very small(no, cozy) backyard, with ivy climbing the fences and walls so that you couldn't even see the underlying metal and brick. She and Evan had spent years creating the multiple levels of the garden, with plants abound. The two trees, situated to the left of the door to the yard, had a hammock stretched between them, and on the right there was a small, old bench that Julia had inherited from her mother. During the summer there were splashes of color everywhere, and in winter the scene was serene, with white snow coating everything.

With this view in this room, it was easy to understand why Julia loved doing the dishes. Spinning the dial so the water shut off, she snatched the floating sponge and reached her hands under the hot water to grab a dish. Dying sunlight was filtering through the leaves of the trees, and the rays bounced playfully off of the silverwear on the bottom. It was a good day.

As she scrubbed, she began to hum... which then turned into a full out song, to which she scrubbed in time.

"I want to sing another melody
So different from the one I always sing
But when I do the dishes
I run the water very very very hot
And then I fill the sink to the top with bubbles of soap
And then I set all the bottle caps I own afloat
And it's the greatest voyage in the history of plastic
And then I slip my hands in and start to make waves
And then I dip my tongue in a take a taste
It tastes like soap but it doesn't really taste like soap
And then I lower in my whole mouth and take a gulp!"

[Evan Jackson]

Evan entered his house, dropping his keys on the table just inside the door. He did the same with the mail he'd just sorted through - most of it was bills. As per usual. He began to remove his jacket, and then paused. A smile spread across his face as he recognized his wife's voice, coming from the kitchen and singing about the dishes she was doing. Quickly, he finished removing his jacket and made his way into the kitchen to greet her.

Julia was the perfect girl for Evan. He loved her with everything he was, loved everything about her. They had their fair share of spats, like any other couple, but they always made up within five minutes after the fight ended. Sometimes the fight would end before it had begun, neither of them able to keep a straight face at seeing the other so angered. It just didn't happen that they could be mad at one another. Most of their fights were about money anyway, and that problem was slowly solving itself.

Evan entered the kitchen, lit solely by the sun coming in through the window, and leaned against the doorframe, watching Julia. He loved to just watch her. She was so beautiful, it almost hurt him to look at her sometimes. She would never believe him when he told her this, though. And so he stayed silent as he leaned there, not wanting her to notice him and become embarrassed.

Her delicate, yet strong voice permeated the entire room, making it seem much lighter and cheerful than it actually was. They would sometimes sit together - he would play the guitar or the piano, and she would sing. Those were some of Evan's happiest memories, looking at her as she sang, her eyes closed. Sometimes he would even miss a chord because he was so lost in Julia-watching.

It was a damn good thing they were married.

Shifting his weight so that he was standing upright, he made his way over to her and slowly wrapped his arms around her waist. She responded immediately, leaning into him before putting down the sponge with the plate she'd been washing and turning around to face him. He took a moment to look into her eyes and then kissed her softly as her hands linked themselves lazily around the back of his neck.

He was the luckiest man alive.