That Which The Pen Does Not Want To Write

A Story by Wharton

He wished he'd never heard the word, wished that when he had, he'd just ignored it, gone on drinking his coffee, nodding his head, pretending to listen like he usually did

He wished he'd never heard the word, wished that when he had, he'd just ignored it, gone on drinking his coffee, nodding his head, pretending to listen like he usually did when his co-workers talked about things he found too trivial to acknowledge.

Not that he was unkind. Those he worked with liked him well enough, they just found that his mind wandered and was forgetful. It was a standing joke, about David's bad memory. They didn't need to know the exact reason for it. It was better if they just thought he was absentminded.

"The Brazilians, the Portuguese, they have a word for that," Miranda spoke, in reply to another worker's story that David drifted through. "Saudade, they say, it's that feeling of yearning, but with a fatalistic tone, like the memory of one far from home, we miss those we knew, those we love , but home is far away, maybe those we love are now dead, time has moved on so there is pain in that we can never go back, never see those we love, experience that feeling. I don't fully understand, but it is an intriguing word."

Saudade...it's odd how words stay in our thoughts, keep popping into our consciousness as we work, while driving home, while eating a Lean Cuisine in front of the television...when going to bed, when...

David woke up the next morning, he rolled over, staring at the still dark ceiling, his heart beat faster than normal and the collar of his tee-shirt was damp from perspiration. But he wasn't ill, though he felt tired, and upset, but there was something more, maybe it was anxiety, well, yes and no. He tried to think, what was he dreaming about? He really couldn't remember, but he'd felt this before, many times, and usually he just got out of bed, made a cup of coffee and got over it. But today he just stayed there and tried to figure it out.

He felt a little like crying...a grown man, he felt ashamed, and yet indulged it, for he wanted to understand what the dream was that caused him to have this mixture of emotions. He thought hard, tried to put himself back in time, to just ten minutes before when he was asleep, and he assumed, dreaming.

Eventually he found a fragment, a piece of the dream. He thought about the things that were most important to him...his family, his friends, the people in his life. His dream must be, in some way, based upon them; and as he thought about that, he remembered a moment in his past. How odd that it came to him, it was just a simple thing, something, he was sure, that most men just ignored...he remembered bacon.

It wasn't exactly the bacon that he remembered; but the moment, just after shaving, cooking bacon early one Saturday, placing it on a paper towel to absorb the fat...arranging the strips into a word, "PAM."

Of course, the dream was about that moment, about the bacon, about his wife Pamela waking, smelling the eggs and bacon wafting into the bedroom, her getting up, head drooped, eyes still half shut, following the aroma; her slippers scuffing, making her way to the kitchen, hair askew, oddly beautiful. He remembered her, clearly, like they were both there now: She looked at the bacon, shook her head as she read her name, telling her husband with an indulgent smile, "You just aren't normal, David, are you?"

That was the dream, nothing more than that. He had thousands of memories of his wife. Happy moments, dramatic ones, many he thought about during the day. He also had those he tried to forget: the sickness, her depression, her acceptance, his feeling of helplessness, death.

It took a long time to get over Pamela's dying...not that one ever does, but he learned to accept it, deal with it, sublimate it...he began to write poetry, fiction, trying to get his feelings out, but not to re-visit them. He wrote humor, silly pieces, that lifted his spirit, made him laugh, poor and hastily written pieces that none-the-less made him smile, made him forget. When written, he'd place them in a three ring binder and forget them...writing was about what was yet to be written, what would be written.

He couldn't think of Pamela for long, couldn't go back to those days, two kids just out of college, no money, but enough dreams, enough love to make up for a cupboard containing Ramen noodle soup and a few packages of instant rice.

How he loved her. He would wake up in the morning and stare at her. She hated that. She'd awake, open her eyes, and he be there, on his side, hand under his head, just looking at her. He couldn't help it. He had a poet's heart, a fool's soul, he was the luckiest man on earth; and as he now thought about it, he saw the trite irony...that his luck had run out.

"Saudade." Suddenly he remembered the word, how his co-worker had described it...how it had got into his head, stuck there, the same way trivia usually did...movie quotes, batting averages, advertising jingles.

The dream slowly fell into place: The bacon, his wife's look, his walking up to her, hugging her from behind as she reached for a strip. The feeling of her warmth radiating through her pajamas, pressed against him...his heart beating strong, her turning, putting her arms around his shoulders, moving her head to the side, not letting him kiss her on the lips, for her breath smelled of bacon.

He shook his head, that was it, that was the dream, he heard, and could feel his heart thumping, the same as when he awoke from the dream. He was suddenly warm, needed some cool air, his neck, below his Adam's apple felt hot...again, he wanted to cry.

But he remembered it all. How he felt that moment, as he held her, as he wanted her, wanted to love her, be loved by her. It was never enough, he could never get enough...and in the dream, he again had that feeling, of needing her, needing something more of her, not just the arms and legs entwined as they made love, not just the feeling of completeness after, but more, intangible things; a kiss, a whisper, a sigh...a promise...he wanted a pledge that she did not, could not give him...she did not love him forever, and that was not fair. She owed him another thirty years, or God owed him, someone did. He wanted a lifetime of Pamela, of her shaking her head at his silly jokes, a million more kisses, a thousand more conversations about bills, about the kids they never had, about the home they never bought, the old age they never had.

It was getting light, the alarm went off, he reached over and hit the snooze button. There was a light ache in his chest, a hollow, a hunger that he could do nothing about. He was going to call into work, say he was sick. He didn't want to face the world, put on a mask. He just wanted to write poetry about slipping on banana peels or cats chasing dogs. He would write thousands of words today, all day, but not one of them, no matter how many he wrote, would be, "saudade." He'd banished that word from his vocabulary, from his life....though he could do nothing about his dreams.