Write Naked People!!

This is a little piece from my NaNoWriMo. One of my blog buds requested I post a little something – you know who you are, so you better give me some feedback!  The rest of you, please let me know what you think . . . ’cause there’s 50,000 words involved by the end 😉  I’ve been writing about Lyla for awhile – she wants to live in my words. There’s several stories involving her on here. Let me know if you’d like me to share anymore, maybe I’ll pick a racier piece. AND YES my title is deceiving in a way – just wanted to remind y’all that it’s okay to write naked – sometimes it’s even more inspiring LOL! Seriously 😉 I, on the other hand, am wearing the t-shirt I have that says Write Naked. 

Stacy picked Lyla up and they went to a nearby Mexican restaurant, where Lyla ordered her usual jumbo Patron margarita.  Stacy insisted she order some lunch since she had not eaten, and because she looked thin – she had lost at least 15 pounds in the last couple months. She started telling Stacy what had just happened, during which she started to cry right there at their table. They had a good talk about keeping busy, and Stacy reminded her that she needed to start doing things that she enjoyed.

After getting some food in her belly, and over half that margarita, she began to feel a little better. Stacy was right, she needed to do some things she enjoyed, like reading. She had several good books she could get lost in, and she planned to start one tonight once she got home. “The Astronauts’ Wives Club” was waiting for her on her nightstand – she had downloaded it to her e-reader a month or so back. Now that she was feeling semi-human again, Stacy paid the bill and dropped her back at the house.

Lyla, buzzed pretty good now, picked out some music, and turned on the pinball machine. She wanted to hit some balls. She had played several games, and had been dancing around the house to 7 Mary 3, feeling really good, when the phone rang. She didn’t recognize the number, but now in a laid back mood, decided to answer anyway.

“Hey baby! How the heck are you,” he asked. She recognized his southern drawl immediately, she always did.

“Hey Travis!” she said light heartedly. “How have you been? Haven’t heard from you in awhile.”

“Yeah, my phone’s been down. You know they make you pay for those things,” he laughed. “So how you been girl?”

She had never mentioned any trouble in her marriage to Travis, and wasn’t sure if she should. But here she was drunk, in a good mood and was tired of keeping secrets. Jesse had been gone for over two months, and other then throwing her a good time once in a while he had made no effort to come home or even act as if he still wanted to married. As a matter of fact, he was still telling the marriage counselor that he did not wish to be married to her anymore, or anyone else for that matter.

Lyla was a beautiful woman and wanted someone to share her life with – she wanted her husband, but if he didn’t want her, than she didn’t know how long she was going to sit at home by herself. She had no idea what he did when he wasn’t there and she didn’t ask. He had made it quite clear that he didn’t answer to her anymore on any level about anything. He said that was why he did not want to live with her ever again – he was never going to worry about accounting for anything with anyone ever again.

Thinking of it like that, Lyla decided to tell Travis exactly what had been going on in her life of late. She needed a friend right now and he was always a good friend to her. “Well, in all honesty, not so good Trav. I lost my job a couple months back and haven’t been able to find another one yet. Then four days after I lost my job, Jesse left me – two days after our wedding anniversary. Right now we’re separated. He says he doesn’t want to be married to me anymore. We are in counseling, and I am holding out hope. But, not real sure what’s gonna happen going forward. Worried I might have to sell the house.”

“What?” he was shocked; he had always thought they had a great marriage, or at least that’s what she had alluded to. “Lyla, I am so sorry to hear that,” he continued, “I’m sure y’all will work it out, you’ve been together too long not to.”

She told him she agreed, but it seemed her husband did not. They talked a while about his back injury earlier in the year, and other things that had been going on in their lives. The conversation was lighthearted once she told him about her circumstances and they did not dwell on that any longer than she wanted to. Her margarita buzz had kicked in full throttle at this point and she was teasing him about something.

“Girl, if you were across the table from me right now,” Travis started, and before he could finish Lyla mockingly laughed, “What, you’d kiss me?”

Catching him considerably off guard, he said, “I’d like to Lyla, but I wouldn’t. Not as long as your married – I would never put you in a compromising position. Though having said that, not sure I’d trust myself, either. I have never told you this, but you’re the woman I measured every other against my entire life. I have never forgotten you.”

“Well, no, I never knew that,” she paused, not knowing what to say to that exactly, “though my sister did say you said something kind of cryptic to her, when she saw you at the reunion, and she wondered if that‘s what you were saying. She and I talked about it. I told her I doubted that as it has been decades and you and I didn’t date that long.”

Travis said, “Well she was right. A few made quite an impression on me, but none like you. Every other woman I had serious relationships with, had the same color of eyes as you.”

Lyla teased, to lighten the moment a little, “You don’t even know what color my eyes are,” she laughed.

Travis replied, “Oh yes I do, if memory serves me correctly, they are green. Green like pine needles that have been in sun for a day or so.”

“Damn, I am impressed that you remember that so succinctly,” she said, surprised, flattered, and touched.

Flippantly, she said, “So you have a thing for green-eyed ladies.” She was trying to be funny.

“No, Lyla, that’s not it.” He continued, “I remember many of our conversations verbatim, and that hasn’t happened to me with too many people, but I remember quite a few of ours, as if they were had yesterday.”

“Would I remember any of these conversations,” she asked.

Travis replied, “You might, if we talked about it, but I am not going to do that. Those are my memories, and under the circumstances I am not willing to share them. If things were different I might.”

Lyla laughed as she said, “Like if I was on my deathbed?”

Travis responded, “No.”

It took her a few days to figure out that he meant only if somehow they were a couple would he feel free to share those memories. Though she was ballsy and direct often, that was not a subject she would ever ask about again – she understood.

[Part 2 – Want to Dance Darlin’]

[Part 3 – Moonlight Drive]

[Part 4 – Imagining What Might Have Been]

[Part 5 – You Want To Make A Memory]