Melting

Kallan got up early and found me sipping my coffee on the couch.  Mark was on a conference call . . . what is it about conference calls that makes everybody use their giant deep voices?  Impossible to think when someone is sitting right next to you using his giant deep voice to talk to a room of invisible noisy people.

It’s like a contest . . . “I have a thought on that, and I will use my deepest and manliest voice to make that point.”

And then a deeper response from the other end of the line, “I think I know what you are saying, but you are incorrect because my voice is even deeper and more manly than yours.”

And then Mark leans back in his chair, crosses his hands behind his neck, and speaks from a gravelly well’s bottom, “Yes, well . . . I would concede the point, except your voice is so high and girly when compared to mine.”

Snort.

So I retreat to the couch and sip my coffee.

Where Kallan finds me.  Curls up into me, still loose and boneless from sleep.

We listen together.

You know how when you are sitting at a red light and a car pulls up next to you?  A car playing a song on its stereo system?  But you can’t actually hear the song . . . instead you hear (or more accurately . . . feel) the vibrations of the too-exaggerated bass notes?

It is like that.  Soothing in an unintelligible sub-woofer sort of way.

Kallan pulls in closer, melting into my empty spaces.

I love when that happens.

I am feeling better this morning.

Yesterday, I was so tired.

Yesterday, I sat on the couch in the basement for a bit in the early evening hours.  And then slipped sideways.  Not sleeping, but not happy about being awake.

And Maj found me.

Maj’s schedule has been nothing but disrupted lately.  She loves visitors, but they exhaust her.  She curled up into the space beside me.

We laid together.

The sound of music tickled from upstairs . . . we couldn’t hear the song, but the high-pitched and bouncy nature of the rhythm suggested it was a Kallan choice.  Maj was loose and pliant with sleepiness.  She pulled in closer, melting into my empty spaces.

I love when that happens.

We laid together, listening and melting.

And then?  The song changed and I caught a few notes . . . Kim Wilde’s Kids of America.

We’re the kids of America!  Whoa-Oh!

And the sound of an accompanying high-pitched voice sang along, ringing out on the Whoa-Oh!

Maj and I realize in the same instant that the singer?

Is not Kallan.  It’s Mark.

Maj’s body shook against mine as she giggled.

“That’s Daddy!”

I shook with laughter as well, “I know!  Shhhh . . . listen!”

We’re the kids in America.
Whoa-Oh!
We’re the kids in America.
Whoa-Oh!
Everybody live for the music-go-round!

And we laughed together, all helpless and teary, burying our faces in one another’s shoulders to stifle the sound.  Shushing one another so we could hear Mark singing all high and girly. . . and then collapsing into gleeful giggles again.

Back to Kallan and I on the couch this morning.

All melty.

Mark’s voice humming low in the background.

Kallan is talking about the mom of one of her old friends, talking about that mom’s voice.

I pull out of my reverie and focus.

“ . . . and so I never liked to go to her house because her mom always sounded so angry.  Like even when she was saying something happy?  She sounded like she didn’t mean it and like there was all angry and mad underneath.  And so all I could hear was the bad stuff underneath.  And her smile was fakey to me, like it was hiding what her face wanted to look like.  She handed me a cookie one time, and I didn’t want to take it because it felt like she didn’t want to give it to me.  Like something was wrong.”

I kiss the top of Kallan’s head, “Sometimes grown-ups have layers.  And sometimes the layers underneath are not as happy as the ones they show the rest of the world.”

“I know that, Mom.  Duh.”

Snort!

She snuggles in deeper, “But layers are not the same as fake.  You don’t try to fool me with fake.  I know when you and Daddy are mad and when you are happy.  Even when there are layers.”

I kiss the top of her head again, “Do you now?”

“Yup.”

I sip my coffee.

She giggles, “Daddy sounds like he is covered in layers of dirt, by the way.  All deep and bossy and buried.”

Maj makes her way down the stairs and into the room.  Pauses.  Cocks her head as she listens, “That’s Daddy’s work voice.  He’s on the phone?”

Kallan and I scoot over and Maj sits on my other side.

She leans into me, “I’m still tired.”

And for a moment?  I sit with both my daughters on the couch as the rumble of Mark’s voice vibrates, reassuring and musical in the air.

The combination of the sound and the silence and the closeness is overwhelming.

I am all early-morning raw and open.  And my daughters?  They pull in closer and melt into the empty spaces.

I love when that happens.