(Going Through the) Motion Sickness

	I held it firmly in my hands while standing in front of her. She knew how much I wanted it. I was pleading, begging please. I was all but on my knees.
	She slouched over and sighed.
	“I'm sorry, I'm just not in the mood,” she told me.
	I took the box of Scrabble and put it back on the shelf. She knew how much pleasure board games brought me.
	I walked back to the couch that she was slumped up in and sat next to her, putting my hand on hers. I looked deep into her eyes and knew that I was looking at someone truly beautiful.
	“Do you think we could--?” I began.
	“Yes,” she whispered in a soft moan.
	Do you think we could become enemies? Was what I wanted to tell her, but I was glad she understood before I even had to finish. It would have been so painful to utter all seven words to her.
	“”But don't you think--?” I was about to ask.
	“Don't worry, dear,” She reassured me. “The walls of the bedroom are thick enough, they're practically soundproof. With the door closed, nothing inside can get out until the door opens.”
	She made me forget what I was even going to ask her. I was unsure whether she wanted to seduce me or murder me, but either way, she was comforting in the only way that she could be.
	We went off to the bedroom, she led me by the hand. We closed the door behind us and sat on the bed. For a split second I thought she had undressed, but that wasn't true; she was wearing her armor, heavily protected and ready to battle. I too was guarded. A fortress and a battalion.
	But she put her hand on mine and it didn't matter. For a brief moment I hoped that we couldn't become enemies, that we were too infatuated with the idea of peace.
	She leaned in close with her warm smile and said, “I want to run.”
	“Run where?” I asked. “Toward me? Away with me? Away from me? Away from here? Toward somewhere?”
	She shook her head. “I just want to run.”
	Was she training for a marathon? I would support her, but I didn't know her to be in good shape. I still wished her the best, but only in my head.
	Now I waited. I waited and wondered. Wondered if this was all just a dream. Where any minute now I'll wake up from my bed, remembering that I live alone, that I'm single, and that I have been alone. Remembering that the morning is the same as yesterday morning, that I'll wake up, make myself some eggs, pour myself some coffee, then head off and do whatever it is I do. Lie around or go to work. I must do something. That's right, a dream. I made up this dream for myself so I would feel less alone, and she doesn't actually exist and I just want to feel like I'm with someone at this very moment and
	that's not true. Why would it be? Why would I conjure up someone if I still end up clashing with them? What good would that be? No. This is real. I snapped back to reality.
	The idea that this was all a dream was in fact, the dream. Being with her was reality. And looking at her confirmed that.
	That's when she said to me, in her soft and lovely voice, “you know, sometimes I have this feeling. This feeling that this is all a dream, and when I wake up I'll be alone and I'll have always been and I'll make myself breakfast and do whatever it is I do.”
	I told her that I was thinking the exact same thing. We both laugh.
	“But this isn't a dream, because you're not a man of my dreams.”
	“Nor are you a woman of my dreams.”
	“But don't you think I'm manic?”
	“When have you ever known either of us to have experienced such a thing as 'mania'?”
	“What about euphoria?”
	She didn't answer. And I didn't answer. We both knew that neither of us had experienced any sense of mania. But euphoria? We hoped. Maybe once in our life. Maybe once or twice. With each other, though? Because of each other? Through each other? We couldn't say for sure, but we hoped. Maybe once in our life.
	I didn't know what we felt right now, or how we wanted to feel. I knew that she wanted to run, and I wanted us to be on the same page. The problem was that we were reading different books, so when we got to the same page we would still be reading different things.
	I tried telling her how I felt, but instead what came out was incessant babbling. She graciously absorbed it immediately.
	I tried asking her how she felt, but instead I told her, “we are running.”
	She nodded her head and fell back. I did the same.
	We were sound asleep and dreaming.
	We never noticed that we had broken the bed.