A Hungry Traveler

"I tell ya, I can't get no respect," he mimicked.

"I'll give you respect," she fooled, and tackled him off the couch and onto the floor, where they made more love. They moved back to the bed, climbed under the covers, and slept in each others' arms. In the light of the dawn, they made love again, showered, admired themselves in the mirror, dressed and ate breakfast at a diner. The breakfast was quiet, because they knew the end was close and talking would just make it sad. They kept it light, making little jokes, making faces with the egg yolks, feeding each other a bite of sausage.

They left and walked back to his car and they were very quiet now. They fell together and embraced hard, burying their faces into each others' necks, afraid to say a word because it would bring a torrent of tears.

"I'll never forget you," he whimpered through his tight throat.

"I'll always feel your soul inside me," she cried.

"We're a part of each other forever," he whispered.

"Yes, we are," she whispered back.

They separated and he climbed into the convertible. She bent over, elbows on the door.

"Sure you don't want to jump in and go to Mexico with me?"

She laughed. "I have friends down there you don't want me to see," she laughed.

They were silent again, knowing it was time, not knowing how to end it.

"You be the happiest you can be," he said.

"You too. I'll miss you terribly, but we'll be better in a while."

The tightness in his throat was choking him.

"Yeah, eventually," he said. "And I won't regret the broken heart for one moment."

"Neither will I," she said, squeezing his arm. She bent toward him, gave him one last firm kiss, and scolded him, "now get out of here and let's begin the healin'."

"Yes, ma'am," he said, and he put the car into gear, and pulling away from the curb, said "I love you."

"I love you too," she said, and he drove away, wiping the tears from his face as he shifted.

He drove down the coast to Laguna to meet his new client. Things went well, he got the new business, and he spent a night in Newport Beach by himself, eating alone in a fish house. He roamed the bars of the town alone, making casual conversation with friendly locals and pretty bartenders. He listened to a jazz trio. Their music was sublime, and he cried, but it was not the music that did it.

He thought a lot about what it was to have a soul mate. He wondered how it was really possible that two people would be so lucky to find each other at the right time, at the right place. That if there was such a thing as a soul mate, that person was out there already somewhere in the world, and it was just luck that your paths would cross at the appropriate moment, before another obligation or promise had been made. Or maybe it was that people were lucky enough to find someone who could become their soul mate, that it was something that you grew into – that it wasn't an organic thing, but was instead dynamic.

He wondered if you only had just one chance in life to seize that soul mate, or else be destined to have to make the best of an inferior relationship.

He didn't know any of the answers. All he knew is that, for one brief period of his life, he had found what he thought was the missing piece of his whole, someone who surely had been a part of him for lifetimes before. Someone who he would – could – never see again.

During his flight home, he ached, knowing how desperately he needed the love of his wife, and he worried that his precious new friend would be as sad as he. In the Salt Lake City airport, he resisted the urge to call her and leave a message. It was over, it had to be.

He entered his bedroom after midnight. He undressed, climbed into bed. He hugged his wife as hard as he dared, but not so hard that she would feel his sadness. He whispered to her that he missed her desperately. She returned his hug lightly, but did not say anything.

He rolled over, tried hard not to think of her, and fell asleep.