It was an impossible situation for them both; she felt miserable and so in love with him and he felt horrible that she was in the least uncomfortable or sad or wounded and he was so in love with her.

He couldn't think of anything to do other than to hold her. He couldn't think of how to breakinto that tiny, precious part of her that was discontented. He couldn't fathom a way to get to her heart without bruising every delicate part of her along the way. He wanted to be inside her, but he didn't want to own her or restrain her or damage her.

He only wanted to see that one moment when her bud would open up to him and become the beautiful rose that the were both waiting for.

Ahh, to smell the sweetness of her first bloom...

She thought about all of the things she accused him of. All of her own misery she had placed on his heart. All of the things she had forced him to be accountable for. All of the things she felt were wrong, out of place, or just plain different that she had made up in her mind to dispise she had put before him in a buffet setting, allowing his appetite for self punishment to pick out and which helping his anger would determine he deserved.

it was her own fault, for allowing him to alter her life beyond her comfort. And all she could do was force him to admit to a wrong that he never committed.

He thought about all of the particulars of their arguement, no matter how foggy the rememberaces might have been. He thought about how trapt she muat feel, how little she really had, how much he really had asked her to give up. He forgave her in his heart for cursing at him but he couldn't seem to forgive himself for cursing at her. he forgived her for being angry, but he couldn't seem to forgive himself for leaving her alone that night. For forsaking her for his own selfish desires. For wanting her to be perfect.

He tried in vain, but couldn't see her as any less than perfect and himself as any less than a thorn in her side.

Among all of their silent making up and apologizing and forgiving there was a moment of reflective quiet between them. A moment when they both were not thinking, but being thought of. A moment when they allowed themselves to relax and stop judging and blaming and hurting. A moment when someone else stepped into their thoughts and whispered gently what they were to feel and think and need.

All anxiety had passed over them and they were now interlocked in a sweet calm, and for a moment, didn't need anything else.

She felt more whole than she had all night without him. Her heart swelled at his touch. She began to slip into a dream like surrender and these words ressounded in her head:

The man said,
"This is now bone of my bones
and flesh of my flesh;
she shall be called 'woman,
for she was taken out of man."

For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and be united to his wife, and they will become one flesh.

And for the first moment since before their argument, she felt as one with him in spirit and in flesh.

He thought to himself

"I am deeply moved, and stirred. It seems to me that I am holding a very fragile treasure. It seems to me, even, that there was nothing more fragile on all Earth. In the sunlight I am looking at hier pale forehead, hier closed eyes, her locks of hair trembling with our heartbeats...What I see here is nothing but a shell. What is most important is invisible . . ."

What is most important to the Heart is invisible to the Eye.