Take A Picture (It'll Last Longer)

That weekend, Ben and I had nothing to do but hang around the apartment, which meant that sooner or later, we were going to have to deal with the problems we had encountered throughout the week. I didn’t want to talk to Ben about the kissing and all the awkwardness that had ensued since that point, but I knew that if I didn’t deal with what was going on, then I might just make things worse between us.

I already had three stories due at the end of the next week, my mother trying to get me to come home so she could show off her new son-in-law to all her friends, and Holly had decided she was the go-to girl for all the office gossip on my relationship with Ben, which did not make me happy in the least. The last thing I needed on my plate was a huge rift with Ben over what direction our relationship was heading and I couldn’t help but smile at the irony that I had to give him the “where is this relationship going?” speech when we had been married a month.

“What do you wanna do today?” Ben asked me, still in his pajamas a.k.a his worn-out boxers and an AC/DC t-shirt.

“I thought we could talk,” I said to him, trying to keep the difficulty of the conversation to a minimum. I thought straightforward would be the way to go. Ben and I don’t always see eye to eye.

“About football?” Ben asked.

“I don’t know anything about football, your country’s version or mine,” I replied.

“TV shows?” Ben asked.

“Not about TV shows,” I said.

“About the decline of Western civilization?” Ben asked.

“No thanks,” I snorted.

“Really? I didn’t think you were one of the millions of fat cats who wants to sit around in ignorance and obliviousness while our earth slowly descends into chaos,” Ben said in mock surprise.

“That’s a lot more big words than I’m used to hearing you say in a single sentence,” I said. “Have you been reading my dictionary again?”

“Only when I can’t find a copy of The Feminine Mystique or Quilting for Dummies,” Ben replied.

“Nice to know,” I said.

“So, what do you wanna talk about?” Ben asked me.

“About…us,” I said, trying to hide how nervous I really was.

“Us?” Ben said, confused. “Are you trying to pressure me into marrying you, because, I hate to tell you this, but you’re a month too late…”

“Ben, please be serious here,” I sighed.

“You know I’m not a very serious person,” Ben pointed out.

“Can you try just this once?” I asked him. “It’s really important.”

“Okay,” Ben said, putting on his best serious face, which wasn’t that serious at all. “What about us?”

“I’m scared, really,” I admitted to him. “I scared that when this is all over, we won’t be able to go back to the way things were before, that we won’t know how to go back to the way things were before. But I think, most of all, I’m scared that we won’t want things to go back to the way they were before.”

“Why are you scared of that?” Ben asked me, suddenly more serious than I’d ever seen him before.

“I guess because it’s unknown,” I replied. “I don’t know what that would be like… doing this for the rest of our lives…”

“You don’t? Ben said, surprised.

“Um, no,” I said. “What? Do you have some sort of idea?”

“I thought it’d be just like this,” Ben shrugged.

“The two of us sitting around talking about ourselves?” I said with a raised eyebrow.

“No,” Ben sighed, as if I was the one being difficult. “Just the two of us being us. Together. I don’t see why it’s such a struggle for you to imagine that. It would be just like the past month has been. Except, we might not remain celibate until we’re a hundred.”

“It’s nice to know which brain you’re thinking with,” I snorted.

“I can’t help it! I’m a guy!” Ben rolled his eyes. “If we aren’t going to talk about sports, we might as well talk about the only other thing I ever think about.”

“The only other thing you ever think about?” I asked him curiously. “Is that about me personally or just in general?”

“You know what I mean,” Ben said, turning that lovely tomato red color.

“No,” I smiled teasingly. “I don’t.”

“Just…” Ben said, frustrated and a pleasantly embarrassed pink hue, “forget about it. Never mind. That never happened.”

“Uh-huh,” I smirked. “You do realize I’m going to hold this over your head for the rest of your life, right?”

“Oh, like you don’t think about me the same way sometimes,” Ben snorted.

“Getting a little self-absorbed are we now?” I said, laughing to cover my own nervousness.

“You’re turning red! I was right! I was right!” Ben said exuberantly.

“Calm down, Tom Cruise,” I snorted. Ben realized he was jumping on the couch and then sat back down, pretending as though nothing had happened.

“Look, Catt,” Ben said after I had stopped giggling about him acting so stupid, “The thing is, we’re best friends. I’m closer to you than I am to anyone I know, my family included. I’m not about to let anything come between the two of us. If our friendship is really that important to you, won’t you fight to keep it, no matter what happens once I get my green card?”

“That’s what scares me, Ben,” I admitted. “I don’t know what I’m going to do or think then. I don’t like the unknown. I don’t like not knowing. I’ve always had everything cleverly planned out but ever since you got that letter from Immigration… everything has been up in the air and I don’t know what to do. It’s freaking me out. I guess I’m just not as go with the flow as you are.”

“I’m not ‘go with the flow’, per se,” Ben replied. “I just take things one day at a time. One problem at a time.”

“I don’t know if I can do that,” I sighed.

“That’s why I’m here,” Ben grinned. “It’s why they put two people in a marriage. So if one of them can’t work it out, the other one can help them along.”

“What about polygamists?” I asked him.

“I don’t know. Maybe they need more help than the rest of us,” Ben shrugged. “Personally, if you didn’t mind me getting a second wife…”

“Aren’t you having enough problems with your first one?” I asked him, trying not to sound too enraged. I was afraid he might like that.

“You’re not too much trouble,” Ben smiled, ruffling my hair. “Besides, following that age old British custom, if you get too annoying or don’t provide me with a son during a certain period of time, then I can just lob off your head and get a new wife. A better wife. One of those Stepford women who stores beer in her chest...”

“Keep talking like that, mister, and I’ll be trying to find some way to dispose of your lifeless body,” I said to him sternly.

“See? We have the perfect marriage,” Ben grinned. “You get scared, I make it better, you bring up polygamy and then dismiss any ideas I have about it. I threaten to execute you if you don’t perform the tasks assigned to a medieval wife and you threaten to kill me.”

“We are freaks,” I sighed.

“We’re more normal than a lot of people,” Ben pointed out. “You see all those weird fetish people on CSI. We aren’t as bad as them.”

“Keep telling yourself that, Ben,” I laughed.

“Are we done talking now?” Ben asked.

“Unless there’s anything you want to talk about,” I shrugged.

“As a matter of fact there is,” Ben smiled.

“I don’t need another lecture about global warming,” I said to him warningly.

“I was thinking more about the fact that I haven’t gotten any snuggles this past week,” Ben said. “It’s like a drug habit almost. I used to get them all the time and now I don’t get them any more and it makes me feel irritable and desperate.”

“You want more snuggles?” I said to him, in disbelief.

“Yes,” Ben pouted. “I have needs, you know.”

“You need to be snuggled? Ben, why don’t I just take you down to the Navy Pier and win you a stuffed animal?” I said with a laugh.

“It’s not the same,” Ben frowned. “And besides, if you buy me a giant stuffed animal to snuggle with, I might just turn into one of those weird fetish people on CSI and I’ll be asking to use the apartment for my weird fantasy parties with all the friends I met in online chatrooms and…”

“Fine,” I sighed, putting my arms around him.

“That’s better,” Ben smiled, cuddling up with me.

“You do know I’m just doing this to shut you up,” I said.

“I’m an addict, Catt. I’ll take it however I can get it,” Ben replied. After a minute, I started to worry that I might start making out with Ben again and so I pulled away from him. He looked at me a little offended. “What was that for?”

“I’m going to go scrounge up some lunch out of the fridge,” I said. He looked a little hurt and I knew I could just let him look that way at me, so after I got up off the couch, I bent down and gave him a kiss on the cheek. “We can snuggle for a little while later, okay?”

“Okay,” Ben said happily. The strangest part of all of it was that I was actually looking forward to later.