Take A Picture (It'll Last Longer)

By that Monday, Ben and I were on good terms. I know this because that morning before work I woke up in his arms and he did everything in his power to keep me from getting up and getting dressed. That week was a tough one at the magazine and every night just about we ordered take out, ate our supper, then basically passed out in the living room watching HBO. Friday afternoon, we got a surprising phone call. Ben was in the bat tub, singing the stupid song he does when he’s giving him self a bath.

I swear to God, it gets annoying every time he decides to have a bath and you have to hear ‘rub-a-dub-dub-Ben’s-in-the-tub-washing-all-his-flub’ twenty thousand times in a row. Especially when Ben decides he’s going to sing it in various musical styles. Two weeks ago it was Motown. Last week it was Disco. This week he’s singing it like Barry Manilow or Frank Sinatra. Anyway, the phone rings and I pick it up, relieved that I can listen to something else other than Ben singing while rubbing soap all over himself. I didn’t expect that I was the US Government.

“Hello. Mrs. Dawes? This is Pam from Immigration,” she said boredly. I still haven’t gotten used to the whole Mrs. Dawes thing so it took me a minute to respond.

“Oh. Hi,” I said. “Is something wrong?”

“No,” Pam said. “We just wanted to move up your interview.”

“Okay,” I nodded. “When?”

“Next Tuesday,” she said.

“Tuesday? That’s…that’s only four days away,” I said in disbelief.

“Yes, Mrs. Dawes. We know that,” Pam said annoyed.

I would have normally cussed her out, but I knew how important his citizenship was to Ben and I wasn’t about to ruin it by cussing out Pam. Besides, if I worked for Immigration, I would probably be a little lackluster about my job too. I bet Pam wanted to be an actress or a painter or something romantic like that. When you’re little and write those essays about what you want to do when you grow up, no one writes that they want to do menial work of Immigration Services.

“Okay. Thank you,” I said, trying to be polite. She hung up.

“Who was that?” Ben yelled from the bathtub. He had ceased his song to eavesdrop on my conversation and I could hear the sloshing of the water. I was sitting on the bed and turned onto the edge of it, facing the slightly open bathroom door. I didn’t want to move and see Ben in all his naked bathtub glory, mainly because that might make him more excited than I wanted him to be.

“Immigration,” I replied. “They moved up your interview to Tuesday.”

“What right do they have to do that?” Ben said annoyed.

“Hey, if you want your green card, you’ll do what they say,” I said to him.

“It’s not even green. It’s yellow,” Ben pouted. “I find that very unsatisfactory.”

“Welcome to America, Ben Dawes,” I snorted. He didn’t say anything and I sighed before laying back across the bed.

“You nervous?” Ben asked me.

“About the Immigration people? Of course,” I sighed. “Though not as nervous as I’m sure you are.”

“I’m not nervous,” Ben said. “We’re married legally.”

“And what if they refuse to give you a green card, even though you’re married to me?” I said. “What are we going to do? Both move to England and find jobs there?”

“I think you’d like London as much as you like Chicago,” Ben shrugged.

“You cannot be serious!” I said, shooting up off the bed. “My mother would kill me if I moved that far away! Besides, isn’t the whole goal of this little charade getting you that green card? What are we going to do if you don’t?”

“I really hate it when you refer to it as a ‘charade’,” Ben muttered.

“I hate it when you sing your bath time song but that doesn’t stop you,” I said. I heard the sploshing around of the water and I knew he was a little upset. I sighed. “I just don’t want you to go back to England, okay? I really want to pull this off.”

“Pull what off? We’re legally married. Isn’t that enough to make me a citizen?” Ben frowned, annoyed.

“I hope so,” I sighed. I heard the sloshing sound of Ben getting out of the tub and closed my eyes, hoping he wouldn’t accuse me of spying on him while he toweled off. “Ben?”

“Yeah?” he said back.

“What are we going to do to prepare for the Immigration people?” I asked him. “Shouldn’t we have a story or something to tell them? I mean, they won’t exactly be pleased if we say we just got married to keep you in the country.”

“Why don’t we just tell them the truth,” Ben shrugged.

“That we got married to keep you in the country?” I said with a laugh.

“No,” Ben said, sounding perturbed. “Tell them we met our junior year of college. That we work together. That we’ve known each other for a while and that we’ve been best friends. And that one day we decided to get married.”

“And that just happened to coincide with the day you received a letter from Immigration?” I snorted.

“We don’t have to tell them that part,” Ben shrugged. “For all they know, we had a lengthy engagement beforehand. We can just say the date of our wedding happened to be set for that Saturday. We could even say that’s why I didn’t bother to renew my card. Because I thought it would be okay.”

“Now we’re venturing into a lie,” I pointed out.

“Like they’ll know,” Ben snorted. “We’ve even got the perfect star-crossed lovers back-story.”

“How do you mean?” I asked him.

“My parents are evil. Yours are accepting. When we met, I had broken up with Brigit and come to the states. Then you started going out with Jon. Then you broke up with Jon. Then we started working together. It all falls into place nicely,” Ben said. “And we can even tell them your old roommate decided to move in with her boyfriend so we could have the apartment to ourselves.”

“As opposed to how Elle moved in with Dirk which resulted in us getting the apartment to ourselves?” I snorted.

“And my roommate was lucky enough to get a promotion right before we got married,” Ben said. “That’s not a lie. And it fits in perfectly. The Fates aligned and here we are.”

“I thought you said we were star-crossed. Doesn’t that mean the Fates are working against you?” I asked.

“Okay,” Ben admitted. “Maybe not. I guess Romeo and Juliet ended up dead because the Fates were working against them.”

“Romeo and Juliet ended up dead because they made too many irrational, hasty, hormone driven decisions,” I snorted. “The entire story is pathetic. Romeo breaks up with his old girlfriend because she won’t put out, finds a girl at a party who will put out, she puts out, and then they die. It’s not about love, it’s about a couple of emo kids going crazy and in a way, a morality tale about having sex with people your parents don’t approve of.”

“I really didn’t need to hear what you wrote your English paper on, Catt,” Ben snorted, walking into the room, wearing nothing but a towel.

“Oh God, Ben!” I blushed. “Don’t you have any clothes in the bathroom?”

“Well, when I got into the tub, you were in the living room and I figured that I could come into the bedroom and get my clothes without being awkwardly naked in front of anyone,” Ben said.

“Can you at least go back into the bathroom and let me go into the living room before you change?” I said to him, still embarrassed and averting my eyes.

“It’s not like it’s anything you haven’t seen before,” Ben said, miffed.

“I can’t believe this isn’t embarrassing to you,” I said, covering my eyes up with my hand.

“I’m not as much of a prude as you,” Ben replied. “Besides, what’s so wrong about a husband being naked in front of his wife?”

“Usually you don’t walk around the house in a towel!” I said, annoyed.

“Maybe I’ll have to start doing it more often so you can get used to it,” Ben said cheerfully.

“Well, you won’t be starting any sort of trend,” I frowned. “If you think I’m about to start walking around in just a towel, you can keep dreaming.”

“What I dream about is none of your business,” Ben said embarrassedly, as he found a pair of underwear in the dresser drawers

“That is just sick, Ben,” I shook my head while put on the boxers. “Much better.”

“Not the reaction I’m used to getting,” Ben frowned.

“You need to go put on a shirt,” I said to him tiredly.

“Definitely not the reaction I’m used to getting,” Ben grimaced before continuing to rustle around in the dresser drawers for some clothes.

“Do you want leftover Thai or leftover Chinese tonight?” I asked him.

“Is there really that much of a difference?” Ben frowned as he pulled a shirt out the drawer.

“Fine, fussbudget. What do you want?” I sighed.

“Fussbudget? What kind of a word is that?” Ben said confused, slipping the shirt over his head. One thing I have to say, Ben’s body has a nice tone to it.

“It means a person who complains a lot,” I said. Ben looked over his shoulder at me in annoyance. “Well, it’s true Mr.-My-Snow-Peas-Are-Touching-My-Macaroni.”

“If you just got those plastic plates with the divider trays…” Ben began.

“Those are for babies,” I rolled my eyes. “Although, there isn’t that much of a difference…” Ben glared at me and I wonder if he was going to pick something up to throw at me. Instead, he just jumped on the bed beside me and the weight of his body hitting the mattress nearly knocked me to the floor. “Some warning next time?”

“Where’s the fun in that,” Ben said.

“Your hair’s still wet,” I pointed out. Before I realized what I was saying, Ben shook his hair like a dog and the water went all over me. “Very nice of you.”

“How about some spaghetti?” Ben asked.

“Do we even have spaghetti?” I asked him quizzically.

“It’s worth a look,” Ben shrugged, but made no move to get up and look himself.

“Aren’t you going to go and see?” I asked. “You’re the one that wants spaghetti, after all.”

“I want spaghetti but I don’t want it enough to get up and make it myself,” Ben replied.

“Which means that I’m going to get up and make leftovers then you’re going to complain about it until I end up making spaghetti just to shut you up,” I said, annoyed. “You’re such a baby sometimes. I don’t know why I put up with you.”

“Because I have a nice smile?” Ben grinned brightly. I rolled my eyes at him and then I found his arms snaking around me. “Besides, I’m not that hungry yet.”

“I’m starving,” I said dramatically. “I’m going to go heat myself up some leftovers. You can make dinner for yourself.” I started to get up but then Ben pulled me back down on top of him. It was a little awkward, especially since he was still sort of wet.

“So you’re just going to go? Like that?” Ben said, sounding like a desperate woman whose husband was leaving her. “What about my snuggles?”

“You got them this morning,” I frowned. “Remember? We were fifteen minutes late and Landon was joking with us in the elevator.”

“That reminds me,” Ben said, “you aren’t allowed to wear short skirts around Landon any more. He likes to look up them.”

“I can wear whatever I want to, Ben,” I rolled my eyes. “If Landon wants to look up my skirt, just tell him to stop. Besides, it’s not like he’s going to ever see it up close and personal.”

“He better not,” Ben growled.

“I’m going to eat dinner,” I sighed, struggling to get up out of his arms. Ben held onto me firmly and I couldn’t move. “Okay, what am I going to have to do in order for you to let me up and eat my dinner?”

“I’ll think of something,” Ben said closing his eyes and pretending to go to sleep. Finally, I couldn’t take it any more and without thinking, just gave him a slight peck on the lips.

“There Sleeping Beauty,” I said, slipping out of Ben’s arms because he was in a state of shock, “I’m going to get some supper.”