A Prayer for Sweetheart

2004-01-26
Sweetheart has reached for a really good idea and wishes for nothing but to be left all alone until she can hold on to it. Pulling herself up from the beams has never been easy, and now that they no longer seem like bars, she has found a way to swing out of such imprisonment and land softly on her feet. Such a troubled girl is Sweetheart and she is the type to flash the reasons from her eyes.

Baby was the man of many dreams but very seldom did they dance their way into the sleep of Sweetheart's. He never placed a hand in hers no matter the situation. It was impossible for Baby to make her understand why he wouldn't wipe her cheeks, and how he never noticed them beg. Some say she would settle even for a slap but Baby was far too distant to reach her. He never seems to speak of her but shares many secrets with his dogs.

Sweetheart knew of a day he once loved her. She became it�s witness as Baby took his eyes away from his plate long enough to settle on hers. A story she would put the doubts to bed with at night only to bring them out again tomorrow. She would tell her mother, in an attempt to avoid any discouragement, that it was a gaze and not a stare. She promised he never blinked but wonders now if his eyes were ever open at all.

Baby knew he loved her once but only now when she�s quiet. He expresses it lately with a forced smile warming slowly above the food she makes him every night. He saves his speeches and declarations for the barroom, for the boys and for the drinks. He leaves his back turned for his Sweetheart when he makes it home.

Sweetheart spends her time just waiting for a plan. She pretends she smells the leaves of different seasons creeping in her car door window. She thinks of ways to make it out of Tennessee. Baby never lets her drive and she's never had a place to go. There�s a bottle of sleeping pills that she took from her mothers over a year ago. She sometimes slips a couple in Baby�s beer and goes out driving in the summer.

Baby always finds a clever way to wink at all the waitresses. His mouth is what gets them into the storage room. He used to hide the perfume on his clothes by smoking cigars on the way home but now he chooses just to sleep at their place instead. He was well versed in excuses as to why he didn�t make it home at night but knows that Sweetheart is now easily stared away from explanation. Baby just sits at the table and waits for his meal.

Sweetheart keeps a knife under the mattress and promises one day to have the courage. She keeps a date in mind written in a journal. But Sweetheart would never want to kill him. She believes that God would never forgive her. Instead she packs while he is working and hides her bags behind a tree just down the road. She gathers quarters and buries them in her pockets for the day they�ll take her away from home.