Velvet Hugs!

(Write a story about summer love — the quarantine edition.)

The small green light next to his name tells me he is on line.  

I wonder what we would have done before messenger and similar platforms.   

Letters, scented and lovely,  a dried flower pressed into the pages!  Perhaps a primary school heart drawn with our initials and arrows depicting sand and stones and the ocean.

Ah yes,  we have a connection...

~~~~~

June: 

Hello my dearest,  I write to you this afternoon to let you know the flame still burns!  Hotly!  I smile and feel the color rise in my face as I would never have the courage to say things like this face to face.   There are advantages to quarantine!

Joseph:

I agree,  somehow the words give us courage but ours is not a recent infatuation,  at least not from my spot here on my lonely island.   How can an island be lonely when it is shared with the multitudes but I believe lonely can happen in crowds or in isolation.    How has your day been going?   I am drowsing in my chair,  lights low and thinking about calling this day over.  But you are midday there,  what are you up to?

June:

Just the normal things,  making a salad for dinner,  waiting for our pre arranged meetings!  I feel like a silly school girl when I see your light come on!

Joseph:

Speaking of silly and I will tell you about my thoughts earlier tonight.  It is quite dark but cloudless and the moon hangs full and gorgeous over the fields and villages.  Off to the east of me,  there is fog rising from the marshes.  It is quite lovely.  I think how nice to show you,  to share it with you so I imagine your hand in mine,  we lean on the gate and enjoy the night!

June:

I’m smiling to imagine us there together.  I have often thought that we share this moon.  This great orb that shows us so many different looks.  I do love the moon and I attach a large portion of mystery to the craters and bumps and ridges.  There is not much that is real that we can directly share with the ocean between us but nevertheless I feel you so deeply.

Joseph:

Yes I was speaking with a local friend about the hardships of maintaining a strong loving local courtship.  All of the rules and fears,  masks must be impossible for that tender kiss goodnight.

June:

We have been as if in quarantine for a few years and yet we are growing closer and closer.  We share so much.  Our worries and hopes,  our feelings….feelings are so important and so many are so guarded.  I have loved our time together,  sharing places and events, exploring history and castles and all the things I remember so vividly from my visit.   You have helped me keep it all alive.  I wish I had known you then,  when I roamed your moors and climbed down to your beaches.  I can imagine how you would have enriched my knowledge of the abbeys  and castles,  it was a dream trip come true for me but you would have made it perfect.

Joseph:

It was no dream and you will have another chance to visit.  Or I will come to you!  Visit your fair land in all of its vastness and diversity.  We will both have the same problems,  how to explain “us” to our family and friends.  We are not really clandestine but neither have we been open.  If they knew the things we have discussed and imagined….well now I feel color rising on my cheeks.  

June:

It has been a slow weaving of facts and feelings.  The fabric that is our love becoming more detailed and beautiful,  it is easy to slip from how are you?  To I love you,  if there is trust and honor.  Every ounce of your being shows me a gentle kind man who hesitates when I would rush ahead.  I imagine us so clearly that my pulse changes,  I can imagine being held in your strong arms.  After that I am lost!  Truly Lost!   Helpless to ward off your charms!   It is almost a thing of dreams,  colors and shapes so real.

Joseph:

As is always the way,  our time is almost up.  Why did we decide to limit our nightly visit to one hour?  A real love affair lasts all night and ends with me cooking breakfast for you in the morning!

June:

I’m laughing now my darling,  don’t you remember your dozing off and I just was left here with no explanation?  It is midnight there!  Time for mature men to sleep!  In truth if I were there,  I would keep you awake with tiny kisses but alas the sun shines here and the phone rings and it is still busy times.  And so our compromise,  one hour of “us” to send you to bed to enjoy sweetest dreams.  To wake healthy and still loving me.

Joseph:

Well we do touch often during the day and send voice messages.  I believe the voice messages brought you closer to my heart than any of our written words.  I can hear you breathe and the intake of your breath tells me you are real,  you sound close,  I hear no ocean between us. I love that we call them velvet hugs!

June: 

When I coined the phrase “velvet hug” I wanted special words only we knew.  It made us more mysterious but even more, it made me feel closer to you.  Yes velvet hugs are lovely and personal.  I think you have heard me speak when I was hiking and out of breath,  when I was discouraged and close to tears and even when my voice broke as I tried to tell you how much you mean to me.  I love our velvet hugs!

And now my sweetest lover, I will tuck you into your bed.  Kiss you lightly on the forehead, wish you sweetest dreams and please wake healthy and loving me?

Joseph:

I will send you a “velvet” on my morning walk telling you about my weather and how things are here.   When you wake it will be waiting!  Never fear,  I will never stop loving “us”!  How we are together!    I have never experienced a love like ours!  

Goodnight,  when it comes time for you to go to your rest,  know I am dreaming of you!   Goodnight!    Byeeeee!  ❤️ 

~~~~~

June closes the cover on her laptop.  It always feels like she has just lost a best friend or something very valuable.  She runs her hands over the cover and imagines Joseph there under her hands.   Her rubbing his tired shoulders and allowing her touch to soothe him.   

They are quarantine lovers in the truest sense but they began long before the medical directives and June knows they will still be  practicing long distance love long after the crisis has passed! 

It is true!  It is real!