Peas be with you

I dropped my purse and jacket on his bedroom floor, down by the foot of my side of the bed. He adjusted the bedroom lights: overhead light off, hallway light on.

"Are we going to play Strip House again?" I asked while kicking off my ankle boots.

"Duh."

Strip House was a game he invented the previous week. The rules are simple: remove an article of clothing any time the words "tumor" or "cancer" are spoken. We were disappointed with the results for the first 55 minutes of the game; however, the last 5 minutes had proved to be more than effective.

I climbed into bed with him. I encircled my arms around his abdomen and laid my head on his chest. He flopped on the bed like a fish out of water, rotating our entangled bodies on his mattress until my big head wasn't blocking him. He enclosed his arm around me where he would periodically tickle my back with his fingertips throughout the night. I kissed his neck. It tasted like salt, mainly because he had been playing racquetball before climbing into bed with me. I picked up the bag of frozen peas and re-adjusted it on his bad knee. He then reached for the remote and turned on his TV.

This is happiness.