A white sofa. Her head rests on my chest. Her fingers idle near my heart. I - too aware - hold my right hand to her upper arm. The more casual, the more instinctive I will myself to become or at least to appear, the more leaden I feel, the more placed and arranged and deliberate. I sense the discomfort trickling from me, leeching into her, as if seeking to fight her contentment and replace it with an extension of my own unease. But nothing is to be said.

We gaze into the middle distance where the television ought to be.  I incline my head to touch hers. Again ridiculous. Again placed and posed and unnatural, the area of contact between her head and my cheek an oval of awkward sensation, of self-conscious being.

�And now really sleepy� he says. �You�re happy, content. Can you put your arm right around her?�

At last � it has only been seconds � my heavy hand is freed, brought around to her shoulder, the one that rests on my chest. Now I hold her to me and gently circle a thumb on her skin and for a moment there is a sense memory, a sliver of the past unlocked and relived. An echo of forgotten song, familiar ground found and lost as quickly.

�Thanks �

Was I somewhere else? For a second.

That�s great.

No. Just here. Aware.

Thanks for coming in.�

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