‘Lovely'. 

I had never had much occasion to use that word nor had I ever had it used to describe me.  So when I heard it - I wasn't sure.  I had to look it up and all I could find in Jim's childhood bedroom was a thesaurus. Which was a bit weird...no dictionary at all...but I somehow found it endearing.  I leaned towards the small desk lamp and flipped to the ‘L' section.

This is what I found under ‘lovely': beautiful...attractive...pretty...good-looking...gorgeous...exquisite...charming...divine...handsome.

The antonym for this usage was, ‘ugly'.

So if lovely had been used as an adjective to describe me...I was the opposite of ugly.

If lovely had been used in its other form....which meant ‘pleasant'. It could also mean agreeable...wonderful...delightful...fine...perfect...superb (certainly I had never been considered superb).  According to this lovely thesaurus I was also ‘nice' and ‘good'.  And the antonym of these things....was ‘unpleasant'.

According to Jim's mother I was neither ‘ugly' or ‘unpleasant'.

I was lovely.

Wait...how had she used it?

I played the conversation back in my mind....it hadn't been meant for me to hear. I'd come down the steps looking for him, and had found him still in the living room with his mother.  He'd had his arm around her, and for some reason I just had to watch...I just had to be there. I had to stay, nestle down on the steps out of sight and listen...knowing I shouldn't have. It was a private moment between mother and son....but they were talking about me...I knew it....

"So..."

"So what?"

"Mom, come on..."

"She's exactly what you said she was...Jim, she's really lovely. Truly...lovely."

"She is, right? God...it's perfect right?"

"Baby, if such a thing exists...I certainly witnessed it tonight. Yes."

"Oh don't go getting all realistic on me now Mom."

"Bite your tongue......Who wants to be a realist when something so lovely comes along?...Look at how happy you are..."

"Yeah"

I whispered the word into the darkness now, feeling inordinately silly about the whole thing.  It was just a word.

I smiled at myself and shook my head. It wasn't like I hadn't known what the word meant.  I wasn't an idiot. I hadn't truly needed to look it up to understand the meaning of ‘lovely'....but something about it being applied to me...to us.

When I thought of ‘lovely' I thought of old English poetry, or paintings I'd only dreamed of one day seeing up close...a terrace in a childhood story

But maybe ‘lovely' didn't have to be so distant.  Maybe lovely...

The knock on the door startled me.  I slammed the dusty thesaurus shut and shoved it in between a couple of comic books which I hadn't noticed before.

The smile I wore got bigger. Comics.  "Come in."

"Hey," he said, a disembodied sexy voice in the dark.

Even in the darkness I knew that he knew I was blushing. He told me once that I did this thing where I scrunched my shoulders a little bit when I was slightly embarrassed.

"What were you doing?"

"...Nothing."

"You took like three seconds to say come in."

"Three seconds is a long time?"

"It is when I've got old porn in here."

I grinned. "Well I wasn't in the mood for porn, so you're in luck.  I was just looking at...your comics."

"Wow...could you have looked at the porn instead?"

I giggled and he came and sat down next to me, his fingers instantly found the inside of my knee and started to rub lightly against it.... "I won't tell anyone about your comic stash."

"Good............You ok? I know I was supposed to be up here awhile ago.  My mom though...when she hasn't seen me in awhile she feels the need to fill me on like every little detail of...everything."

"It's ok......I really like your mom."

"That is excellent because she really likes you."

"Oh yeah?"  I really wanted to hear him say it. God, I just wanted to hear someone say that word again.  There was something so...wonderful about it. Something extraordinary about it.

"Yeah," he said quietly and wove his fingers with mine. He lifted the back of my hand to his lips and held it there for a moment.  Not even really kissing it, just letting his lips be there...against my skin.  His lips were warm, his nose the only thing that reminded me it was snowing outside.

My throat became tight...Oh. lovely . Lovely wasn't far away at all.

"Do you know what I love?" he asked finally.

Part of the word...there it was...

"What?"

"Just...getting to be here. I mean...you and me with my family.  I don't know..." he said and I knew he was on the verge of blushing himself this time. "It's just...great."

I found his mouth then in a whisper of a kiss that quickly felt more solid than that initial whisper. Like the firmer press of a broad, bold stroke of color on canvas.  Here was something I could make myself.  Here was something we could create together that would be lovely enough for us forever.

"Wow...what was that for?"

"I don't know...I think...I don't know...maybe your family turns me on a little...."

"...That is great news Beesly......Although if that's the case I'm pretty sure I should keep you in this room for the duration of our visit...wouldn't want you making out with any of them."

I smiled and shook my head. No need to worry.  "No...we wouldn't want that."

Moments later as the night became even more still around us, save for our breathing. When his hands were in my hair, and his lips were near my ear, he whispered..."You are lovely."