For a man who had just spent ten years in prison for a crime he didn’t commit, he had an irrepressible joy about him that would linger within me long after we’d part company. And when we’d see each other again, my soul would light up like it remembered him, like déjà vu but from another lifetime. I hadn’t planned to see him on the beach that night, and for a moment, I wondered if my soul had sent for his, or his for mine, or if it were one soul that willed its unity. I didn’t run to him, nor him to me. I waited patiently and watched him gracefully stride through the sand with his gaze locked on me. He never looked down or side to side. He wasn’t awkward. He wasn’t customary. When he came close enough to speak, he didn’t. Neither did I. He extended his arms as though asking permission to embrace me. He was elegant. He knew he could’ve thrown me on the ground—right there in front of everyone—and made love to me without my resistance, but he was dignified. We embraced until we danced. There was no music playing but we were swaying to the same beat, breathing to the same rhythm, composing the same love song. I could hear the whispers: “Isn’t that the preacher’s daughter? Isn’t she a preacher? What is she doing with that thug?” Ignorant people will assess your worth by your résumé or a background check. They judged him because he had spent time in prison, it didn’t matter to them that he was innocent: A preacher’s daughter could do better for herself. He could tell the whispers bothered me but he never acknowledged them. He just kept gazing into my eyes with that irrepressible joy.
April 6, 2013
