She moves quietly on bare feet around their room, carrying a mug of steaming coffee with lots of cream and sugar, and sits on a stool by the window where the first rays of sunlight hit the blank white canvas on the easel. Setting her coffee down and pulling her blond curls into a ponytail at the back of her head, she selects a few of her favorite charcoal pencils to sketch.
As she looks back at the bed, white cotton sheets are rumpled around his waist with his tan back and arms stretched long and at impossible angles, as if he was a child who threw himself down to sleep. His pink lips are opened slightly, breathing in and out, and she loses herself for a moment in the gentle rhythm.
His hair has grown out somewhat in the few months since they started dating but she likes it now, how it forms a messy dark halo around his face on the white pillowcase. The dark lead of the charcoal captures his curls and his soft eyelashes on the blank canvas.
His face and hair are a favorite subject to draw. He looks so different in sleep, sweet and innocent, far from the guarded look he carries with him when going through day-to-day life. Perhaps she likes to capture its likeness in the hope that she could give him back that peace of mind even when he wakes up.
Sam never likes the sketches that Jessica draws of him. He loves her other art but he’s self conscious when she says he’s beautiful. But that’s what he is in this thin morning light. Beautiful. And every thing she could possibly want.
Morning Light
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