She told me her favorite songs, and why she used three different colors of nail polish on her toes. She told me that she likes hot tea and speaks her mind about why she hates Yes and Alice Cooper - I love them.

It never occurred to me that her silent side might actually like the color of my hair or the way I look without my shirt- it was a mystery to me.

She never said a word.

There wasn’t any deception in her smile, or the way she held my hand as we stood in line at the theater. She never told me the films she wanted to see- only deferred to my twisted sense of humor and my total lack of respect for Jerry Bruckheimer.

I’d visit her apartment and find boxed copies of McSweeney's in the bathroom beside an empty bottle of "Red" perfume. I found greeting cards from Nepal and Tahiti, and Nebraska with yesterday’s date. When I picked them up and read the obscure poetry, scrawled in the margin between the postmark and the address lines, she would wait until I was finished and subtly pack them away in a kitchen drawer. I'd keep asking myself, Who were those people? Who the hell did she know in Nebraska?

She might have me drop her off at a cabaret on Thursday night and never discuss it with me afterwards. When I would ask her if I could come next time, she'd forbid me with her eyes and I'd fall silent.

I couldn't figure out if what she said was gibberish or too profound for me to understand.

Sometimes I'd wonder if all of this mystery was just a ruse to keep me interested. It was if she felt like she must be mysterious. But there were too many! There were too many questions snipped off at the bud, too many nights in bed when she'd laugh and I’d wonder if it was about me or someone on the other side of the world. I hadn't asked for the confusion - love, not enigmas. Our life seemed like a perpetual neon sign glaring: What the hell?

I kept wondering where she kept her soul. I kept asking why I knew nothing about her time outside of me - didn't she know how insane I become in her absence? Where is she? What is she doing? Why won’t she tell me? She knew - I was just entranced by the gaps in my own knowledge.

I wanted to rifle though her junk drawer and see if I could find some answer there, a discarded wedding ring from a previous marriage, or maybe an odd PEZ dispenser with the head of Bugs Bunny - something more, anything. I just wanted to know if she was crazy, or cheating. She was just far too interested in keeping me mystified.

She just liked the look of confusion on my face, but she never mistook that for love. She just thought that if I discovered that she was just a plain old sod like me that I’d lose interest. She was wrong.

When I discovered that her secret was a shy little girl hiding behind the façade of the amazing, I simply held her hand. I kissed her cheek and let her average, humdrum life bloom and fill mine with all the color of her smile.

I can see it now; her plain and lovely just sparkles. Amazingly, none of what came before was a lie.

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