He picked up his coffee, took a sip, then set it down as if it had betrayed him too.
Everything was betraying him this morning, apparently.
Poor thing.
I wanted to hug him. Just wrap my arms around him and tell him everything was going to be okay, that the universe had a plan, that this was all unfolding exactly as it should. But I had a feeling that would make him flinch again, and I didn’t want to add to his stress.
So instead, I smiled and tried a different approach.
“So,” I said brightly, “I realized we don’t really know each other yet. I mean, we’re married, which is amazing, but we skipped a lot of the traditional getting-to-know-you stuff. Which is fine! The universe doesn’t really care about traditional timelines. But I think we should probably... you know. Learn about each other. Don’t you think?”
He stared at me.
“Like, for example,” I continued, because silence made me nervous and when I got nervous, I talked more, which Freyja said was a Gemini thing, but I thought was more of an Athena thing, “I don’t even know what you do for a living. I mean, I know you were giving a presentation yesterday, which wasvery impressive, by the way, very authoritative, very confident, but I don’t know what you actuallydo. Are you a teacher? A researcher? A professional presentation-giver?”
Something flickered across his face. It might have been amusement. Or pain. Or both.
“I’m a neurosurgeon,” he said quietly.
I blinked.
“You’re a what?”
“A neurosurgeon. I operate on brains.”
Oh my Goddess.
Oh my GODDESS!
The universe is SO CLEVER.
“You operate onbrains?” I said, probably too loudly, because the couple at the next table looked over. “Like, actual human brains? You cut into people’s heads and fix things?”
“That’s... a simplified version, but yes.”
“That’sincredible.” I leaned forward, suddenly fascinated. “So you spend all day being precise and careful and making sure everything is perfect because if you make a mistake, someone could die?”
He looked uncomfortable. “I wouldn’t phrase it quite like that.”
“And you probably work really long hours and have a lot of responsibility, and everyone depends on you to be perfect all the time, and you can never make mistakes and you have to be in control constantly because lives are literally in your hands?”
“I... yes. That’s fairly accurate.”
Oh, universe. You beautiful, brilliant, cosmic genius.
It all made sense now.
Everything made sense.
The universe hadn’t just sent me a soulmate. It had sent me someone whoneededme. Someone who spent every single day of his life being responsible and controlled and perfect, whocarried the weight of other people’s lives on his shoulders, who probably never let himself relax or make mistakes or justbe.
And the universe had looked at him, at this brilliant, tense, wound-too-tight man who was probably one bad day away from snapping, and said, “You know what he needs? Athena. Athena, who believes in cosmic chaos and trusts the universe and doesn’t plan anything and walks around naked without caring what anyone thinks. Athena, who will remind him that life isn’t just about control. That sometimes you have to surrender to the flow. That it’s okay to not be perfect.”
That’s why we’re soulmates.
Not just because we were opposites, though we definitely were, like yin and yang, like sun and moon, like order and chaos, but because webalancedeach other.
He needed someone to take care of him the way he took care of his patients.
