Chapter Text
Something people don’t tell you is that there is a real downside to having a brilliant and talented husband and that is: they tended to become important at work. I was endlessly proud of Rocky for everything he had accomplished, overjoyed to see him live his passion each day. All this being said, there was one aspect of his success that I couldn’t find within myself to be a fan of: work trips.
They didn’t happen that often - only during the important projects or if he was invited to give talks at an engineering conference or some such thing. Sometimes, I even got to tag along with him if they were during the weekend or a school holiday. Most times, however, I would say goodbye to him at the entrance to the airport, smiling sadly at his departure until he was out of sight with one final kiss blown to me across the distance.
I hated how silent the house was without him. Earlier in my life I would have said I hated superfluous noise. That was before the UNESCO conference and my downfall and subsequent rebuilding of an entire existence. Before Rocky bulldozed his way into my life.
I could say then, after 3 years of dating and 2 of marriage, that I just hadn’t found noise I liked before him.
Rocky was animated, in both his body language and his constant sounds. Singing, humming, tapping, and a laugh that filled a room twofold. He was impossible to ignore. Impossible to turn a blind eye to. Not when he was filled to the brim with life and willing to share it with those around him. It was like his soul was too big for his body, overflowing and washing over me like a tide. I considered myself endlessly lucky to be so indelibly caught in his orbit - a lone planet circling a sun.
Loving him, living with him, came with music and dancing while cooking in the kitchen, over-the-top debates about the realism of Star Trek, and a constant presence nudging me in the right direction.
The house without Rocky in it stopped feeling like the home it normally was to me. It felt cold, devoid of life - the same as the apartment I had lived in my first few years of teaching before I met my match in Rocky (that beautiful, stubborn genius knocking against my high walls until they inevitably crumbled).
I did my best when he was away by putting on music he normally played or listening to podcasts. The high-end speakers around the house did their darndest to fill the air and loneliness. Physically they succeeded - the sound waves reaching every corner of the house - but without my husband there, harmonizing in his smooth accented voice or tugging me into impulsive dances, it was still entirely too empty even when I coaxed our cat Armando into playing with his tinsel toy.
Falling asleep was virtually impossible when he was away. I was too accustomed to his radiating heat and gentle snores, the weight of an arm laid across my ribs. I often times found myself waking up after a restless night on Rocky’s side of the bed, burrowed under every blanket I could find in the closet and enveloped in the dulling smell of him that still clung to the sheets - Armando smothering me in the absence of his normal cuddle buddy.
Most work trips he took were bearable, usually being less than a week long. I’d artificially fill my space with sound and warmth in the ways I could. I texted him and called when our schedules would line up. If fate was really on my side, we would be in the same time zone and I got to go through the steps of our bedtime routine with him over the phone. Hundreds of miles apart but I could hear him humming whatever song was stuck in his head as we brushed our teeth - though the space to my left at the sink remained conspicuously empty.
We would chat about our respective days and, more often than not, I would fall asleep to his soft voice coming through my phone speaker. Rocky never made me feel bad for it, thankfully. He knew how I was about routine and seemed to pick up on the fact that his absence always got me out of sorts.
Last month, Rocky had slunk in through the front door of our home with a sheepishly apologetic smile while I had been grading tests on the couch.
I squinted at him, suspicious.
“Before you get mad, it wasn’t my idea but it’s a necessary evil.”
Not a great intro to whatever this was about.
“Rocky…” I started, but he ran ahead, words getting quick and slanted as they did when he was riled up.
“Carmen is worried about the project team in Hong Kong so she wants me to go supervise or some shit for a while, and there’s that conference I told you about, and the Cummins project is finally nearing an end and they want me to be there for the wrap-up.”
He said all this while walking over to me where I had laid down my grading materials and leaned back to look up at him as he had approached.
That’s… a lot. The Hong Kong project had been a bit of a nightmare from the get go as it was headed by a newer (“fucking dipshit” per my husband) member of the company, and the Cummins one had just been a very long process that was to blame for more than a few of Rocky’s grey hairs. He was at least excited for the conference - I knew that much.
My mind flashed to our shared calendar in the kitchen, already imagining the splattering of blue ink all of this would create.
“Okay,” I drawled out as he kneeled on the ground between my legs and rested his head against my stomach. I ran my fingers through his salt and pepper hair and he wrapped his arms around my waist. Oh boy. I hadn’t seen him act this dejected and remorseful since he accidentally (mostly) killed my years-old sourdough starter while I was visiting my brothers.
“What are the dates looking like? The people at the airport are gonna start recognizing me.” I agonized dramatically in an attempt at easing his mood.
He took a deep breath, exhaling with a raspberry as he geared himself up. That doesn’t bode well.
“Next month. The 7th to the 29th.” He pressed himself harder against my front and my hands froze in his hair.
“The 7th-“ I spluttered, “The 7th to the 29th?! Rocky, that’s more than three weeks!” Now I saw why he was so despondent - this would be the longest we’d been away from each other since we met. By a mile.
“I know, my soul, I tried to see if there was anyway around it but there isn’t. I’m sorry.” I was upset at the news but Rocky sounded down-right miserable for what his job was making him do. He tipped his head down and placed a kiss to my hip bone. I resumed petting his hair as I turned over the whole ordeal in my head.
Hong Kong was 15 hours ahead of us, if the Cummins meeting was in Thailand then that’s 14 hours ahead. The conference was in New York so that was only a 3 hour difference.
God, three weeks.
“I’m going to starve to death.” I groaned at the ceiling.
Rocky reared his head to look at me, eyes a bit frantic, “No no no. I will not be letting you return to the damned dark ages, mi vida.” He sat up and put his hands on either side of my face. The drama. “I’m meal prepping like a fucking maniac and if I hear you even looked at a cup ramen or goddamn microwave spaghetti, I’m not watching that new dinosaur documentary with you when I get back.”
Oh, he was serious, serious.
I remembered how appalled he’d been upon first being invited into my old apartment and promptly snooping through my kitchen. What can I say? Cooking never felt worth it when I was by myself.
I pictured the limited room we had in the fridge and freezer. Is that much meal prepping even feasible?
“Rock, that’s too much and you know it.”
He smushed my cheeks between his hands, “Nothing is too much for my Grace. I will figure it out and you will eat well and think of your lovely dotting husband at least three times a day until I return.” He said with a smile, pleased as punch with his solution.
“Bold of you to assume I’m getting up early enough to eat breakfast everyday.”
“You will.”
“You can’t make me, Mr. Halfway Across The World.” I snarked.
“We will see about that, my dearest darling husband.” He had a glint in his eyes I didn’t like, “Remember what’s on the line.”
Prehistoric Planet marathon in our PJs. I glared at him petulantly, “Can you make the cookies I like, at least?” I grumbled out, but my hopeful eyes definitely detracted from my attempt at being upset. It was always difficult holding a grudge against the embodiment of sunlight and affection. Even when he was sometimes a bit of a self-righteous jerk.
Rocky laughed and leaned in to peck a quick kiss against my nose, “Of course. I will make you anything as long as you promise to eat it.” Then, more to himself as he stood up, “They weren’t lying when they said the way to a man’s heart is through his stomach.”
”Hey! I heard that, y’know!” I scolded as I lightly swatted at him with my previously discarded test key and he scampered out of my reach with a laugh.
Later that night, I wrote down the trip details on our calendar and grimaced at the sea of blue ink that indicated Rocky’s itinerary. Armando begged for his dinner from the other room, meowing over the music that was playing, and Rocky had our food simmering on the stove, some sort of dough about to be placed into the oven. I tried to accept my fate graciously, but next month was going to be rough.
I nearly jumped out of my skin as he suddenly spun me away from my preemptive mourning and dipped me into a low kiss in front of the fridge, a dusting of flour falling around the two of us from where it had been caught in his hair.
I laughed against his lips and returned the kiss, letting myself enjoy the security of his arms holding me up effortlessly as my hands rested on his shoulders.
I could make it three weeks alone.
For Rocky, I could do it.