but his eyes found no purchase on the dark sky so he turned them towards the back of his wife's head upon her own bolster in her own twin bed across the valley of the nightstand -- a game he played whenever she fell asleep before he did: to seek her while still blind from the reading light, to watch her form emerge from the gloom as his pupils dilated, to see if he'd aimed just right with his eyes.
^^^	<---|--->	<|>