My dad is notoriously known in our house for never wearing lotion.
I’m not sure if it’s some unspoken allegiance to the stereotype that men should have rough hands, or if he truly just doesn’t care. He walks around perfectly content with dry, cracking knuckles, as if sandpaper is a personality trait.
My mom, on the other hand, has the softest hands I have ever felt.
I know what you’re thinking: Well, you haven’t felt my mom’s hands.
I’m here to tell you — you’re wrong. My mom wins. Softest hands in the world. No contest. Sorry.
It’s a beautiful balance for a beautiful marriage. Dry and soft. Rough and gentle. A dynamic duo. But really — who wants to hold hands with sandpaper?
So my mom found a solution.
Whenever we were in the car, my dad driving, his amazing daughter buckled safely in the back, and my mom in the passenger seat, she would reach over the center console with a bottle of lotion.
Without a word, she’d lather his hands.
One hand off the wheel. Apply. Switch hands. Apply. A quiet choreography. I watched this ritual every time. And every time I thought: That is real love.
It felt like the same genre of romance as giving someone your coat on a cold night, a small, selfless offering. For years, that was my definition of love: one person sacrificing, the other receiving.
But somewhere along the way, the trope evolved.
Now the receiver pauses. “Won’t you be cold?” they ask.
And that’s when it becomes something deeper.
Subject A loves through sacrifice. Subject B loves through concern. The beauty isn’t just in the giving, it’s in the mutual care. The quiet “I’ll take care of you,” met with an equally soft “But who takes care of you?”
When I was nineteen, my friends and I were leaving a fraternity party—as one does—and it was bitterly cold. I hugged my goose-bumped arms to my chest, breath coming out in little white clouds. That’s when I saw my best friend sitting on the steps with her complicated situationship.
He looked at her the way I look at her, delicately, carefully. And then he wrapped his flannel around her shoulders.
An odd ache bloomed in my chest.
I thought of my parents. Of lotion across a center console. Of Chandler Bing refusing to give Monica his coat, not because he didn’t care, but because the engagement ring was tucked in the pocket.
“One day,” I whispered to myself as I exhaled into the cold.
Years later, I found myself in a situation not unlike my best friend’s, with the worst possible candidate: a coworker.
I know. Please hold the tomatoes.
In my defense, I am but a simple girl. A nice smile and any height above 5’10 will humble me instantly.
Let’s call him Peter.
Peter had rough hands, too. Winter made them worse, dry, cracked, and stubborn. And since I am my mother’s daughter, I always carried lotion in my bag. Peter knew this.
During our shifts, he would come up to me and ask for some. Every time, my heart would leap into my throat, but outwardly, I’d roll my eyes and reach into my apron.
One night, as we waited for our coworkers to finish so we could walk to the train together, Peter asked again. I popped a piece of mint gum into my mouth and pulled out the bottle.
Too much came out, of course it did. He rubbed what he could into his hands, laughing softly.
What I didn’t expect was for him to take my hands into his.
Time stilled.
For a split second, I wasn’t standing outside a restaurant waiting for the late train. I was in the backseat of my parents’ car. I could almost smell my mom’s perfume mixing with my dad’s cologne as she reached across the console.
I blinked.
Peter was still there, smiling at me, unaware of the entire fairytale he had just stepped into.
Too much lotion on your hands is a common human experience. But Peter had no idea what he had unlocked, what memory he had brushed against.
Like many things, that ended. I wasn’t just heartbroken over another failed attempt at love. I was grieving something deeper, the last fairytale I had allowed myself to believe in.
I had already made peace with the fact that no prince was climbing a tower for me. No one was fighting dragons in a dark forest for my affection. Real life doesn’t work like that.
But the lotion across the center console, that felt real. That felt attainable.
And when Peter and I ended, it felt like even that slipped through my fingers.
Of course, it wasn’t his fault. Some people simply aren’t meant for one another. I’m mature enough to understand that. I just thought —hoped — it might finally be my turn.
That maybe I would get the kind of everyday magic my mom has. The quiet, consistent affection. The hands reaching for yours without being asked.
I once read that the best part of loving someone is being loved in return.
And as Valentine’s Day rolls around, I’m reminded that despite what the Hallmark aisle would have you believe, this day isn’t only for candlelit dinners and bouquets. It’s for friendships. For family. For pets. For the steady love that shows up in ordinary moments.
And for yourself.
Who knows, maybe one day I’ll create my own version of that center-console love story.
Maybe my children will watch from the backseat and think, that is real love.
And maybe that will be my fairytale.
