By the time we were done, it was late. I was wiped. I guess Fox was, too.
“So, ah … where do I sleep?” he inquired.
The couch was more of a love seat, and not long enough to accommodate him. Besides, we’d been forced to paint that too, and both of the armchairs, since they’d all developed a rash. I wasn’t about to suggest he try sleeping on the floor either. Nestled in my pubic hair? I don’t think so! But if we were going to be stuck here together for several days, then I’d have to do something. All things considered, it was sure to be something well outside my comfort zone.
“Well, uh, there’s m … my room,” I stammered. “You can come … take a look.”
Given my behavior earlier with the crossbow, I guess he had a right to look askance at me, to wonder about my hesitation. So I bit my lip and led him toward the one room I’d painted all by myself. As we went, I reminded him, “As you’ve seen, the furniture is all part of the house. So pretty much everything in here is … me.”
He nodded as he glanced through the arching doorway. Then he froze, and frankly gaped.
I knew what he was looking at. The beds. A pair of rounded mounds, each had a single dark brown cushion at one end that rose about six inches higher than everything else if you stroked them a little. Softly wrinkled, the pillowy masses were circled by smooth brown areolas and there was simply no mistaking what part of the body they’d been derived from.
To give him credit for having
“I’ve never needed them,” I said. Which was true. The beds were as warm as my own skin. They
I woke in the dark, still exhausted, not quite certain what had roused me. Then I heard it—a slurping sound of mumbled contentment.
Sitting up, I peered at my unwanted roommate.
He was sleeping peacefully, sprawled on the other bed. His head had slipped off the cushion, however, and he’d wrapped an arm around it. In his sleep, he nuzzled it. As I watched, the nippillow grew firmer, rising, and so did its counterparts, on my own bed, on my chest. It’s hard to describe the sensation. Electric yet ghostly, unlike anything I’d felt before. I found myself stretching out, reaching out, longing for something I couldn’t name.
But even that much movement set off my skin. I wasn’t used to wearing clothes at night. They clung to me, the wrinkles leaving welts, rasping at my neck and my shoulders and hips, and I couldn’t help wrapping my arms around myself and digging in. Pretty soon, I was a ball of misery, tears rolling down my face. Every part of me that I could reach lay next to a piece that I couldn’t. I was so freakin’ miserable, I didn’t even know I was whimpering. I never heard him get up either. He was just suddenly there, beside me.
I sobbed. “I can’t stand it!” I dug in again, but he stopped me.
“Easy, now,” he murmured and called up the room lights. He slowly forced my hands down into my lap. He lifted my face, frowning as he caught sight of the multiple tracheotomy scars on my throat. He rubbed one thumb across them. Then he got behind me and began rubbing my back. My shoulders. My hips. And when the cloth got in his way, he eased the shirt off me and worked on my bare skin. It wasn’t the kind of massage you’d get at the spa, like I was a loaf of bread being kneaded. This was more like being stroked, over and over again. He did it just hard enough to move blood through my skin but without any hard edges. Slowly, the itching subsided, becoming a layer of heat, as if the whole outermost inch of me was slowly combusting.
Laying me down, he continued his work, down each arm and leg and back up again.
“You have such beautiful skin,” he said, breathing the words at my bare shoulder. “Beautiful. …”
“Yeah, sure. As long as I stay clear of plastic,” I whispered. Last time I wore rayon, I looked like a leper for most of a week, and Rick … well, Rick seemed to think he might catch it. When I reacted to his aftershave as well … I shuddered, trying to shake off the memory. “History,” I told myself.
Fox didn’t notice. He was too busy caressing the sensitive skin at the base of my spine, where tiny hairs had begun to tremble.
So long, I thought, since anyone touched me.
I sat up, turning to face him. He smiled. He’d taken off his borrowed shirt somewhere along the way. His mandala glowed, gently spinning. His hands kept on moving, caressing my thighs.
I looked down at the tent in his borrowed trousers. “Rub me all
The next time I woke, it was nearly dawn. I felt … human. I lay on my side and the warmth at my back wasn’t welts. It was Fox, his body spooned around mine. He was snoring, each breath ever so faintly stirring the hair on the nape of my neck.
