Imagine what she’ll sound like when you press into her.
I shake my head, dispelling the aroused thoughts. I reach for the belt around my waist and begin to undo it. Harriet purposely glances at the ceiling and allows me the opportunity to study her profile.
Just like a few hours ago, I’m struck by the appearance of innocence she wears, like a painting. I’m still fuming that she made such a stupid decision this afternoon. The panic that seized me doesn’t disappear quickly. She has no idea what I have dragged her into. No idea howbrutal this world can be. She’s seen the tiniest of portions and she seems to understand it all. Each hour I’m with her, there’s more and more pressure to spill my guts about what happened to my former wife just so I can scare some sense into her. But when Harriet spoke her name out loud. It was like she kicked through my ribs and squashed my heart.
Gen…
In this moment, sitting before my future wife, I realize that I have mourned my past wife for longer than I ever knew her.
Four years together. Ten years apart.
Soul-crushingly brutal.
It still feels like a betrayal to be happy when she’s not around. To smile when she no longer can. And no amount of time can lessen the guilt. Nor the words of a therapist who speaks only because I paid them too.
Harriet, however, is getting under the sticky layer of tar I slathered over myself almost a decade ago. I know she sees it, and instead of being put off by the effort, she subconsciously picks at it every time we speak.
As she sits before me now—glazed blue eyes, tousled black hair and rosy cheeks. Smooth legs, round breasts, and collarbones that look good enough to eat—the harshness, the murkiness of my mistakes tattooed on my skin seem to not matter.
“I’m sorry about what I did tonight,” she whispers, knocking me from my head.
My hands pause their work on my pants. “Yes, well. I’m still trying to figure out whether to forgive you or punish you.”
She smiles despite the warning and bites on the fingers of her right hand, her eyes trained on the surrounding jungle immersed in twilight.
“My mom used to call me Etta the Bull because I would run head first into danger without ever noticing. I got hit by a car when I wasten. I raced after a dog that had escaped and broke my ankle when it got crushed under the wheel.”
I remain still, poised on the edge of the bed.
She laughs, a memory coming to life. “One time, my mom found me asleep in one of the recovery cages with a very cranky mastiff. I remember him barking so loudly when he was taken in for surgery to be desexed. I remember him licking my hair and the movement of his stomach beneath my cheek. I remember the fear on my mom’s face. But she never got angry at me. She just spoke calmly to me about how to make better choices, and I still always made the wrong ones.” She sighs deeply, mournfully. “I think I was so naïve because she was always at my back, protecting me. I was the wings, and she was the body, sturdy and supportive. But God… she must have been terrified for me all the time.”
She crosses her arms over her chest, her fingers clawing at her skin. “I used to sleep in bed with her, even as an adult. I never slept in my own room as a child. I hated it. Sleeping alone, in the dark, down the hall from safety—it was the worst. Mom always left her door open for me, and I would always sneak in, even when she married my stepfather. ‘It’s a biological norm,’ I heard her tell him one night when he was complaining about me. ‘You want to sleep next to me. Why can’t my own daughter?’”
She huffs, wipes at her eyes, her gaze flicking back to me. “Sorry. I, ah—I haven’t spoken about her in a long time. I haven’t slept next to someone in a long time, too.” Her chin starts to wobble. Her eyes water. “She had a fatal heart attack a little over a year ago, and I—” She sniffs and brushes at her cheeks. She notices my half naked position and all the lust she was overflowing with is now replaced with melancholy.
She shuffles and steps off the bed. “I think I need to sober up.” She takes off toward the bathroom.
I contemplate putting my shirt back on when I hear the shower run. I go after her instead.
She stands completely still under the water, her clothes soaked and sticking to her skin. Her hands are bunched by her sides and her entire body shivers. I get closer and a spray of water hits my chest.
It’s freezing.
“Etta,” I growl, reaching for the handle of the shower. She slaps my hand away.
Anger rises in my chest. “What do you think this is going to achieve?”
Her teeth chatter as she admits, “It makes me feel better.”
I let her stand in her misery for ten seconds more. “Alright, that’s enough.” She continues to ignore me. “Fine.” I step under the spray, taking the brunt of the water on my neck and shoulders.
She reaches to shove me away, and her palms collide with my chest. Instead of flinching, she keeps them there, resting lightly on my abdomen. We stand like that for an indefinite time. Touching. Shivering.
“I did it for her. Selling the Tramadol. It was all so… convenient,” she sighs. “I never thought it would be so easy. They sought me out. Offered me a way to make money on the side without anyone knowing. I was desperate. I was so—” She cuts off. “I was stupid. It was wrong. I know it was wrong. But I couldn’t stomach the thought of losing her clinic, the place she fought so hard for. If I lost it, it would be like losing her all over again.” She fixates on my neck and my rapid pulse. “If I sold the drugs, I could keep the clinic, but I would be worsening an already horrible drug problem. But if I didn’t sell the drugs, then the clinic would go under, and I—It would destroy me.” She rubs her nose. “I’m a failure either way.”
“You’re not,” I tell her.
God, I’m the one who’s a fucking failure.