Page 44 of My Lovely Tragedy
He twists, not bothering to hold his own weight. The strain against my arm is significant but wanted, and I silently chant for my body to cooperate with the pained nerve signals moving to my brain. I drag the wet cloth over his face. Over each closed eyelid, his thick eyebrows. Through his beard, across pursed lips, around to each ear, and down his neck.
Then, I apply face wash and massage it into his greasy skin, careful around his eyes and nose, but thorough as I lather it. After I rinse it all away with a few wet drags of the cloth, his face is left shining, but still just as beautiful.
Each breath that whistles in and out of his nose reverberates throughout the steamy room, significant and so,soimportant.
As I reach for the glass to wet his hair, shifting Brooklyn’s head in my palm to accommodate the movement, I notice the rigidity to his limbs in spite of his compliant behavior. His legs are locked beneath the water, arms stiff over his lap, once again blocking his most intimate body parts from my view.
Rather than comment on it, I work on dousing his hair, ensuring I get each and every strand before I lather them with soap. Knowing I will have to work it through a few different times, at least, I take my time massaging his scalp. Digging the pads of my fingers into his skin and tugging gently, caressing in slow circles.
The resounding groan spilling from Brooklyn’s mouth sends goosebumps buzzing across my flesh. Lashes flutter, heat builds. Slow and tantalizing.
Insidious and seductive.
Breath heavy in my lungs, I rinse the soap until the water runs clear, and then I start the process again. Seeking that heavy, unrestrained groan. The pliant laxity of his limbs. Water—warm and stimulating.
By the time I lather the cloth to scrub his body, Brooklyn is near sleep again. I start in an easy place on his right arm. I weave the soft cotton between each finger, over thick scar tissue—evidence he’s worked with his hands for many years—down each knuckle. His palms and the callouses there. Over the circumference of his wrist, the knobs of bone. Delicate.So easily breakable.
Easily chained.
I wrap my middle finger and thumb around his dainty wrist, absentmindedly measuring the exact circumference. Dragging my blunt nail over bone.
When I reach the soft, silvery scars over his forearm, I hesitate. I trace them. With the cloth, with my mind, trying to imagine the state in which he felt he had to mutilate himself. To leave such beautiful, haunting marks behind.
“They’re pretty old,” he says quietly but clearly. His voice startles me, causing water to splash over the side of the bathtub and onto my thighs. His lip quirks. My heart skips.
“I know.” I continue across their path, no longer alone with his pain, and work my way up his bicep, around to his underarm. I add more soap and scrub at the hair there before dipping the cloth into the water to move across his broad ribcage.
“I didn’t want to die, either.” His words give me pause for a moment as I work over where his comment came from—and it comes back rather quickly.
“Good. The world would be a much darker place without you in it, BrooklynCrow.” The use of his last name makes him roll his bleary eyes and huff out a breath of discontent.
“So, you googled me.”
“I did.”
“And what did you find?”
“Not nearly enough to satisfy my curiosity, but enough to satiate me for the time being. I loved listening to your music. Your voice is… angelic.”
He snorts. “Angelic.” Insult laces his words. “I’m screaming most of the time.” I nod, agreeing.
“Precisely. I found it quite lovely.”
“Yeah? Metal your thing now, Tobias?” A flush of warmth—it floods my cheeks, scraping its way down my neck where it makes its home. A soothing balm.
“I am not too certain about that, but if you are the one singing, then I suppose the answer would be yes.”
“Kiss ass.”
I shake my head, sending my glasses down my nose. “Honest.”
“So, is that why you’re calling me crow now? Because you know who I am?”
This is the most Brooklyn has spoken in nearly two weeks, and while I was painfully aware of missing the cadence of his voice, having it in front of me now,hearingthe rough tenor, makes it piercingly real.
I miss it already. And regret I cannot truly capture his true, vibrating intonation.
“No.”
