Page 109 of Homebound
“Pears?” She counted nine cans. “I ate them?”
Slowly, Simon lowered his pointing hand and rose to his feet. He approached carefully so as not to startle her and stood over her bed.
“You don’t remember?”
She swished her head on the pillow in a negative shake looking up at him. At the same time, she realized it must be true, for the all-familiar gnaw of hunger no longer tormented her stomach. And she realized something else: she badly needed to use the bathroom.
“How long have I been here?”
“Four days.”
“Four days?” Gemma tried to sit up too fast and paid for it with a darkening vision and spinning brain.
“Easy.” His arms reached under her back in support, holding her steady as she recovered. “Do you want more pears?”
“Yes, please.”
He helped her sit up and went to the counter to get a new can. Slicing through the lid with a sharp nail like it was the most natural thing in the world, he gave the can to Gemma and watched as she carefully drank the bland syrup with small chunks of something that could be pears. His onyx eyes stayed firmly on her, exciting and a little unnerving.
Licking her lips, Gemma lowered her legs to the floor.
“Is there a bathroom I can use?”
He pointed to the corner where a small partition acted as a door. Making her way there on her own, Gemma peeked inside.
A rusty old pot sat on the floor, its bottom hollowed out. That was it.
“It drains to a ditch outside,” Simon informed her from the room. “There’s a spigot in the wall if you want to wash.”
He was right, there was a makeshift faucet protruding over another hollowed-out pan that served as a tub. Gemma went inside and moved the partition to block the doorway. She didn’t dream of complaining about the rudimentary amenities. After so many weeks of answering the calls of nature under the elements, the conditions of this place seemed godsent.
She used the “toilet” she turned on the spigot to test if the water was available. It was. And there was soap.
She began frantically scrubbing her hands and face.
It suddenly hit home that she could shower, and she paused, water dripping down her nose. And then she went crazy.
Ripping out buttons, Gemma threw away the hated coat, mindless of needing it again later. She tore off her filthy garments, clawed at the shoelaces that held together her soiled boots, shoved down her disgusting, sticky underwear. Finally naked, she stuck her head under the weak trickle of lukewarm water and rubbed soap into her hair with such force that her scalp hurt. She washed, and she cried, humbled and reveling in the experience she had thought she’d never undergo again before she died.
She lost track of how long she spent in the bathroom cleaning her hair and body over and over again, wasting so much soap, rinsing, and rinsing, and rinsing the grime away, splashing around, trying to fit her entire frame under the weak spray. This was how Simon found her when he moved the partition aside - wet and shivering, wild-eyed, squeezing water out of her hair with trembling hands.
“You’re done,” he declared in his calm, accented voice and turned the water off.
It took him two strides to go back to the bed and yank the sheet off. He carefully wrapped Gemma in the sheet and carried her to bed.
She didn’t resist, but her wild eyes must have told him she was on the verge of a major breakdown. He sat down with her in his lap and said something she failed to understand, so close was she to falling completely to pieces. But the sound of his deep voice calmed her down. Pressing one ear to his chest, she listened to the vibrations of his words and the strong, harmonized beating of two of his hearts. This closeness, the sound of his steady breathing, his solid body against hers, all of it came into sharp focus.
“I can’t believe you’re here.” She gripped him as hard as she could, irrationally afraid he’d disappear out of her arms.
“Why?” he sounded puzzled.
“I thought you were long gone. That you left Earth.”
“Why would you think that?”
“Why would I think differently?”
“Because I told you differently,” he sounded exasperated.
