35. Zelda
ZELDA
On the last Friday in August, Hedy has Otto at her place.
She sent me a photograph before supper: my son lying on a blanket, staring at her as if he can already tell her which stories he prefers.
His little bed is empty in the second room.
I check the photograph again, then leave my phone on the kitchen shelf with the sound turned up.
Jeremiah arrives carrying bread. We planned supper for seven and his staying afterward.
When I open the door he forgets to come inside. I am wearing an old soft shirt and a skirt that lets me sit comfortably at the table. It is the third thing I put on.
The first two outfits are still on my bed, where I very much hope we will be later. I remember them as he steps inside and nearly go to move them before I have kissed him hello.
“You bought bread,” I say.
“The good bread.”
“Did you stand in the queue?”
“Long enough to develop an opinion about the man who bought six loaves.”
We eat soup from my mismatched bowls. I tell him about the week at the library, and he tells me the revised handle on the carton finally passed its test. I am pleased for him. My hand rests on the table near his. I can move it across the space whenever I want.
After dinner he washes the bowls while I put the rest of the bread away. He knows where I keep things because I have shown him. When he reaches for a towel I pass one to him, and our fingers touch. He turns off the tap.
“Are you all right?” he asks.
“Yes. I’m nervous.”
“So am I.” He looks down at the bowl he has washed twice. “You may have noticed.”
“I know.” I take the towel from him. “I want to kiss you.”
He meets me halfway. The first kiss is familiar enough to make me ache and different enough that I don’t shut my eyes yet.
His hands settle at my waist. When I step nearer, he backs against the counter.
He is warm through his shirt. I am back in our bedroom after the December arcade date, with his mouth on my neck and the question I was afraid to ask.
My hand stops against his chest.
“What is it?”
“That night after the arcade.”
His fingers loosen at my waist. He knows which night. I can see it in the way his mouth closes.
“I asked you to believe me. You said, ‘So why ruin it?’”
“Yes.” His eyes stay on mine, though his face has reddened. “I said that.”
I wait for the rest, the explanation that will leave me arguing my way back to those four words. He doesn’t give me one. The refrigerator starts behind us.
“I hate remembering it now,” I say.
“I’m sorry.”
I rub my thumb over a button on his shirt. I still want to undo it. I keep hold of the button until I can look up at him again.
“Come with me,” I say. We go to the bedroom slowly. He pauses in the doorway while I turn on the small lamp, giving me enough light to see his face. I pull him in by the hand, then snatch two dresses off the bed.
“Were we expecting more people?” he asks.
“Don’t.” I am laughing as I push them into the chair. “I had a very dignified evening planned.”
My shoes stay beside the door. I lift the hem of my shirt to undo the skirt, then stop with my fingers at the fastening.
There is a stretch mark low on my abdomen, darker than I expected. I touch it, suddenly aware that my body has done a great deal since the last time he saw me undress. Jeremiah follows my hand.
“You can look,” I say.
“I am looking.” His voice catches. “You are beautiful.”
I believe he means the woman in front of him. I ask him to take off his shirt, and when he does I put my palms against his chest. He has the same small mark near his collarbone I used to kiss while he tried to talk about tomorrow’s work. I kiss that mark now. His breath catches beneath my palms.
I put his hand on my waist, under my shirt. “Here first,” I say. “I’ll tell you where.”
“Here?” His thumb moves over my ribs.
“Yes. There.”
He kisses down my neck and I lose the next instruction.
My shirt goes over my head and catches on my ear.
He has to stop to free it. I unfasten my bra while he drops the shirt beside the bed, and we are both laughing when his mouth finds my breast. The laugh turns into a noise I haven’t made since last year.
His weight comes down beside me on the bed, and my chest locks.
“Wait,” I say.
He stops with his hand lifted off me. He is breathing hard and he doesn’t move.
I cannot tell him what is wrong. Nothing he is doing. Everything I want him to keep doing. My fingers have caught in the sheet, pulling it loose from the mattress.
He shifts his weight onto his own elbow. The space he leaves feels cold.
“Don’t go.”
“I’m here.”
“I know. Just…stay close.”
He lowers his head to the pillow beside mine. I put my hand against his cheek to keep him there. His skin is rougher here than at his jaw; I can feel where he missed a little when he shaved. I stroke it twice, concentrating on that small patch.
“I’m frightened of how much I want you.”
He closes his eyes for a second. When he opens them, he doesn’t ask me to trust him.
“Can I kiss you?”
I nod. The first kiss is only my mouth. The next is the corner of it, where I have started crying without any intention of crying tonight. He stays there while I wipe my face with the heel of my hand. I am embarrassed, then cross with myself for being embarrassed.
“This is taking ages.”
“We’ve got ages.”
The laundromat door bangs across the street. A car goes by with music playing. He kisses my damp cheek, and I let the sheet go, one finger at a time.
The fright does not disappear. It becomes something I can feel beside the warmth of his mouth. I touch his shoulder, then move my hand down his back.
“Again,” I say. This time I pull him nearer.
Then I am the one in a hurry. I push the skirt and my underwear down my legs and drag at his belt and get the buckle wrong.
He helps me, his fingers unsteady too, and steps out of his trousers and briefs. When he is naked I look at him for a long moment. “I like you like this,” I tell him. “When you forget to be composed.”
“You should have seen me trying to choose a shirt.”
I move across the bed and pull him down beside me. We lie facing each other, close enough that his breath warms my mouth. His hand rests on my hip until I draw it between my legs.
“Here,” I say.
He touches me slowly. I put my forehead against his, and he kisses me when I lift my face. I can feel how much he wants to hurry. When his fingers find the place I need, I grip his wrist and keep him there.
“Like that.” My leg slides over his. “God. Yes.”
He watches me while he does it. I had forgotten how difficult it is to keep looking at someone when they can see exactly what they are doing to you. I kiss him hard enough to stop his next question.
“I want you inside me.”
We have to move to manage it. He bends one leg beneath mine, and I help him, laughing once when we get in each other’s way. Then he pushes in slowly and I stop laughing. I hold his shoulder while my body gets used to him.
“All right?”
“Yes. Stay close.”
He keeps his face near mine. The movement is small at first, awkward, until I find how to meet him. My foot presses against the back of his thigh. I tell him I missed him, and then I tell him exactly what I missed. His rhythm falters and he groans against my mouth.
“I’m not going to last.”
“Then don’t.” I pull him closer. “I want to feel you.”
He comes with his hand spread against my back, saying my name. I hold him while he shakes. When he draws out, he stays beside me until he can kiss me without trying to catch his breath.
“You haven’t,” he says.
I shake my head. I am still aching for him. He kisses my shoulder, and I catch his hand before he can move it between us again.
“Your mouth,” I tell him.
He goes down the bed. The first kiss inside my thigh makes me lift my hips, impatient now. I put my hand in his hair when his mouth reaches me. I can say what I want. I say it, and he does it, and when I come I hear how loud I am and don’t care.
Afterward he brings the sheet over us. I lie with one leg over his and hear the laundromat doors closing across the street. He reaches for the lamp, then waits because I am looking at him.
“Breakfast,” I say.
He waits. It was easier, a few minutes ago, to ask him for something that made me shout. Now I am tracing the seam of his pillowcase instead of looking at him.
“I want you here for breakfast. When it’s light.”
His hand comes to rest over mine. “I’d like that.”
“There’s bread.”
“The good bread.”
He turns out the lamp. In the dark I find his shoulder again.