Chapter 8 Back to Now…
Get out your head.
Count to ten. One more time.
Get out your head.
Deep breath.
Eight, nine, ten.
Deep breath.
Deep breath.
This is real.
* * *
I turn away from the mirror, from the dog, and open the bathroom door. Take the short walk across the hall to Aria’s bedroom.
She’s sitting on the bed, but stands when she sees me. Dazzling. Still. The lamp is on, casting orange across her skin.
The music is a melody I don’t recognize. She’s cracked a window, just barely. The spring air feels nice.
“You okay?” she asks, the faintest shiver in her voice. And all of a sudden I think of the last two years.
How… regular it’s been. Not the right word. How… natural. How lucky I am.
“I’m… a little nervous,” I say.
She nods and gives a nervous grin that softens as I grin back. She reaches her arms behind her back, undoes her bra.
Deep breath.
I follow her lead, push my underwear to the floor.
Deep breath.
She follows my follow, pushes her underwear to the floor.
Deep breath.
“Me too,” she says. And I wish I had synesthesia. Wish I could taste those five letters. I know they’re sweet. Sweeter than I don’t know what.
And now my breathing begins to even. Which is odd.
“Also,” Aria continues, “while you were in there, I, um… I figured out my three words.”
I smile. There is a trumpet oozing low through the speakers.
“I’ve known mine for a long time,” I confess. I say the thing.
And in that moment, I extend my pinky, reach out for her. She meets my hand with hers, locks her little finger in mine. Tonight,
we are hooked. We pull each other. Me and Aria. Meet in the middle. Of ourselves. As ourselves.
Closer than close. And softly, softly, softly, almost as if our breath has perforated, as if we are vibrating, we whisper a laugh into each other’s ears.