Everything about our relationship is sex.  Not in a shallow way, but in a whole way.  Physical becomes spiritual and we become this divine thing.  Our relationship just is. And it doesn’t feel wrong.  Sex is sex is love lust divine passion being human.  Too much for right now.  But it always is (and always shall be).  Nothing new.  Everything new.

The thoughts come pouring out of some neglected corner of my brain.  How easy it is to pick up where we left off.  Too easy?   

“Why does it feel – ?”

“Like I never left?”  She smiles at my mouth agape with unformed words.  “I have no idea.”

No.  Actually it does feel like you left.  Like I’ve been chasing a dream all these years and now that I’ve caught up to it I don’t know what to say.  I don’t know what to feel.  So much life has passed between us, so much has drowned me til I can’t breathe.  But there is that life, that existence I’ve built outside the dream and that is real.  This is real.  What is real?  The past mixed up with the here and now and I don’t know anything anymore. 

That’s when you know you’re lost.  When it doesn’t matter, consequences.  Because you’re not thinking about them.  It all kind of slips your mind and keeps on going.  No effort needed. Just don’t think about it.  Though the guilt might kill you later.

“Hey.  You know what?”

She just looks at me, confused.  Then a slow smile comes, spreading across those full full lips.  She leans back in the chair, arms crossed.  “What?”

I smile, suddenly shy, face burning.  I glance down.  Take a breath.  “I love you.”

Laughs.  Quiet, deep down.  Shakes her head.  “Damn.  You don’t forget anything, do you?  Even the little games.”  The smile sticks, but leaves her eyes.  “Again?  Or still?”

She giggles into my silence.   Quiets, looks around.  “I hate this place.”

“Which one?”  Did I say that out loud?

“I live my life in bars.  Jesus.  I’m a fucking bartender and I can’t stand it.”  Eyes plead.

I search for a question to answer.  Hear the weakness of my response. “Then change it.”

“I can’t.  I won’t…”

“You won’t let yourself be happy.”  See her leaving again.

Silence. Too much silence.

“Come on.  Let’s get out of here.”  A desperation sets in.  Sudden, violent panic.  I pull her after me.

“Where’re we going?”

“I need a picture of you.” 

“Why?”

“Just because.”  I can’t explain why.  I just do. Maybe to have physical proof.  Maybe to use in some voodoo once she disappears again.

She laughs.  Full throated and alive.

* * * * *

They never tell you that no matter how old you get, how grown up, you always feel eighteen.  Breath catches, heart batters at my ribs.  Her body pressing up against me isn’t sixteen anymore.  Neither is mine pushing back.  Twelve years is a lot of time to grow up.

Her lips taste like cherries and sweat.  She laughs and dances away. 

Standing in this room is like being encased in amber.  A liquid miasma of reds and orange and muted gold.  Candles flicker and the blues slow burns in rasped ecstasy.  She moves in and out of the shadows.  Her skin glistens, sparking with a million thousand flames.  Stars spin out of her eyes; a blue I can taste.  She moves to the music, letting it own her.  Her movements own me.  I am bound. 

“Are you sure?”  Back in my arms.

I’m quiet for a minute, lips resting on the warm skin of her neck.

“Are you?”

“I’m sure I love you.”  I lean back, look at her.  Eyes question.  I don’t know if that’s the answer.  Hell, I don’t even know if that’s the real question.  She pulls away.

“Is this right?  Do I want to deal with everything that’s going to fall apart?  Is anything going to fall apart?  Is anyone ever going to know besides us?”  I reach for a cigarette. “No.  I’m not sure of anything right now.  But, you’re here.  And this is what I want.  And it damn well feels right.”

She is quiet.  “Oh.” 

Candles flicker, weaving shadows around the smoke curling up towards the ceiling.  The world, the past and everyone in it, not a part of here and now.  It all fades down past memory.

Something in her changes, released.  She is the girl I loved back then.  She is the woman I love still.  But for the love of god and my soul, don’t ask me why.

 “Dance with me like we used to.”

Fingers long and delicate.  Nails trace the side of her neck, just below her ear.  Slowly she scrapes them down, leaving faint red trails til they come to rest in that little dimple at the base of her throat.  Head tilts back, eyes closed and I am mesmerized by her finger circling circling calling me drawing me drowning me.

“Everybody knows that the dice are loaded.

“Everybody rolls with their fingers crossed…”

She sways.  Eyes closed, singing the words in that same childlike sing song I remember.  Her head falls onto my shoulder.  Hair tickles gentle and soft.  I can smell the tobacco smoke, the whiskey.  Sweat.  And her.  She presses against me.  Draws me into her rhythm.  Bodies shift, sliding across one another until they fit.  Blocking out air.  Blocking out everything.  I feel her heart against my chest.  The heat as her hips grind against me in the slow slow beat.

“Everybody wants a box of chocolate and a longstem rose…. Everybody knows…”

My fingers caress her neck, her jawline.  Tangle in her hair.  Cool cool lips and hot hot breath.  Hover there, let hands run all crazy like.  Starved with forever.

A single, whispered word.  “Please.”

Our lips connect. And I am there.  I am everywhere and nowhere but in the moment.  In her.  No thought beyond an overriding need for her.

“That’s how it goes… everybody knows…”

“Just us. So far above it all.”  Her lips still on mine, I feel the words more than hear them.  “Be with me.”

Slow, I lift her shirt over her head, trapping her hands.  She lowers them behind her back.  I undo her bra and step back.  Her jeans slide down, steps out of them.  Head tilted, an odd smile, she watches me watching her.

So familiar yet so different.  A tiny tattoo of a pair of cherries on her left hip.  She raises her arms and does a slow spin, eyes closed.  Smirking.  A name across her lower back.  I trace it with my finger.

She looks up at me.  Eyes flash, challenging.  “My daughter’s name.”

I grab her hips, turn her around.  Nails scratch my stomach.  I taste her neck, shivering, leaning into her hands.  They drop lower.

She laughs.  “Damn.  I forgot-.”

 I cut her off with a rough kiss.  No more talking.  No excuses, no explanations.  No more running away.  No more past.  It all dissolves against her lips.  Her hands, free now, grip my hair and I am swallowed, consumed.  By her.  By her force of being.

This is how I knew it would be.  This is how it has always been and always will be.  It’ll never change between us.  It doesn’t have to.

I slide down, tongue teases.  Hips buck, grind grind grinding all slow and rough, legs wrapped around my neck, locking me to her.  Tiny bites.  Push to the peak and ease off.  Again and again until the sweat rolls off us and we are soaked in each other. 

I slide up her body.  Slick heat.  Enter her.  Her entire body grips me, arching off the bed.  She cries, quiet little spasms.

 “What’s wrong?”

“Nothing.  Oh god, nothing.”  She kisses me.  A deep real kiss. Souls touch and I know I am as close to heaven as I can be.  Everything is okay.  It’s all okay forever and ever and we all fall down.

“I’m happy.”  Again, words against my lips. I taste them.  Swallow them down and make them a part of me.  Keep them locked up tight and safe.  We laugh and cry and lose ourselves in each other for a while forever for the first time.

* * * * *

She sits curled in the windowsill, looking out at this city that neither of us belongs to.  The lights, the moon bathe her.  Make her glow.  Like an angel.  So beautiful.  Petite, almost delicate.  But strong.  She looks out and doesn’t look hurt or sad or fucked up confused. 

I silently raise the camera.  The flash makes her turn, smiling.  She stands and stretches, arms thrown over her head.  She is an unforgettable.  An archetype. 

I hold the picture up.  Laughing, she jumps up on the bed, straddling me.

“What’d ya do that for?” 

“I told you I wanted a picture.”  I tuck it away in the nightstand drawer.  Stick out my tongue.  She leans in and bites it, wrapping me in her arms.  Deep long kiss and she slides off.  Lays there smiling.

“We should sleep.  Sun’ll be up pretty soon.”  She curls up against me.  My turn to wrap her up.  If I hold on tight enough, maybe she won’t be able to get away this time.

I speak into her hair.  “Don’t go.”

She runs a hand across my chest, pulling herself in even tighter.  She doesn’t say anything.  I feel her chest rise and fall and sink into the rhythm of her.

* * * * *

I open my eyes.  The room is light.  Late morning sunshine slants through the window.  The bed feels cool.  Empty.  She’s gone.  On the other pillow there is a piece of paper.  A picture with writing on the back.  The words “thank you” and a phone number.  I smile.

 I pour a cup of coffee, stare into the chipped white ceramic.  Deep clear brown coffee steams, throwing off heat like shedding morals.  But, who’s morals?  Discarded absolutes, certainties.  I wait for the guilt to come.  Battle down the rationalizations that creep in.  Shifting blame.  Let it come unhindered.  I feel it deep deep down. But it won’t come.  No blast of conscience.  No hollowness.  The opposite, really.  Something has been filled.  Fixed.  Made whole.  Well, at least more complete than it was before.  Damn.

Turn the picture over.  She lays there smiling all glorious and divine.  Dark hair framing those blue blue eyes.  Chin propped up on her sculpted hands.  And the rest of her stretched out all beautiful and naked.  Focused on her face, everything else is shimmery, like a mirage.  Like a ghost.

I laugh.  Feel the words against my lips. I’m gonna haunt you, you know.  I’m gonna haunt you like music.

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