My legs and arms are covered with dark bruises. I haven’t realized until right now how sore I am all over: Everything hurts. When I’ve let the water drive over my face and pool in my eyes and mouth, I lean forward and feel it beat a rhythm on my back, like the drumming of a thousand tiny feet. The water is icy cold, and smells fresh, as though it has carried some of the scents of its spiraling journey past stripped branches and tiny, new March buds. I have never felt anything so amazing in my life. Then I tip my head back so the rain hits me square in the face and courses down my hair, my back, my aching shoulders and chest. I lower myself to a crouch and ease myself off the platform, splashing into the tracks, feeling the bite of metal and wood on my bare feet. The cold air raises goose bumps on my skin. I stand naked on the lip of the platform, reaching my arms up toward the sky, as ribbons of water continue twisting through the grates: liquid gray, as though the sky has begun to melt. For a minute it’s possible to forget what I’ve done-what I’ve had to do-to escape, to forget the pattern of blood seeping across the storeroom floor, the Scavenger’s eyes, surprised, accusatory. For a minute it’s possible to forget that the Scavengers are somewhere out there in the dark, looking for us. “We should get moving again.” I wait until Julian’s footsteps are a faint echo in the cavernous space before stepping out of my clothes. I’ll just-I’ll go scout ahead.” “I’ll be quick,” I say. “Oh-oh, right,” he stammers, backing away. “I’ll need to get undressed,” I blurt out, since Julian doesn’t seem to be taking the hint. I can’t seem to pull myself back into her body. I’m losing the thread of the new Lena, the hard one, the warrior made in the Wilds. It has been a long time since I’ve felt this way, so open and exposed. Under the grates.” “Okay.” Julian nods, but doesn’t move. “I’d like-I’d like to get clean, like you did. He hauls himself up onto the platform, surprisingly graceful. It was already getting light.” His jeans are on. His hair makes a pattern of water spots around the neck of his T-shirt. “Did you sleep at all?” Now he’s wrestling with his jeans. “I just woke up,” I say as he finally gets his shirt on. The cuts on his lip and forehead are scabbing over. His eyes are no longer swollen, but they are ringed with deep purple bruises. Now that he has cleaned away the blood, I can see his face clearly. I would laugh if he didn’t look so desperate. He accidentally gets his head caught in an armhole and has to try again. “I didn’t know you were awake,” he says, fighting to get his T-shirt on, even though he’s soaking wet. When he sees me awake, he jumps out of the stream of water and scoops his clothes up off the platform lip, covering himself with them. All of a sudden I am horribly embarrassed: I’m trespassing on a private moment. He shakes his head a bit and water pinwheels from his hair, a glittering semicircle: Happy and unaware, he starts to hum quietly. There is a perfect stillness to him, and in the pallid gray light he seems to glow slightly, like a statue carved out of white rock. I got used to the strangeness of their bodies, the bits of curling hair on their chests, and sometimes on their backs and shoulders, to the broad, flat panes of their stomachs and wings of their hipbones, arcing over the waistband of their pants. In the Wilds, I finally got used to seeing men naked or half-naked. I’m transfixed by the sight of the rain coursing over his back-broad and muscled and strong, just like Alex’s was-the rolling landscapes of his arms and shoulders his hair, now dark with water the way he tips his head back and lets the rain run into his open mouth. His back is turned to me, and he has stripped down to a pair of faded cotton shorts he must have found when we scavenged for clothing and supplies. The rain is pouring through the grates, long, twisting gray ribbons of it, and he is standing underneath them.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |