She sat up on him then, sinking low, lower, trying to press him into her core, she wanted to feel him buried so far within her that she could taste him in her mouth. He groaned and arched his back slightly, giving her a few more centimeters to a depth that seemed immeasurable. She was looking down at him through half closed eyes, their pleasure like a wave they were surfing together, and he reached for her hands, holding tightly.
“Do you really see God?” he asked hoarsely, his breath coming fast. She nodded, her lips parted, she smiled slightly, squeezing his hands in response. “What does he look like?” The question was serious now, not teasing her, his eyes genuinely asking her to tell him.
“Colors,” she murmured, closing her eyes, impaling herself, impossibly, just a little further onto his shaft by rocking forward, then back, sending a deep shockwave of pleasure through her body. “And light. Like a rainbow imploding, turning in on itself again and again. Can you feel it? Can you see it?” Her voice was a whisper, but her eyes were on his now. She thought she could see his eyes glistening with tears. He was shaking his head, and her heart ached at his pained expression, the way his jaw worked. He wanted to see. He desperately wanted to.
“Fuck me,” she said, tugging at him, urging him to roll her over onto her back. He did, moving into her softness, that yielding opening that received him without resistance as he searched her flesh with his cock. She was wrapping her legs around him, her hands pulling at his back, her breath fast, her voice a hoarse rasp in his ear, “Fuck me, David, fuck me to God.” The sound of that phrase, sacred or profane, thrilled him. He felt like a god on her, in her, feeling the sweet waves of her orgasm beginning to draw him even more deeply into her.
“Fill me,” she urged, her muscles squeezing him deliciously, and he came, shuddering and meeting the thrust and clutch of her in a blinding white flash.
Their slow return to the world came in gradual shifts, his body collapsing onto hers, the shift and turn of him as she labored to breathe under his weight, the mingling of their hands, the seeping between her legs, thick, like sap, the roll of him onto his belly, hugging the pillow beneath his head, the deep even sound of his breathing. Dawn dozed, in and out, the light on the ceiling brighter now, the day begun out there somewhere, this first day of Hanukkah. It was after Christmas, the holiday her husband cared about, and she had spent it with him. This was her holiday, her week of worship, and she was praying here, in a little flat in London with a man she felt knew her better than anyone in the world, yet whose presence she had physically basked in only a dozen times at most. The world was a funny place.
She rolled to look at him in his sleep, and gasped when she saw the scar on his back. She hadn’t noticed it in last night’s darkness in their fumbling hurry. It was enormous, very near his spine. “David?” she whispered, not wanting to wake him, wanting to know.
“Yeah?” He was awake.
“What happened?” she asked, tracing over the ugly, jagged scar. It was puckered and dented, and looked like someone had been digging into his skin.
“Melanoma,” he said flatly. “Malignant. They took it out two months ago, but it was already into my bones.”
She lost her breath, feeling like someone had kicked her in the stomach. She found herself sobbing without even knowing she was doing it. Light was always muted here in this part of the world, but things now truly looked as if the color had been bled out of them, and she felt as if she were wandering in a thick, gray London fog. David turned to hold her, and she railed against him, simply wailing, pounding against his strongly muscled chest hard enough that he would later discover fist-shaped bruises.
He didn’t try to quiet her, he just let her storm, until finally she eddied and then ebbed, in hitching sighs, fits and starts.
“This is why I don’t believe in God,” he said finally. His voice was as lifeless as she had ever heard it and she winced, pained, feeling as helpless and hopeless as he sounded. “If there was a God, and he cared about what happened to us, then I wouldn’t have cancer, and…” he hesitated only a moment, the words barely above a whisper as he breathed, “I would have you.”
“I’m sorry, David.” It was hardly enough. She didn’t know what else to offer him, although she desperately wanted to comfort him, ease his pain, and her own. “Maybe there is a bigger picture that we can’t see…”
She felt his laugh, cynical and bitter, against her ear. “Yeah, sure. Famine, war, it’s all part of the plan. My grandfather’s ashes carried over Krakow on the wind. All part of some grand plan. You can’t really believe that?” He sounded incredulous. “This isn’t heaven, Dawn. This is hell on earth, every damned day.”
She clasped his hand in hers, pressing it between her breasts. Her heart was beating hard. “I believe in us. I believe that what we have transcends anything else, everything else, even death.” Her voice was shaking. “Even death. Yes, ok, this is hell on earth… but it is also heaven on earth. This is all we will ever have, and it really is divine.”
He pressed his shaking hand to hers, over her heart, his trembling lips against her lips, and they tasted her tears together in that one moment of connection, a brief, fleeting thing that was all they ever had, all we ever have, something forever sacred and inviolate, one transcendent moment of wonder in the great mystery of it all.
THE GUITAR MAN
Sam had a guitar, and he could play. No one else was very impressed with this fact, I guess, because I was the one who stayed at his feet all night, begging him to play another song for me. He would smile and oblige, as willing to have an audience as I was to hear him play and sing in his smooth voice. He went through his entire repertoire for me, so that by 2 a.m., everyone else had gone to bed, and it was just me and Sam sitting alone in the living room, me holding the music, turning the pages, him strumming his guitar and singing in my ear.
“Play another one,” I begged, opening my eyes when the music came to a slow, sweet halt. He grinned.
“You’re insatiable.” He idly strummed.
“I know, I’m sorry.” I leaned back against his leg. “You’re such a nice guy, to sit up with me and do this… I’d listen all night long. You can stop if you want to.”
“Nice guy, eh? I’ve been called a lot… I can’t remember being called that one.” He laughed softly. “You know, I think I’ve played every song I know…” My disappointment must have been palpable because he said, “But… I can still sing to you.” We both looked up in surprise when the timer-light on the lamp went out and we were left in the dark.
“It’s a sign.” I laughed. He smiled in the dark, and I saw the glint of the moonlight and the streetlight outside coming in from the window on his teeth.
“Maybe it is.” He slid to the floor next to me and putting his guitar aside. “So what do you want me to sing?”
“Anything at all,” I said eagerly. He started singing a Simon and Garfunkel song that he had played earlier on the guitar, and I closed my eyes to listen. It seemed natural when he moved behind me, his hands rubbing my shoulders, whispering,
“Relax” and then singing softly in my ear, his breath warm and sweet on the side of my face. I let myself go, all the tension in my body that had been building for weeks released with the touch of his large, warm hands. I didn’t think about anything but the sound of his voice, and the feel of him against me, his long legs stretched out next to mine, his hands slipping under my shirt so I could feel the calluses left by the guitar strings on his fingertips as they brushed my back.