He had never been with a woman before; he had never felt the need, not caring much for their voices and never trusting intentions. Some men thought the wiles of women gave meaning to life; he didn’t. Then one day there she stood.
Red headed, freckled with bright green eyes, the distinguishing marks of an ugly woman on paper yet her beauty stopped him mid-stride. Wrapped in drab shades of green and ecru which reminded him of a Renaissance portrait he felt the palms of his hands itch with the knowledge she stood breathing in the 21st century. Tall, straight with large hands for a woman it did not deteriorate her beauty for her hands were thin and her fingers tapered. Her body perhaps too thin yet well proportioned beneath her dress. He imagined pulling a corner of her layered clothing and unravel the deep forest colors of her garb yet remain mesmerized by her eyes.
Taking her hand he did just that. Testing his surmise he found that looking into her eyes while he pushed away what hid her body was easy despite the periphery proof that her skin proved glorious. When he discovered that she didn’t have a rough patch of skin, smelled like spring-time rain, and that falling into her was something between physical bliss and realizing he had been half a person all of his life, he became sullen and angry afterward. He didn’t understand why.
He forgot about his anger when she woke up, when she wrapped her legs around his waist and pulled him in as a man pulls in a sack of potatoes to hoist upon his shoulder. The awareness of the room, the air, the sounds, the smells the physicalness of his actions crystalized, sharpened and seared his every sense into an awareness he never thought possible. The briefness of life pounded in his mind while with her and sullen anger lingered about his dulled senses afterward.
Questions emerged. Why at jaded middle age did she walk into his life? How did mere sex become longing? And above all, how was it that within the secretness of his heart, he did not trust her? Sleeping beside him, tousled hair, shivering skin beneath the tracing of his hands proved his life wasted right? Opening her astonishing green eyes and gazing up at him, he felt for a moment she did not understand his awakened need.
After a few strenuous nighttime hours he slept and dreamed of his childhood home, a forest deep in the wilderness. He saw everything in pairs but in seven pairs; the birds, the fish, the deer, the elk, the mountain lion, the bear. Seven pair of every creature gazed at him and beckoned him to follow. He didn’t miss his lover or mourn her he followed the animals. While following an awareness of seven ideas, seven sounds, seven smells, seven pairs of the animal’s tread upon the earth stirred in him; he walked along the old familiar paths without the suspicion and caution life in the wilderness taught him at an early age. When he awoke, the night was a deep silence and beside him was a cold vacant spot.
The gritty anger that surrounded him revealed its truth; she didn’t want to keep him, wasn’t interested in his ability to provide for her and was sure that she had used him. He closed his eyes and listened. Perhaps she was just leaving him, just sneaking out the door with what she needed. Other men grumbled at the bar when his wife was demanding and insatiable in her drive for things. If her need turned toward the tangible, then she may take a grab for the few things he possessed and leave him to sleep.
When he heard the door close behind him, the shivering, knife’s edge feeling that went up his back and across his shoulders told him not to look. Instead, he gazed out the thin glass and wooden window. The sun glimmered low and icy blue rising to meet the tender leaves of spring, still dark and indistinguishable in the early morning. No sound of birdsong, no rustle of an animal disturbed the air.
Don’t turn around man, don’t be a fool.
A frigid thread and then another draped across his naked waist and then tightened, cutting deep. His cry was reactionary to the pain. He turned without so much as a thought, or even with the conscious idea that he had turned but could not rise.
Her two hands encased him in her web, her two eyes told him her intent, her two lips smiled in devilish glee. His voice drained away first, the last was his dread.