Bad feelings are one part of what sucks about this world. Good feelings are the other. Because the good stuff is what can get taken from you, the rug that gets pulled out from under you. A warming feeling that, once it's gone, leaves you out in the...
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C A R L
The sound of thousands of drops of water recoiling off of the shower tile echoes from the other side of the closed bathroom door.
Standing guard while the girl takes the first shower, my hands rummage through the box of things that Jessie brought me. The woman kindly gave me some of her eldest son's old stuff. She said that he's been dying to meet us.
My hands find a thin strap, the unfamiliar piece of fabric not ringing a bell of anything I've ever worn.
As I pull on the strap, the fabric gets stuck on something else in the box. Using a bit more force, I'm finally able to pull it out of the box, revealing a thin bra. I study the foreign fabric in my hands, not knowing what to do. My focus consumes me as I clearly didn't hear the water from the shower come to a stop.
"I think I grabbed the wrong stuff." The girl says, peaking her head out of the bathroom door.
I quickly shove the bra back into the box, acting as if I was looking for something else, when really I was just burying it underneath the other clothes.
"Yeah, I think you might have." I manage to choke out.
The girl fully opens the bathroom door and there she stands.
Her long hair drips with water droplets as it cascades down her back, moved completely away from her front side. A clean, white towel is wrapped around her small frame, hiding what's trying to creep from underneath. Her collarbones are scattered with beaded drops of the drying water. The skin of her neck clings inward tightly as she has not yet had the nutrition needed to fill out the sunken-in areas.
I avert my eyes from the freshly-showered girl and turn back toward the box of clothes that lies on the untouched bed.
The sheets being freshly made as neither of us have actually used them nor slept through the night. Instead, we both stayed awake in the living room to take guard, which eventually led to us catching up about what happened during our time apart.
"Here you go," I breathe out. My flustered hands grab the box and walk it over to where she's standing. As I approach her, the steam from the bathroom and the floral scent of soap hits my nostrils in the most pleasing way.
Megan reaches her arms out for the box, taking it in her grasp. Her towel moves down a bit as she grips onto it, exposing another inch or so of the shadowy curves that were once behind it.
