Our Infinite Sadness

Morning After

Not four minutes after breaking into her sprint, she sat on Benjamin's rocking chair. For all of her desperation and the terrible stridency of the voice within, she had missed nothing. He slept peacefully, now more lightly, in and out of dreams.

Charlie was downstairs sorting through piles of equipment, making trips out to the driveway where, presumably, one of the Quileute elders would soon be coming by to pick him up.

She was fully clothed and aware for the first time of the ensemble she had snatched from the cubby at the door: loose khaki cargo pants, a sun-yellow blouse, and a bulky peach sweater which she had pulled absently over the rest, in the midst of considerable distraction. It was all too big for her. Evidently she had grabbed Emelia's clothes from the wrong closet cubby. It didn't matter. She was back with Benjamin. Nothing else mattered.

He slept quite lightly. He tossed every time Charlie banged about downstairs, tromping around in boots and slamming doors.

She perched on the rocking chair, sitting on her heels, and hugged her knees, a posture that she often took when she was anxious. For the first time she no longer felt guilty or ashamed of being here, because Benjamin was aware, and she had his acquiescence.

Why was she anxious? She was with him now. The newly awakened presence within was quite sanguine. Not too bright, it seemed, more like an emotive force than a subsidiary intellect. How curious. And she was distracting herself. As usual. She was anxious because morning light, filtered and subdued by the overcast sky yet light nevertheless, filled his room. And she knew from books beyond count that humans were more sober and circumspect on the morning after. Last night in the darkness the heat of passion had overtaken him, and he had lost himself in the tempest. She dared imagine that he had enjoyed everything that happened between them, but how could he not? They were virgins, and for his kind especially, embattled from within by their own hormones, lust had overcome him. There was nothing she wanted more than to take these ridiculous clothes off and rejoin him in his bed, and feel his arms around her, holding her stomach and breasts tightly, kissing the back of her neck and her hair. She yearned for it; he was right there; she wanted only to be held by him, but he was tossing and turning. He could awaken at any moment, and she would surely awaken him if she joined him and lowered the temperature of his little nest by sixty degrees. And when he felt the cold, emanating off her like an open freezer door, how would he not be repulsed by the sight of her in the stark light of morning, ugly despicable creature that she was? With the fresh clarity of the new day, with his head clear and his eyes open, how would he not be revolted by her and resentful of the memory of how she had exploited him?

A truck was revving down the street in a low gear, thankfully somewhat quieter than the ridiculous junkyard artifact that Ben drove to school. The truck was pulling in. The thoughts within were easy to read. Harry Clearwater was at the wheel, a pudgy wizened man and thirty year member of the Quileute elders. In the back seat, with a big cooler by his side, sat the older of the two, Jez Ateara. Charlie had gone outside with the last of his tackle and waders under a couple arms. Harry got out to help him load his gear into the back and secure it firmly under webbing for the drive. Charlie took shotgun. They pulled out, and moments later they topped the rise and were gone.

Now Benjamin and she had this house to themselves all day. This fact would not escape Benjamin. What would he do with that convenient opportunity? Would she attract, or repel? She had drunk from his body last night, and the unlikely miracle was that she had found a way to accomplish it without killing him. Benjamin's seed was more delicious to her than his blood, and he had enjoyed having it taken from him.

Would he be resentful now, in the morning? He had spent his seed on barren ground, after all. Would she be repellent to him? She wanted to undress and join him, but what if he found her body revolting? Now that he'd gotten her out of his system, rounded the bases as it were, and had ample fodder for the eager listeners in the boys' gym locker room tomorrow morning? If now he was through with her, she should not be surprised.