Her hands were out of sight
beneath the suds. She caught his eye and grinned crazily, then her hands
shot out of the pool, clutching the hunting knife.
"*Put on the White Rabbit!*" she howled, cackling fiendishly.
He leapt back and she continued to cackle. "Come back, come back," she
choked. "I'm doing the tub scene from *Fear and Loathing in Las
Vegas*. I thought you were into reading?"
He cautiously peeked around the doorjamb, playing it up for comic
effect. "Give me the knife," he said.
"Awww," she said, handing it over, butt first. He set it down on the
dresser, then hurried back to the bathroom.
"Haven't you read all those books?"
Alan grinned. "What's the point of a bunch of books you've already
read?" He dropped his boxers and stripped off his T-shirt and climbed
into the tub, sloshing gallons of water over the scummy tile floor.
#
When I was two years old,
(she said, later, as she reclined against the headboard and he reclined
against her, their asses deforming the rusted springs of the mattress so
that it sloped toward them and the tins of soda they'd opened to
replenish their bodily fluids lost in sweat and otherwise threatened to
tip over on the slope; she encased him in her wings, shutting out the
light and filling their air with the smell of cinnamon and pepper from
the downy hair)
When I was two years old,
(she said, speaking into the shaggy hair at the back of his neck, as his
sore muscles trembled and as the sweat dried to a white salt residue on
his skin, as he lay there in the dark of the room and the wings,
watching the constellation of reflected clock-radio lights in the black
TV screen)
When I was two years old,
(she began, her body tensing from toes to tip in a movement that he felt
along the length of his body, portending the time when lovers close
their eyes and open their mouths and utter the secrets that they hide
from everyone, even themselves)
When I was two years old, my wings were the size of a cherub's, and they
had featherlets that were white as snow.
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