He lifts his in a toast and drains half down, then licks the residue off his lips. A single drop remains until a second swipe clears it up. “Drink yours, and I won’t comment on how much—or how little—else you consume.”
“Nag.” The mix of fruit and yogurt, likely plus assorted nutritious additions, cools my throat as it goes down. He’s a decent cook, not that I’ll admit it to his face.
“All of it.” He doesn’t bark, but there’s a commanding edge to his voice. Matching shadows tinge his eyes. Or are those questions? He doesn’t ask anything, yet.
We eat in silence.
I clean the kitchen after, since he prepared the food. Fair’s fair.
Then we retreat to the living room, with its comfy, mismatched, overstuffed furniture in every color under the sun, its walls displaying photos of the family in our heyday: when we numbered six, three adults and three growing girls. A moderate-sized screen hangs on one wall, in case there’s anything worth watching.
The evening passes in a blur. In some ways, it’s the most typical of days—reading, answering emails and returning calls from friends and family who couldn’t make the service, screening a show that I don’t take in at all—and Corin going up to bed earlier than me, and me earlier than Max would have.
The house remains quiet, despite background noise from the screen.
There’s no Max, with his usual dry commentary, sometimes welcome but equally likely interrupting key moments with predictions about what would happen next. I haven’t heard it for a month, two months, more, since he’d stopped doing it as he started getting fatigued—a sign we should have noticed, that to some degree Ididnotice and nag him to see a doctor, which he kept putting off.
Max failed to make time for a doctor, but wrote to Dan, along with whatever else he got up to without telling me.
No, time enough to think about that tomorrow or another day, when I’ve got energy again.
When I go upstairs, my bed is still a mess. Pushing the clothes to one side just makes for a different-shaped mess. I try to lie down next to the piles, but they’re so cold and unmoving. The shape is wrong, long and flat, but nonetheless too reminiscent of Max at the end, when his spirit had gone.
He died in our bed, not the one I’m sleeping in now.
Despite blankets heaped atop the sheets and the furnace chugging away in the basement, cold seeps into my limbs, making it hard to sleep.
Max and Dan’s visages, as I last saw them, dance in my brain. Max, pale and waxy, flesh remaining but spirit most definitely fled, versus Dan, full of life, the glint of his alpha flashing in his eyes.
If I were a child, on a night like this, I’d knock on my parents’ door and ask to snuggle. Once Max and I moved in together, we cuddled most nights. Having little interest in sex didn’t mean he lacked desire for hugs, for heads leaning against shoulders—for touch. Helovedromance.
Sometimes after Corin and his ex-wife split, he and Max and I would cuddle together, with or without his daughters, forming a big puppy pile. Max bought the biggest bed he could fit in our room just for that purpose, Corin likewise. I think we all slept better those nights. I certainly did.
In the end, I flee from the images of Max and Dan—and from my lonely bed.
Rising, I tiptoe barefoot down the hall, as though trying not to wake the peoplenotsleeping in the house anymore, all the way to Corin’s room. He’s still awake when I knock, standing by the window, holding the curtain back. Angled rays from the streetlamp below gleam off his bare chest so that the hair sprinkled across his chest casts shadows. Pajama pants hang from his hips.
“I can’t sleep. Can we have a puppy pile?”
He lets the curtain fall and, for once, doesn’t argue, just guides me to the bed redolent with cedar and apples. We do nothing but lie side by side, only our hands touching, still his nearness warms me, lulling me to sleep.
His presence keeps the ghosts at bay.
Chapter 5
Two Tired People Sharing Comfort
JOHANNA
The best night’s rest I’ve had in months ends with waking to Corin spooned around me. His feet hook underneath mine, keeping my toes warm. His head curves around the back of my neck, nose brushing my skin and leaving cedar scent marks as he breathes. A strong arm drapes across my front, fingers entwined with mine against my belly while his erection presses in from the other side.
Just the usual early morning arousal. I’ve been in this position before—many times when we slept in a puppy pile, in fact. It never mattered whether the pile included only me and Max or us with his daughters, or the few times packs from my family visited and we wound up all sardined together on the floor of the living room for an inside campout. No matter how we started the night, I always woke next to Corin. Either back to back, with him facing away from the rest of us—or him spooned around me, and me around Max.
Before, to the extent I thought about it at all, I figured Corin’s subconscious considered me the safest choice. Apart from beingcousins, Max would’ve jumped and treated us all to a scene if he found himself the middle spoon and got prodded by a hard-on. He was very particular about who could touch him where and when.
Even me.
Now, it’s only Corin and me, and we wind up in the same arrangement: cuddled, comfortably, as closely linked as the fingers interlaced over my stomach. Thin layers of fabric separate all but our feet, head, and hands.
