W worked tirelessly, but no treatment could be found. As time grew short, W became desperate; they flooded the entire hilltop where F and W lived in Molten Ice, suspending it from the ravages of time. There, the two companions could reside indefinitely, so long as they never left.
What happened from there was a matter of improvisation.
The play’s title hearkened to a speech F gave W midway through the opening act.
Lay down your work and sit a while.I wish you wouldn’t struggle so. Even art cannot stop time. Bend it, sure, manipulate it, yes. But stop it? Firecannot breathe inside of water. There is no thirteenth hour in a day. Every story has its end. I cannot live forever, nor would I wish to.
The next day, Noahput the kitchen renovation on hold and drove to Kinko’s to photocopy the script. He and AJ read through it on the patio while Bud snoozed on the grass nearby.
Ezell had written the show as an outlet for his and Eudora’s grief over his terminal cancer, and AJ immediately identified with Eudora’s role.
“I should be W,” she declared. If Noah’s master plan was for her to wander these halls the way Eudora had after Ezell died, he could at least give her the part.
Noah smiled, then informed her that they would each be playing both parts.
“We’ll alternate every night,” he said firmly. “That way, we both get a chance to initiate the unscripted section.”
“Wait, so we have to memorize the whole thing?”
Noah’s eyes lit. “You’d end up memorizing it anyway. I’m just asking you to do it on purpose.”
AJ grumbled, but in the end she did as she was told. He was the director; this was what she had agreed to. Frankly, learning the lines was a trifle compared to acting them out across from Noah.
It had been easy this summer, ensconced with grill-dad-country-squire Noah, to forget that he was also Academy Award–winner Noah Drew. And looking on Noah’s true form was blinding.
His abilities were self-evident and breathtaking. AJ hadn’t experienced his focus, his seriousness, or his breadth since they had been thrown together onInto the Blue,and nothing but sheer desperation could have compelled her to stand before him now, once again utterly outmatched.
The result was debilitating attraction.
“The staging will be spare,” said Noah. “Like, black backdrop and two chairs.”
They were back on the patio, the August sun raging overhead, and AJ could not concentrate. Every time Noah stressed a point, his forearms flexed in this way that made her dizzy.
They were halfway through the first scene when Noah noticed. He casually grabbed her shoulders to move her to her mark, and when he let go, she drifted after him as if caught by static electricity. He looked up, and his face softened as he took in her desire. AJ couldn’t hide it.
“Hey,” he said softly. He set the script down and led her by the hand up to the gray bedroom.
AJ wasn’t one to use the term “making love.” But there was no other way to describe how Noah was with her that afternoon. He knew her now, knew where to go and what to do, and he was doing it because she needed it and because he wanted her to have what she needed.
He removed her garments one by one and laid her gently down, appraising her form in the afternoon light. The way his hands touched her skin made AJ feel lacy and love-worn and dear, like a passage he knew by heart but would endlessly revisit in search of new meaning.
It’s still me,he was telling her.You know me.
His beauty was astonishing. The apple of his shoulders, the tendons in his neck, the delicate wristbones that married fragility and strength.Oh,the look of him as he bent toward her, his body scythed, his eyes half closed, unaware of whether he was falling or flying.
He kissed her, and it was flight, AJ thought, to be so swept up in another person that your entire consciousness became dips and swoops and gulps of air. In her ear, he told her what she was to him, and she told him back, and he shuddered, then arced, stealing the breath from her lungs.
He didn’t rush to get up and neither did she. They lay together for an indeterminate amount of time studying each other’s faces as though looking in a mirror.
Noah brushed an eyelash off her cheekbone.
“Hair dryer?”
“Hair dryer.”
Noah began each morningby warming them up.
“Hello.”
