“Don’t stare,” I tell him.
He puts his chin on his paws.
That night, I overfeed the stove when the temperature drops. The living room is near eighty degrees.
I’m in the armchair with McCarthy. Same page for twenty minutes. The words won’t stick.
Her door opens. She walks into the living room in a tank top and a pair of my boxers.
The tank top is gray. Thin. The boxers are loose and ride low on her hips. Her legs are bare. Freckled. Her auburn hair is loose around her face. She’s not wearing her glasses, and her face without them looks softer, wider.
She looks ready for sleep, comfortable in her skin and safe in this space.
Don’t look.
I look.
Bare feet. Calves. Her thighs. The curve of her hip under the flannel. The strip of stomach where the tank top doesn’t meet the waistband. Her full chest, collarbone, and neck.
Her face.
She sees me looking, and her lips part. Her hand wraps around her elbow.
My gut clenches.
“Goodnight,” she says.
I say nothing. My jaw is locked.
She pads down the hallway and closes the door. The latch clicks.
I sit in the armchair for ten more seconds. Then I put the book down.
She didn’t flinch at my scar and accepted it as part of me. No different from my jaw or my mouth. I want to thank her. Words catch. I want more. But I don’t dare.
In the morning, I’m up at four. Stove lit. Coffee made.
Two mugs on the counter. Hers is full. The cream sits next to it.
The handle is turned toward where she stands.
Seven days until the pass opens. Six after today.
I get my jacket. My boots. My saw and my keys. My hand closes on the doorknob, heavy with the choice. The idea of her waking, walking intomykitchen, is a knot in my gut I can’t unpick.
I have to go before she wakes up.
seven
. . .
Rosalind
The next day,the storm passes, but clouds hunker low on the peaks. The afternoon air smells like wet pine and the faintest sulfur from the hot springs in the valley below. Spool sleeps by our chairs on the porch, his legs twitching through some dream.
As Jace drinks coffee, I pretend to read.
I trace the same line of Wendell Berry for the fifth time, the words blurring. A question buzzes in my mind, finally ready to surface. “Does it hurt?”
