Dark, inky magic glitters around his arm in the moonlight, and a script I don’t recognize scrawls across him like a tattoo. His palm warms against my belly, and the pain eases a little.
“It just hurts,” I say, placing my hand over his to hold myself steady.
“No, that’s not what this is.”
His other arm comes up to my neck, forcing me to lean all the way back into him.
“Tell me,” he whispers.
The water pounds from the faucet into the tub, dampening our voices. Maybe I could say it out loud, and he wouldn’t hear, but then…it would be out.
“I’m fat,” I declare.
“No, you’re Cait,” he says.
I chuckle, despite the pain and tears streaming down my cheeks.
“I didn’t used to be this big, and my ex let me know just how much he didn’t like the change. He told me I wasn’t the woman he used to love, and—I mean—he wasn’t wrong. A lot changed with my illnesses, and more than just my weight. But I didn’t think…”
My lip trembles as fresh tears spill over my eyes.
Bastian’s hand strokes across my neck to my shoulder. He brushes my hair away and hugs me tighter.
“Tell me.”
I swallow the lump in my throat. “I didn’t think I’d become…unlovable.”
My composure breaks and I sob. Bastian sighs into my hair and rocks me gently as his hand warms my belly. He holds me in silence as I let out my frustration. My tears splatter on my arms and roll down to my elbows, dripping into the tub.
The water reaches my mid-shin, and Bastian lifts a clawed foot to twist the bath controls. The gushing faucet slows to a trickle and so do my tears.
He grabs my chin and turns my head over my shoulder. “You are the quintessence of lovable.”
I search his face for any hint of a lie, but there’s none.
His lips press against my temple in a featherlight touch before he pulls back. Then he stands, leaving me on the edge of the bath.
“Now, strip off your clothes and get in.”
Protests die on my lips as he turns away and closes the door.
I look at myself in the mirror. My bloodied shorts and rumpled night shirt. My tear-stained face and red eyes. The moon illuminates it all. There’s nowhere to hide.
I push my shorts and underwear down, then step each dripping foot out of the leg holes. I straighten up and tug off my shirt, leaving myself totally bare.
Quintessence of lovable.
I grab the swell of my stomach in a rude way, pinching it in my hands and jiggling it.
“Stop it, Jerry!” Bastian yells from the other side of the door.
I chuckle despite my tears and release myself. I grab my dirty shorts and wipe the excess blood from between my legs—they’reruined anyway—then sink into the tub. The hot water envelops me like a hug, and I groan in relief.
“Tell me about thisex,” Bastian says.
“Tell me about where you come from,” I retort.
He grunts. “You first.”
