My thoughts require clarity to answer. Got none. I merely nod.I’m putty. Clean putty. Putty with a smile. I’ll wear lotion and Katherine for eternity.
“Are you feeling better, Your Grace?”
Oh I’m feeling stuff. “Yeah.”
My half-dead body awakens as her hands salve comfort to my chest, then my abdomen. Then … Katherine awoke my appetite. I’ve always hungered for her touch and her lovely feet—bare, large and lovely, with a bold arch—lodged against my calves, driving my passions to greater and greater rewards.
I grin like a witless soul. Guess I’ll take a thirst for her to my grave. “Why?” After everything—the abandonment, the lies, the fraud—how can I want … “You?”
Her face tilts closer. “Why me? ’Cause I was or am your wife. And you deserved better. But keep talking, Jahleel. That way, I know you’re not in shock.”
Her admitting to me that she’s in the wrong and I want to believe her is shocking. My teeth chatter. “Katia …”
“What are you saying?” She touches me and draws my breath away.
All imagined. This can’t be. “Fever dream. Nothing’s true. Never this good to me.”
Her head lifts from my chest. Hurt black eyes capture mine. “That isn’t true. We were once good together, very good. And I care.” Her hands are on me again—poking, sliding, accurately hitting the areas that need her.
“I think your fever has fled.”
No it hasn’t. It shifted to my soul.
Her fingers glide up my arms, even swipe over my face. The lotion smells delicious. She would be delicious. “See. I’m here, Jahleel. I’m real.”
The woman I loved, grew to hate, embraces me—my nudity, my shame, my pitiful desire to be loved as a man deserves.
“Stay with me, Jasha.” Katherine clings to me like she’s the only thing keeping my soul from heaven or hell.
“Coconut, berries, rosemary … clean sheets. Best dream in a long time.”
Her fingers dance along my jaw. They land behind my ear. “Do you feel this? My thumb on your lobe?”
Oh, I feel a lot of things. More if her slippers were gone, and she’d keep climbing all over me.
“Let me try something, Jahleel.”
Waiting, hoping, I listen for a shoe to fall, for silk stockings to drop away. But she surprises me, running a bare, ringless finger over my lips. Back and forth, even slipping her pinkie inside my mouth. “Did you feel that?”
If I say yes, does that mean she stops?
“Jahleel?”
With a thumb to my nose, she checks for breath. I see relief spill, her cheeks wetting when she catches my breath on her fingertip.
“Respond, Jasha.”
“How? Kissing you? Begging to be loved as I transition to eternity?”
“I … I meant …”
I raise a weak palm to her chin. “No fretting. I’m again in control.”
“Then talk to me,” she says. “Tell me how to fix—”
“A year ago, I begged. A month ago, I forwent my pride, and we held each other and mourned our son Andrew. I would’ve forgiven anything. Now, at death’s door, I’m not so sure.”
“Then don’t beg. Just accept me.” She descends. Our lips meet.
