He turns on the light over the vanity and leaves the overhead one off. I get to have my tub for two, just like I wanted. But I am melancholy now. Part of that may be because I am worn out both physically and emotionally, and part of it is something else. He runs the water and holds my hand, helping me in. His hand stays on mine as he sits and brings me in front of him. The only noise comes from the tap that cascades water down the side of the tub. I lie in his arms silently while the bath fills. His hands trickle over my arms and my breasts. This time, though, his touch isn’t just sexual. It’s more than that.
I close my eyes and let myself be held and… and loved. Later, he sits me up and very, very slowly washes my body and my hair.
This time there is no imaginary blood and no screaming.
“Christopher,” I murmur.
He moves a soapy hand over my shoulder and murmurs back, “You’re the only person who calls me that. I like it.”
When he’s done, I pull the drain and watch the water empty. I turn around and kiss him softly before I slide behind him and refill the tub. I run my hands over the muscles in his arms and his back. His skin is slick with water and my hands glide easily over his body. And over his scars.
While the tub refills, I kiss his back and massage his shoulders, savoring every moment that I have with him.
I trace his broken scar with my fingertips over and over. And I think. And then I understand—I see—something. His skiing-accident explanation? I’ve given the same lie when asked.
Chris drops his head down. He can sense that I know.
Finally, I say what I don’t want to, but what needs to be said.
“This wasn’t an accident, was it?”
He doesn’t answer me right away. I cup water in my hands and drop it over his skin. I watch the drops roll across his body, and I wait.
“No, it wasn’t an accident,” he finally says. “Not really.”
And with those words, my heart shatters.
His father was a much meaner son of a bitch than anyone has told me.
I keep dousing him with water, almost ritualistically, until he turns and pulls me firmly into his lap and takes me in his arms. I stroke the back of his neck with my hand, maybe to comfort him, maybe to comfort me. No matter what I may be screaming in my head, I will stay calm for him. I know all the things not to say, but I don’t know any of the thingstosay.
“I’m okay, Blythe,” he whispers. “I’m okay. It’s over.”
I nod.
“Do you hear me? I’m safe.”
I nod again.
“Sabin, and Estelle, and Eric? They’re safe, too.”
I don’t want to let go of him, but I want out of this tub and back in our bed, where we are protected and shielded from everything. He stands with me and steps out, supporting me around the waist with his hands as I step over the edge of the tub. I can’t stand to have him even a foot away from me, and I wrap my left arm under his and my right goes over his shoulder. I lock my hands together and set my cheek against his strong arm. I look in the mirror at the two of us. Our reflection in the mirror is poignant because I don’t know when I’ll see us like this again.
And then I see something that I can’t make sense of. I study the reflection while I cling to Chris. What I am looking at is not possible.
The scar on my forearm sits perfectly between the two that angle across his back. My scar fills in, itcompletes, his. As if we are an exact match… as if we are…
This is crazy.
I cannot show this to Chris. We don’t believe in fate, or destiny, or coincidences… or whatever the hell this is. We don’t believe in the unexplainable, and this is unexplainable.
And yet, I believe.
I start to shiver. Chris breaks our hold to get a towel, and he shrouds me in the thick white terry cloth. “You’re cold, baby. Here.” As he dries my shoulders, I move my hands to his face and hold him. His green eyes are dark tonight, more muted than usual. He is tired, I can see that. But effortlessly, with one arm behind my back and the other under my legs, he lifts me and carries me into the moonlit bedroom, and we make love over and over again for one last night.
It is hours later that we fall asleep with me enclosed in his arms.
When I wake in the morning, he is gone.
