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Her hand is limp in mine, her fingernails blue under the clear nail polish. But the skin of her fingertips are still petal pink, indicating she still has good circulation even though she’s obviously cold.
Her tiny wrist is miniscule in the palm of my hand, and when I gently rotate it, there doesn’t seem to be any resistance. Then I press lightly against the flesh of her forearm, finding the bones inside and tracing their length to make sure they’re uninterrupted by fracture.
At her shoulder, I rotate her arm to ensure there is no strange dimpling or deformation to indicate a dislocation.
Nothing. So far, so good.
Repeating the entire process on her right arm, I keep an eye on her expression. She never winces or moans to indicate pain. I don’t know if she could feel it right now anyway, but I want to make sure I’m not hurting her.
“That’s good,” I tell her, though I don’t know why. “Now, this might seem a little rude…”
The nylon shirt zipper sounds remarkably loud in the room as I unzip it, sliding it away from her skin. With as much clinical detachment as I can muster, I run my fingers over her collarbones, then her ribs, then slide my hands behind her back to feel the ridges of her spine. Her breath is a tiny animal sound in my ear as I hold her close to me, counting each vertebrae under my thumb.
At her waist, I press against her hip bones, looking for thigh dislocation, happy not to find one. Swallowing nervously, I unzip the ski pants and slide them over her thighs, leaving her in just a pair of sky-blue nylon panties and staring helplessly at her long, creamy, lightly freckled legs. The panties gap at her crotch, revealing a downy tuft of auburn hair, just a subtle hint of the pubic treasure she’s hiding in there. Swallowing, I force myself to look away.
“Jesus.”
Her right ski boot comes off easily, but the left one does not. Once I have the buckles unclasped, I try to twist from the heel and she groans loudly without waking up, curling to one side protectively.
As soon as I get the boot off, I can see why. Looks like it’s probably just a sprain, but her left ankle is swollen significantly, with a lumpy knob distorting the joint, already turning purple underneath.
Gingerly I tug on each one of her toes, making sure that the nail isn’t discolored. Thank God she isn’t wearing toenail polish today. I can see that her circulation is still good. It’s probably just a sprain.
Relief floods through me. Just a sprain. I stand over her, smiling and nodding to myself. A sprain I can handle. I can get this wrapped up, no problem.
“Get it wrapped up… And then what?” I ask aloud.
Because in reality, what do I have here? A strange naked woman? Who I just undressed in my cabin in the woods? Who’s injured and came here for God knows what?
What have I done?
Chapter 6
Lola
I’m hot but shivering, alternately feeling like I’m boiling and then frozen in ice. In my dream, I’m hanging onto a plank floating in an icy river, trying not to fall off while the current carries me underneath spiny branches, between water monsters and poisonous slicks of red liquid.
I want to cry out or something, but every time I take a deep enough breath, I feel like I’m sinking, about to slide under the water again. So instead, I just try to stay attached to that one thought: breathe. In and out, over and over. Just keep doing that, and hopefully everything else will come clear. As long as I am breathing, I am probably not dead.
Eventually, it seems that I’m not on the river, but in a bed. I’m hot but especially on one side. A fire maybe? A fireplace? I think I can smell smoke. Maybe I should worry about that, but every time I try, the thought slips away like mist through my fingers.
I just need to rest. I just need to sleep some more.
Again I wake up, aware that I’ve done this maybe a dozen times now. This time, there’s a little more clarity. I’m definitely not in the hotel. I’m on a bed, a small one. There’s a fire to my left, but it’s in a box. A stove, I guess.
I realize my eyes are closed but it hurts to try to open them. By raising my eyebrows, I can see just a shard of a distorted, swimming image of a room, but it’s all bleary and funhouse-reflected. It barely makes sense.
Probably best to just keep my eyes closed.
Again, I fall back into sleep. Immediately I start dreaming of the river, but then the river turns to snow, and I’m skiing. I’m skiing behind Nance and some grumpy fellow named Roger, and also some guy… Chad. That’s Chad.
He’s wearing a snakeskin ski jacket for some reason, and there are sparks shooting out of the back of his ski boots like this is some kind of show for tourists. He skis back and forth in front of me, dangerously blocking my path. I think he’s doing it on purpose.
I’m angry at Chad. I feel misled and sort of stupid for even flirting back with that guy. Why did I make it so easy for him to flirt with me? I should have known that he was married. You have to ask people these things up front when you’re dating. You can’t just assume that a man is going to tell you all the things that you need to know.
I’ve been around the block. I should know better by now than to fall for Chad’s dumb lies. It’s all some kind of game with them. They think it’s so funny to withhold important details like the fact that they’re already married, or the fact that they are moving to Singapore or they don’t love you anymore, until you figure it out on your own. They’re happy to take whatever you’re willing to give them until you figure it out.
That’s the point of the game: figuring out that you’ve already lost.
