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To be alone. To not have anyone in my head.“Just, this, all of this. Life without the Anubis.”
Luca continued to pet Nox, each caress sending a shiver down his spine.
“I got us some food.” Luca stepped back. “And some water so we can bathe.”
Nox didn’t want to eat or bathe. He just wanted to hold Luca now that the Anubis wasn’t there to take the moment from him.
“C’mon.” Luca picked up the tub. Nox took it from him.
The weight yanked at his arms, catching him off guard. “That’s heavy.”
“Three gallons of water by itself is twenty-four pounds.”
Is this what twenty-four pounds really felt like? Nox stood, his body weight another experience, as if gravity had increased. Not to the point of slowing him down. Rather, he now noticed it. At least he could walk.
“This is weird.” He followed Luca into the trailer.
“What?”
“It doesn’t feel like coming out of a pool.” Nox set down the bin. “It just feels more real. Everything. Like I’ve woken up from a lucid dream.”
Luca emptied the bin and opened a gallon of water. “I’m going to take a bath, or at least scrub my armpits. I know you said you like the way I smell—”
“I just smell you now.”
Luca squished up his face. “Terrific.”
Nox laughed. “I don’t care. It’s just… I hadn’t realized how different it was.”
Luca poured the water into the bin. Steam rolled off the top. “I got him to give me hot water.”
“You should have asked to use his shower.”
“He offered. But then we couldn’t wash each other.” Luca undressed, then took a bar of soap and cloth from the bundle. “You need to get rid of those.” He nodded at Nox’s clothes.
It wasn’t like they hadn’t bathed each other before, yet Nox’s heart clawed the inside of his chest. He took off his shirt, then his jeans, leaving him nude and strangely vulnerable.
Luca lathered up the cloth and started at Nox’s ankle. The tarp rattled in a breeze and the cold air made Nox shiver. “Damn.”
“What?”
“It’s cold.”
“It’s winter.”
“I mean, I didn’t realize how cold.”
“It’s not that bad today, almost seventy. Wait till it gets down to freezing.”
Nox would have no way to keep Luca warm. Without the Anubis, there would be nothing for him to share. Luca would be completely reliant on the Varu to keep him healthy.
And what would happen as Nox aged and Luca remained the same? Nox had a good forty years ahead of him if he didn’t have any issues, but without the Anubis, he could die of cancer, or a heart attack, or an aneurism…
He could be gone tomorrow.
While that was also true with the Anubis, his death wouldn’t be from trivial human issues like falling off a ladder.
Luca chuckled.
