Varian Krylov (22 page)

"And now, the lady's pants, if she pleases."

He unbuttoned and unzipped her fly, and eased the pants over her hips and down her thighs. Then he had her sit on the bed and, crouching down, he lifted one foot, then the other, sliding her pants the rest of the way off.

"Now. Bedtime meds?"

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She told him what she needed and he brought her the colorful pill cocktail and her drink. One by one she put the pills on her tongue and sucked juice through a straw to wash them down. When that was done, Galen put one arm behind her back, lowering her gently to her pillows, while with the other arm he lifted the weight of her legs up onto the mattress. He pulled the covers up and pressed a kiss to her forehead.

Only now that she was safely, comfortably tucked into bed did she feel how much she'd been dreading it—the frustrating agony of doing such tiny things. She felt so grateful, so relieved that she wished he would hurry up and go so she could let go and cry.

But he wasn't leaving. He stood there, gazing down at her, and with dawning horror she watched as he pulled his shirt over his head.

"Galen. What are you doing?"

"Getting undressed."

“Galen. I want you to go. Please."

"This way, I'm here if you need anything."

"What are you going to do? Sleep on the couch? Listen for me crying out in the night?"

"No. I'm going to sleep here. With you."

She laughed. He gave her a steady look.

"No.

"Yes."

"You won't get any sleep. I'm not still. I'm not quiet."

"I can miss a night of sleep. It's not like I have to be at the office in the morning."

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"I get night sweats. The sheets get soaked."

"You're embarrassed. You're afraid. I get it, Vanka. But there's no good reason to push me away."

"I can take care of myself. I have to be able to take care of myself."

"Not all the time. Not now."

He walked around to the other side of the bed, took off his shoes and pants, and slid into bed beside her, somehow just barely making the mattress shift. He moved close, kissed a spot of shoulder not hidden under the blanket, found her hand, down by her hip and took it in his.

"I miss feeling you next to me while I sleep. I don't want to go home. All right?"

"Yes."

"Good."

For the first time in days, she fell asleep almost instantly, the warmth of his hand in hers and the faint tickle of his breath on her shoulder occupying just enough of her notice to keep her mind from its usual dark thoughts.

* * * *

The pain woke her after seemingly endless dreams of pain. She heard herself groan as she woke, and a hundred groans echoed in her memory, and her eyes and temples and the scalp above her ears were wet. She'd been crying and crying out in her sleep.

Morphine. She wanted the morphine, but the thought of moving terrified her.

When it hurt like this, just lying still, moving was torture. Like being ripped open. She 206

sobbed, letting herself cry and wallow in this easier pain for a moment before forcing herself to reach for the pills.

"Vanka?"

Galen. She'd forgotten.

"Are you awake?" he whispered from the wrong side.

"Yes."

She hadn't meant to sob like that. Sleep weakened her defenses. Just one of the reasons she hadn't wanted him to stay.

The bedside lamp clicked and lit up.

"What do you need?" he asked. Soft. Calm.

"The morphine. The little bottle. Two tablets."

One by one he picked up the smaller of the amber-clear plastic vials, scanning labels, then worked the child-proof white cap off of one and tapped two tiny white pills into his palm. With a hand at the back of her skull he gently lifted and tipped her head forward.

"Stick out your tongue."

He placed the pills on her tongue, and a second later had the straw at her lips.

She sucked and swallowed.

"Thank you," she said as he lowered her carefully to her pillow.

The tears were just flowing now, determined not to be dammed up. Sleep and the pain had worn down her walls. But something else was making her cry.

"Ssshhhh. You're welcome. Just be still. You'll be better in a few minutes."

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He leaned over. Kissed her forehead. His lips felt cool. She knew she was burning. That her head was hot and wet. And the tears were still rolling, rolling, tickling her temples and her scalp as they ran into her hair.

"I've got a cool wash cloth here. For your head."

He pressed the cold we cloth to her forehead. A soothing chill rippled down her burning body.

"Better?"

"Yeah."

He left the compress for a moment, then lifted it, and she could hear the faint slosh and drip as he made it cool again with fresh water in some receptacle he'd brought to her bedside. He pressed it gently to one cheek, then the other, then lay it over her forehead.

"Do you want the covers off?"

"Please."

He lifted the blankets carefully from her chest before pulling them down, below her feet. Cool air chilled her hot, wet skin. She felt like she'd been airlifted from hell.

"More juice?"

"Please."

He brought the straw to her lips and she drank. Her sweats left her desperately dehydrated. Now, cooled by the air and the compress, her thirst slaked, she could focus on the pain burning and throbbing in a roughly straight line across her chest.

"What else can I do?" he asked, refilling her glass from a pitcher he must have found in the kitchen.

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"How about a swift mercy killing?"

"It's a bit premature. Don't you think?"

It wasn't the words. It was the tone and the look that went with them. He'd thought about it, too.

He smiled and touched the lamp, making it click and dim, leaving them in the pale and blue of the moon. His tread sounded softly toward her feet and around to the other side of her, then the bed squeaked a little as he lowered his body onto it and moved toward her. With a pleasant tickling touch of fingertips he stroked her arm, her palm, her fingertips, meandering slowly down, then up, then down again, distracting her a little from the pain until his tingling tickles mingled with the nerve-numbing morphine streams and she slept.

* * * *

In the morning he made her breakfast, watched her not eat it, washed her dishes, washed her bedding, and did her laundry—the precious few articles of clothing that were comfortable enough and easy enough to get in and out of while she healed. She was grateful, but an impish little part of her was amused. Galen the houseboy. Too funny.

Of course she was going nuts cooped up in the house, and of course he noticed.

They went for a slow stroll around the block. It made her feel human. Less sick.

Outside. Moving.

“How about if I give Khalid a call? See if he wants to come over for a while?”

Galen asked that evening.

“I'm tired. Maybe tomorrow.”

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“You said that yesterday”

“I'll try to be more perky tomorrow.”

“You're punishing him.”

“I just don't feel up to it.”

“Vanka.” Galen took both her hands in his, and nailed her down with his gaze. “I understand you being mad at him. But Khalid wasn't being selfish. He was thinking of you. Of me. Even though I know he cares for you, you know the most selfish thing he could have done would have been to throw away that piece of paper and pretend not to know anything. So don't think too badly of him.”

* * * *

When she woke and saw that the room was lit by daylight, she was cheered.

Maybe the agony that had woken her the night before was over. Funny, waking on one's back when one had slept all her life on her stomach. That even in sleep something kept her from reverting to habit with excruciating consequences.

"Morning."

She turned her head, and there was Galen, lying on his side, watching her lamely pondering sleeping behavior and the possibilities of pain.

"Morning."

"You did better last night, I think."

"Yeah. Better."

"I'm glad."

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He smiled sweetly and affectionately ran his index finger in slow streams up and down her arm. He looked ethereal in the morning sunlight, his hair lit up like a halo, his face somehow boyish.

"Need anything?"

"No. Thanks. I just feel like lying here for a while."

"Mind the company?"

"No."

She smiled. It was nice having him in her bed with her.

“My dad gets in on Friday.”

“He knows?”

“No. “ Her gut sank for the hundredth time in two days, thinking of having to say the words, to see her dad's face as she told him she had the disease he'd watched kill her mother. “No, I want to tell him in person. This way I'm right there, with him, he can see I'm OK. Basically. And Sasha'll be around to . . . well, basically so they can go to the brewery and pity me behind my back.”

“Your brother holding up all right?”

“Yeah.” Sasha had aced the cancer thing—he hadn't tried to hold her hostage to a cascade of forced optimism, and he hadn't gotten maudlin. It was only when she told him she'd had the double mastectomy that he'd sobbed, “Oh, god, Vanka,” over and over.

“So. Do I get to meet them?”

“Sure.”

“And how will I fare? After David?”

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“Sasha and David would make a better couple than David and I did. You might have to promise Sasha a chance meeting with Angelina Jolie to get on his good side.

But Dad will love you.”

The whole sentence was out of her mouth before it all hit her. She was talking like Galen was her fucking fiancé. Like they had a future as a couple and the coming meeting was some kind of audition with the in-laws.

"Where are you going?"

She didn't answer. Into the sunlight, grass tickling and poking the soles of her feet, she let go, let hot tears stream down her cheeks, let sobs convulse her aching chest.

When he found her in the backyard and touched her shoulder she let him even though something about him doing that made it all worse, made her sobbing come on harder. She felt his arms go around her, his hand stroking her convulsing back, the other holding her head to his chest, his cheek or his lips pressed to the sun-warmed hair at her crown.

Later, when she'd finished crying her eyes out, when she'd blown her nose and washed her face, and she'd gone back to him even though her eyes were red and swollen and her cheeks had that post-bawl mottled look, he took her hands in his and gave her one of his brain-boring looks.

"I wish you'd stop pretending to be brave all the time. Acting like you're not sad.

Not furious. Not scared shitless."

"Is that what I'm feeling?"

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"Fine. I admit it. I don't know what the fuck you're feeling. Because you never tell me. I guess I'm just like everyone else you know. Just another person to hide from. I'm trying to be your friend, Vanka. But if I'm just in your way, if you want me to leave you alone, just tell me."

She'd thought the well was dry, but a fresh stream of tears were spilling down her cheeks.

"Or if me being here hurts you," he said in a tender voice, "I'll understand."

She finally managed to whisper, "I don't want you to go."

It felt like coming out of hiding, dialing the phone.

“Vanka,” Khalid's rich, smooth voice, her name stroked into that other shape on his foreign tongue.

“Hi, Khalid.”

“It's so nice to hear you.”

“I was thinking of going for a walk. Could I come over for a bit?” she asked.

“I'm not at home now. What about at three?”

As she dressed, she reached for the thick cardigan she'd been hiding in since the surgery. And then she just stood there, absently fingering the loose weave of the charcoal yarn. The thought of going out her front door with that cardigan on suddenly felt about as doable as showing up for a shoot in her bathrobe. The walk to Khalid's took on the portent of a debut.

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Rationally, it was ridiculous. But she felt, at her core, like she was a different person now, without her breasts. She was asexual. Sexless. No breasts, but no cock, either. And so, as she dressed, she recreated herself. An androgyne.

She abandoned the mastectomy-camouflaging layers of T-shirts and hoodies and cardigans and seized a short-sleeved black turtleneck, which, thanks to the properties of its knit, she'd always thought showed her tits off to great advantage and now emphasized her flat chest just as shamelessly. Even her bandage was faintly discernible. She'd endured the pain of getting her arms into those sleeves, so she convinced herself she could take the pain of getting out of yesterday's knickers and into her favorite pair of boyshorts—a cut she'd loved even before "the transformation," as she was starting to refer to her new self-image. Next she worked her way carefully into her favorite pair of black slacks. They rode lower on her hips, already—if she'd dropped this much weight just the stress and the surgery, what was chemo going to do to her?—

but they didn't sag or drag on the floor, once she'd managed to get her boots on. She thought her reflection in the full-length mirror looked sort of mod—all black and sleek.

Sexless, maybe, but not a caricature.

After some deliberation, she decided to forgo the makeup. She just put on a little moisturizer and shaped her eyebrows. Her bob she just tucked behind her ears, thinking, as she did every time she brushed or washed it, that soon she'd be shaving off that soft blond hair.

She walked the five blocks to Khalid's, then hinged the heavy pewter knocker, which seemed for a moment to have magical properties, the big, carved door swung open so instantly. God, Khalid. She'd forgotten how obscenely beautiful the man was.

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She waited for the furtive appraisal. But Khalid gently grasped her shoulders, read her face, smiled, then kissed her cheeks, left, right left. Then he backed up to put her at arm's length, and blatantly looked her down and up.

"I hardly expected to find you looking so well, Vanka," he pronounced. "Or flaunting your new figure so boldly. You're lovely. Really."