'I bet she was thrilled.'
'Certainly was. Especially when we realized that the song was 'Sexual Healing.''
Laughing. 'Oh my God. You've got to be kidding.'
He held up a hand, laughing, too. 'Cross my heart and hope to.. .' He didn't finish the phrase.
Her smile trembled, and her eyes got a bit brighter. She turned back to the moonlight on the water. 'I'm so glad my sister finally found someone. Someone worthy of her.'
'Me, too.'
She leaned back, pressed her head against his collarbone. 'It makes such a difference, to be with someone who's right for you. Who'll stand by you when things… when things get…'
Her shoulders started to shake.
He gently took her in his arms and turned her to face him. 'Hey,' he said quietly. 'Hey. Look at me.'
She did, a tear streak below each eye. The moon illuminated those, too.
'You and I are going to beat this thing,' he said, and she nodded. 'We're gonna be toasting your sister on her fortieth anniversary!' She nodded again, fiercely, but still not meeting his eyes. 'You don't have my permission to bail, do you understand? Not with your aunt Myrna waiting in the wings.'
At this she laughed-a big laugh, full of relief. She stood on tiptoe, put her arms around his neck, and kissed his cheek. 'I love you,' she whispered.
'I love you, too,' he said. He ran his hands up her waist, feeling the green silk slide between his fingers. His hands traveled over her ribs, to the swell of her small, firm breasts. She let him.
Her arms tightened around his neck, and he leaned down so that she could press her forehead against his. 'What are we going to do?' she said in a frightened whisper.
'You've got the surgery next Tuesday. After that, your only job is to get better.'
'But what if… what if the MRI shows that it's in my bones?'
'Shhh. No use borrowing trouble.' The phrase was old-fashioned, was his mother's, but it did its job, and she relaxed a little.
'I know. I'm such a freak. I'm just wound up so tight.'
'No kidding. So what can we do about that?' His hand drifted carefully down her abdomen and gently played across the cleft between her legs. It would work, or it wouldn't.
She made a soft sound, and after just a moment, imperceptibly parted her legs. He took it for an invitation and made the most of it. He could feel the heat of her through the silk.
A moment later, her breathing became raw. 'If you don't stop, you're going to spoil my nice new dress.'
'There is a third option,' he said, quickly taking hold of the green silk hem and lifting it. When he slipped his hand beneath, he found a surprise waiting for him.
'Oh, my God,' he said. 'You went commando to your sister's wedding?'
She bit her lip and widened her eyes flirtatiously. 'Couldn't help it. Forgive me?'
'Only if you forgive me for this.' He gently pushed her back against the bridge railing and sank to his knees in front of her.
'Matt, are you crazy? Not here-there's people everywhere!'
'Won't take long,' he said, and closing his eyes, pressed his mouth to her warm crux, tasting her soft nest, easing his tongue into the familiar, fragrant groove.
He heard her gasp as he went to work, felt her fingers clutch his hair, tasted her salty acquiescence. She opened beneath his insistent touch like the night-blooming flowers of the pond, and her scent mingled with theirs until it overpowered him. She let out a small, familiar cry as he drew her into his mouth. Like sucking on an orchid, he thought for the thousandth time.
When she released, he drank her like he always did, until he had drained away her fear, her anxiety, and her will to do anything other than stroke his head and whisper, 'I love you, Matt… I love you so much.'
He nodded wordlessly, wrapping his arms around her, knowing it was the truth, knowing that he felt the same way and that nothing that was to come would ever change that.
RED BLACK RED BLACK RED BLACK RED BLACK RED BLACK
Matt came crashing back to the reality of the padded table, the blinding fluorescents, the ache in his jaw, the fire in his veins.
And the smell of singed hair and urine.
'Well, look at that,' Hirotachi croaked. 'Looks like someone messed himself real bad. Do we need a dia-dee, Matthew?'
Matt glanced down and saw that his jeans were stained at the crotch. He couldn't have cared less. The shock treatment had recovered a memory he'd nearly forgotten-recovered it so completely, in such perfect detail, that he couldn't get his mind around the fact that it was gone, that she was gone, and that he was here in this godforsaken hell with this witch, instead of being on a bridge, in the moonlight, with-.
Hirotachi flipped the switch on and off quickly.
Matt grunted, went rigid as lightning coursed through his veins, then collapsed, gasping, in a pool of sweat.
Hirotachi cackled. 'God, but I used to love seeing 'em stiffen up like that,' she said. 'Those were the days.'
Matt turned his head to see Maloria looking at him wide-eyed. She looked down immediately.
'I think he had enough a' that,' Maloria said softly, keeping her eyes on the floor.
'Oh, you do, do ya? Shows what you know, you fat black bitch.'
Maloria's eyes flashed up, hot with defiance.
Hirotachi peeled back her lips to reveal a row of small, nicotine-yellow nubs. 'Problem?'
Maloria looked down again, lips clamped shut, muscle twitching at her jaw.
'Shoe's on the other foot when the night shift's here, ain't it?'
'Just sayin', what you're doin' is like to kill him. Then he can't be took to the Ring at all, and who'll be in trouble then?'
Ring? Matt thought. What in hell's the Ring?
'Don't you worry your fat head about that. He's still got plenty of spunk left in him. See?'
And she flipped the switch again.
RED BLACK RED BLACK RED BLACK RED BLACK RED BLACK
Again they stood together, Matt and Janey, staring at moonlight on water.
Only this time, there was no warm spring air, no band playing in the distance, no scent of lotus. Instead, the breeze was the dry by-product of the hospital's industrial air-circulation system, and the only scent was the chemical tang of lemon-scented disinfectant.
He had woken up at two a.m. to find that she'd left the room. When he stepped out, he'd found her standing in the hallway in front of a window overlooking a landscaped industrial park between the hospital and its parking structure. Snow covered the neatly spaced prairie grasses that bordered a small, frozen pond.
He put a hand on her shoulder blade.
'Hey, you.'
She didn't startle. Just leaned back a little in that way he'd always found so assuring.
He cleared his throat. 'Want to take a walk? I know a vending machine around the corner where we can score Funyuns for a song.'
She shook her head.
He let it go. Stopped trying to be clever. Gently stroked the back of her neck.
'It's so beautiful,' she said, staring out the window.
'Yeah.' He looked at the snow-covered industrial park doubtfully, wondering if he was seeing what she was. 'You mean the snow?'
'All of it,' she said. 'All of it.' And began to cry.
He put his arms around her, placed his cheek against hers, and held her as she shook silently. Behind them, an orderly rattled past with a trayful of meds. Ignored the weeping couple. Nothing he hadn't seen before.
They stood there a long time, cheek to cheek, staring out at the frozen pond, the parking structure, the cold eye of the moon.
He was just about to suggest that they go back and try to sleep again when she cleared her throat and shook
