I spotted my lockbox key on the way to the porch, and Marshall retrieved it for me. He helped me up the steps and into the house. Until I saw him look around, I had forgotten he’d never been in it.
He said, “We need the bathroom,” and waved me into preceding him. Marshall undressed me quite… clinically. First, he cleaned the scratches on my face, put antibiotic ointment on them, and then he turned his attention to my ribs. He ran his fingers over each rib, gently but firmly, asking me questions as his fingers evaluated my injury.
“Take two aspirin and call me in the morning,” he said finally. “I don’t think anything’s broken. But you’ll have a bad bruise and you’ll be sore. I’ll tape you. It’s lucky he’s a sedentary alcoholic, or you’d be in the hospital now. How much warning did you have?”
“Not as much as I should have,” I admitted. “He was waiting for me in the carport, with the mask and dark clothes on. But still…” and my voice trailed off, as I found I could not put one coherent thought together. He got my first-aid kit from the little linen closet and worked on me for a while.
“I have to shower,” I said. “Out.”
“Keep the tape dry. Turn that side away from the water.”
“Yes, sensei.”
“I’m sleeping on your couch tonight.”
“It’s a love seat. You’ll get cramped.”
“Sleeping bag?”
“Nope. Don’t like camping.”
“Floor.”
“You can sleep with me. It’s queen-sized.”
I could tell he wanted to ask me why I’d left his bed earlier in the night. I was glad he was too decent to badger me when I was so exhausted. He helped me off with the rest of my clothes and then just left, without saying a word. I felt immense gratitude and relief. I turned on the shower and as soon as the water ran warm enough, I stepped in, pulled the curtain closed, and just let the water run over me. After a few seconds, I got the soap and shampoo and made as thorough a job of it as I could with Marshall’s strictures. I even shaved under my arms, though bending over for my legs was too difficult.
When I stepped out into the steamy room and brushed my teeth, I felt much more like myself. My nightgown was hanging on the hook on the back of the door, and I pulled it over my head after my automatic deodorant, skin cream, and cuticle remover routine. I’d almost forgotten Marshall was there until I went in my bedroom. It was a shock to see the black hair on the pillow next to mine. He’d civilly taken the inside of the bed and left me the outside by the night table, and he’d left the bedside lamp switched on. He was sound asleep, on his left side, turned away from me.
Moving as silently as I could, I checked the front and back doors and all the windows-my nightly routine-and turned off the lamp. I slid into bed cautiously, turned on my right side, my unbandaged side, so my back was to his, and despite the strangeness of having someone in my house and bed, I was sucked down into sleep like water circling around the drain in my sink.
My eyes flew open at eight o’clock. The digital clock on the bedside table was right in front of me. I tried to think what was so different… Then I remembered the night before. My back felt very warm; it was pressed against Marshall’s. Then I felt him move behind me, and his arm wrapped around my chest. My nightgown was thin and I could feel him pressing against me.
“How are you?” he asked quietly.
“Haven’t moved yet,” I murmured back.
“Want to move some?”
“You have something specific in mind?” I asked as I felt his body respond to contact with me.
“Only if it won’t hurt you…”
I arched harder against him and felt him press against me fiercely in response.
“We’ll just have to try it out, see if it hurts,” I whispered.
“You sure?”
I turned over to face him. “Sure,” I said.
His strength enabled him to hold his weight off me, and his eyes showed nothing but pleasure. In view of my scratched face and the black bruises on my side, I found this touching and amazing. I realized I’d already gotten used to his acceptance of the scars. So it was doubly dismaying to me, after we had finished lovemaking and were lying side by side holding hands, when he said, “Lily, I’ve got to talk to you about something.” His voice was serious, too serious.
I felt my heart shrivel.
“What?” I asked, trying to sound casual. I pulled the sheet up.
“It’s your quads, Lily.”
“My…
“You really need to work on them,” Marshall told me.
I turned to stare at him. “I have scars all over my abdomen, I have scratches across my face, I have a huge bruise on my ribs, and your only remark about my body is that I need to work on my quads?”
“You’re perfect except for your quads.”
“You… jerk!” Torn between amusement and disbelief, I pulled the pillow from under my head and hit him with it, which immediately activated the pain. I couldn’t hold back my exclamation of dismay, and clapped my hand to my side.
“Lean back,” Marshall urged me, sitting up to help. “Lean back, slowly… there. Raise your head a little.” He slid my pillow back under my head.
“Lily,” he said when he could tell the worst had passed. “Lily, I was teasing.”
“Oh.” I felt abruptly and totally like a fool.
“Well, I guess I’m hardly social anymore,” I said after a moment.
“Lily. Why’d you leave last night?”
“I just felt restless. I’m not used to sharing time, or space, with anyone. I’m not used to visiting people’s homes as a guest. You’re still married. You’re used to having someone else around. Probably you and Thea were invited places, right? But I’m not. I don’t date. I’m just…” I hesitated, not sure how to characterize my life of the past few years.
“Coasting?”
I considered. “Existing,” I said. “Going from day to day safely. Doing my work, paying my way, not attracting any attention. Left alone.”
“Not lonely?”
“Not often,” I admitted. “There are not that many people I like or have respect for, so I hardly want their company.”
Marshall was propped up on one elbow, his muscular chest a treat for my eyes. And I thought of it that way, as a treat: a seldom-achieved, rare thing that might not happen again. “Who do you like?” he asked me.
I thought about it. “I like Mrs. Hofstettler. I like Claude Friedrich, I think, in spite of everything. I like you. I like most of the people in the karate class, though I’m not partial to Janet Shook. I like the new doctor, the woman. But I don’t know any of those people that well.”
“Do you have any friends you don’t know through work or karate class, anyone your own age that you… go shopping with, go to eat in Little Rock with?”
“No,” I said, my voice flat and verging on anger.
“Okay, okay.” He raised a placating hand. “I’m just asking. I want to know how uphill this is going to be.”
“Pretty uphill, I’m afraid.” I relaxed with an effort.
I glanced at the clock again. “Marshall, I don’t want to leave, but I have to work.”
“Are you just having a flash of anti socializing, or do you really have to work this morning?”
“I really have to work. I have to clean the doctor’s office this morning, visit Mrs. Hofstettler, go to the police station, and do my own shopping this afternoon.” I keep grocery expenses down by making a careful list and following it to the letter on my one visit to the grocery store a week.
“How are you going to manage with your ribs?”
“I’ll just do what I have to do,” I said with some surprise. “It’s my job. If I don’t work, I don’t get paid. If I don’t get paid, I go down the drain.”
