He smiled, pulled my legs apart, and got on his knees. He entered me in three short bursts, each one making me gasp with pain then pleasure. Then pleasure again. And well, it was all good after that.
That night he came home, he bent over me, pressing our bodies together. I looked in his face while we made love so slowly, it was almost torture. I memorized the lines and curves of him all over again. I touched his cheeks and ran my fingers through his hair. And even when I closed my eyes because I couldn’t take the rising tide of my orgasm anymore, I kept his face in my hands and let the scent of burned pine and sweet olive blossoms meld and linger until they became a unique harmony of their own, never to be separated again.
***
I put my head on his chest and listened to him breathe.
“It’s a good room,” he said.
“It’s ours. Just ours. Let me show you the best part.”
I rolled away and opened the French doors onto the orchard. The breeze caressed his hair, flicking the ends. I sat on his side of the bed, stroking his forehead. A scar so straight it looked as if it had been drawn with a ruler shot across his temple and past his hairline. I drew my finger along it. No hair grew along its length, even past his ear, where it tapered and disappeared.
“Thank you for waiting for me,” he said.
“Tomorrow, I’ll show you your orchard. We can walk the rows.”
“How’s business?”
“Breaking even.”
“Good. Very good.” He rolled onto his side, draping his arm over my thighs. The moonlight fell on his cheek, and the mating calls of crickets filled the air. “I’m so tired. I didn’t realize until now.”
“Go to sleep, Antonio. I’m here. You can sleep now.”
The last word had barely left my lips before his eyes closed and his breathing turned even and slow. I didn’t think I’d ever seen him sleep without a care as to how he woke up. I curled up behind him, putting my lips to the back of his neck, and I thanked God for him, for our life, for the love between us that hadn’t died even when we almost did.
I was sure we would pay for our sins in either this life or the next. But maybe there was a little in us that could be saved. In this little room with a half-empty closet and a full bed, maybe salvation would come in the form of love.
THE END