Melt

by Selene Castrovilla

  It’s the same thing, every time. No matter where we are. “Okay,” I say.

  He strokes me some more, so gentle. His leg’s wrapped around mine, so warm. “Thanks.”

  We’re surrounded by workout equipment here in Jason’s makeshift gym. Some is Jason’s, but more belongs to guys who have no place of their own to set it up. Three bench presses, leg machines, arm machines, and lots of barbells in different sizes. The radio propped on a bench in the corner is playing an eighties tune, “I Melt With You.” The singer declares he’ll stop the world. It feels like that here—now and whenever we’re here—it feels like the world’s stopped. He touches me so slow, so tranquilly. Hard to believe hands roughed up like that could feel so soothing. Harder even to reconcile those tame hands with the devastation they’ve caused.

  They’re so respectful to me.

  They’re practically reverent.

  He kisses like that too. With this sweet serenity, like there’s only us. Like there’s no such thing as time.

  He does that now, he kisses me. He pulls me closer against him, presses tight against me, and that tingling rises again, from somewhere way inside me. It’s always there, always going, always generating when I’m with him, but when he kisses me like that, that’s when it escalates. That’s when it demands attention.

  He feels it, I know. It’s what hit us when we first met, times a thousand.

  He feels it, but he never acts on it. I keep waiting for him to move further, to act. But he doesn’t.

  And I ….

  I don’t know how to.

  Only this time, I can’t take it.

  I slide my hand under his T-shirt, glide across ribs and ripped muscle. His body jerks from the sensation. Heat surfaces, melts into my touch. Slow, slow, I smooth my fingertips up the middle line of his chest, tracing the indentation. He pulls back. “Stop, you’re making me crazy.”

  “Is that a bad thing?” I ask.

  He regards me, looks at me like I’m some new creature he’s discovered. I stare back into those wide eyes, waiting for an answer, acutely aware of the blood push, push, pushing through my veins, and wanting only to brush his skin again.

  Still, he doesn’t answer.

  I say, “It’s been three months. Do you not want to make love with me?”

  He jolts at the question. After a few seconds he finds his voice. It’s rocky. “You kidding?”

  “Then why ….”

  I leave the words dangling, reach for him. I pull his shirt up, up, over his head, then slip it from his arms.

  He doesn’t resist.

  I lean against him, press my fingers into snug chest fuzz.

  I don’t know much, but I know I want him.

  “Why …,” I say again, and again that’s all I say.

  I push my chest into his, reach my hand behind, drift down, down, down the small of his back, until I’m tucked inside his jeans.

  His heart rate quickens, drums its beat into me.

  Thump thump thump thump thump thump ….

  I rest my lips against his ear, share the shiver they provoke.

  “Why don’t you?” I ask.

  Joey

  The question zaps through me like ten thousand volts.

  Why don’t

  I

  make love with

  her?

  Because I never held

  anything

  so precious before.

  Because I’m afraid so afraid ….

  I tell her,

  I’m afraid I’m gonna break you.

  She laughs. Says, I’m not a doll silly.

  Silly. No one’s ever called me that before.

  Dickwad.

  Scumbag.

  Piece of shit loser.

  Not silly.

  I like it.

  It’s light.

  I wish I was light.

  With her

  with

  Doll

  I feel like I got a shot at being light.

  What are you thinking, she asks. She’s touching

  touching

  touching me.

  I’m thinking

  I don’t wanna ruin it ruin this.

  Ruin

  her.

  I’m thinking I’m gonna hurt her

  somehow

  I’m thinking I’m scared for her

  and maybe even of her.

  But I don’t tell her that stuff ‘cause it’d make her bolt for sure. You can’t show fear

  you can’t show

  yourself

  even if you feel safe enough. Safety is bullshit. There is no safety. More things I can’t tell I could fill a book with them.

  She’s waiting for an answer

  I know

  but I’m not saying nothing I’m like a deaf-mute or something. Why she’s bothering with me I don’t know. I don’t deserve her I don’t deserve her touching

  touching

  touching me like this and god I’m so afraid I’m gonna hurt her.

  I never done it before, I tell her.

  I tell her I never made love.

  She looks at me now she’s got this skeptical look she don’t believe me.

  It’s true,

  I tell her.

  It’s true I never made love never did it with no one I cared ‘bout before.

  I had sex I screwed but I

  never

  made

  love.

  She’s touching

  touching

  I lie here skin prickling temperature smoldering arms frozen so scared to touch back so scared I’ll become

  the monster Pop is;

  the monster

  I am

  when I lose it lose

  control.

  My first time,

  I tell her,

  my first time I was fifteen it was August it was hot so hot

  me and Jimmy we were at my cousin Billy’s pool chilling.

  Billy he was twenty and he had a bunch of friends over too. This chick Libby she was nineteen she had these great round tits they were practically popping out of her hot pink bikini she started rapping to me then she sat on my lap next thing you know she was tonguing me.

  That night

  me and Jimmy we banged her in room twenty-four at the Beachview Motor Inn.

  She blew me at the pay phone on the street while I called my mom to tell her me and Jimmy we was

  eating

  out.

  It was like that every time since. Not the situation but the emotion.

  There wasn’t no emotion.

  Just going through motions.

  I feel something trembling.

  It’s

  me.

  How can I touch her like that touch her pure

  pure skin? My hands they’re so mangled they’re ruined like me beyond repair I’m bad so bad she’s pure she’s good and

  I’m

  so

  bad.

  She kisses me she’s undeterred by my tale of debauchery she kisses me her soft

  soft lips against mine their moisture sinks inside me she quenches my thirst.

  She kisses me and I get it. Suddenly

  I get it

  she don’t care what I done she don’t care what I

  am

  she takes me

  shit and all.

  Like someone opened a window

  I get it

  a blast of fresh air

  I get it I kiss her back and then just like that

  I

  melt.

  It happens so fast I can’t scream or despair

  can’t panic

  can’t blink

  I just melt.

  No regrets no goodbyes I melt through her arms I melt to the mat

  then

  I

  rise.

  I rise without burdens

  no voices

  in my head

  there’s light

  silent

  light
<
br />   lifting through.

  No worries no doubts

  only light

  calm still light

  I feel something light

  it’s me.

  It’s me

  and Doll

  in the quiet

  alone and I’m light I’m

  light I’m

  light.

  Touch me Joey, she says.

  She says, Please.

  So I do.

  Dorothy

  His eyes fill with light, so beautiful. I watch the pain melt from them. Drip, drip, drip, it shrinks down, it just shrivels away ‘til it’s gone. They’re happy now.

  He’s happy.

  I made him happy.

  Joey

  She’s letting it all out it’s like there was all this shit stuffed way inside her that she finally gets to let out.

  I’m letting it out.

  For once I’m doing something good.

  I’m following her now I’m scrambling up a mountain sprinting up up up scuffling over rocks darting around trees splashing through streams there’s a place for us after all there’s a place for us it’s here at the top of this mountain it’s where we can lift off we can leap we can sweep through the sky …

  oh god

  I’m flying

  the breeze on my face it feels so incredible

  I head for the clouds

  I’m right behind her now

  I catch up I take her hand.

  Six

  Dorothy

  “Happy birthday, Joey,” I tell him. We’re in Jason’s garage once again. We get to use it about twice a week. The rest of the days we make out by the water, which is pretty great too. I’ve suggested hanging out at Joey’s house, but he won’t go for it, and he won’t say why. He just changes the subject. It’s been nearly four months and I’ve never even seen the inside of his house, or met his parents. Of course we could go to my house—it’s not like my parents barred him, but they sure wouldn’t make him feel at home, either. Things haven’t improved in that area, but the good news is there hasn’t been any noise pollution emitting from the Fields residence.

  So, it’s the water for us when we can’t borrow the garage. I don’t know what’ll happen in the winter, but we’ll tackle that when it comes.

  I cuddle close against him, press my skin into his. His pulse is tranquil now, it’s come down from its heightened state. “Want your presents?”

  “You mean there’s more?”

  “This wasn’t a gift, we do this all the time.”

  “This’s everything I want,” he says, and I know he means it, but he’s still getting his stuff.

  I hoist myself up, grab his crumpled Black Sabbath T-shirt, throw it on—I like to wear his shirts because they’re long on me and they smell like him—and I head to the corner where I hid his presents under a bench press. “Jason let me drop these off yesterday,” I explain, carrying three gifts over to him, two small and one large. They’re wrapped in firecracker red paper, which in fact does have lit, sizzling firecrackers depicted all over it, together with the words, “Hope your birthday’s dynamite!” Corny, but colorful. I plop them in front of him on the mat. He sits up, pulls them in. He’s still naked, and all those muscles in motion look so luscious, I have to do a mental slap so I don’t jump his bones again. Not that he would mind, but I do want to see how he likes his gifts.

  He takes the card from the top, slips it from its envelope. It has a quote from Emerson: “What lies behind us and what lies before us are small matters compared to what lies within us.” He reads it, laughs. “You are so friggin’ deep,” he says. “The guys, if they’d buy one at all, they’d pick out a card about farts or something.”

  “A fart card was my second choice,” I say.

  He opens the card, reads what I wrote. It says, “Joey, I hope this year brings you as much happiness as you give me. XOXO, Doll.”

  “Gee …,” he says. He pauses, swallows hard—so deep that his Adam’s apple swerves, it oscillates in his throat. His mood veers also, I can feel it. It takes this dip, this plunge, like the mere mention of happiness sends him plummeting.

  Damn.

  But then he snaps back, he fights his way up again, and he smiles. “Thanks,” he says. I smile back, but it sucks, it really sucks, that everything has to be a fight for him. Every little thing, inside and out.

  I want to take him in my arms, hold him, but I don’t.

  Not this time.

  I can’t shelter him from himself.

  Paper crinkles, tears as he opens the first gift, one of the small ones. It’s a book, my favorite book. He lets the wrap drop, holds the book gingerly, tentatively, like some foreign object—perhaps something that might ignite in his hands. “The Catcher in The Rye?”

  “You’ve never read it?” I ask.

  He shakes his head no, leafs through pages.

  “Holden Caulfield reminds me of you,” I tell him.

  “Yeah?” He scans the beginning, raises his eyebrows. He flips to the middle, reads a little more, and arches those brows even higher. He asks, “In what way does this dude remind you of me?”

  I don’t want to tell him now, on his birthday.

  I don’t want to say I think he and Holden are both running from something, searching for something, that they’re both lost and lonely. Because as much as Joey’s with me, here with me, he’s also not.

  He’s missing—a part of him is missing. It’s severed from him, out there somewhere all alone.

  “In … in a metaphysical kind of way, I guess,” I say.

  “Oh.” He laughs. “That explains it.”

  He puts the book down and opens the next gift—the larger one. Rippp! Rippp!

  Out of the shreds he raises the lid of the box, takes out one of the blue boxing gloves I bought him. He holds it, regards it with a look I can’t quite discern. I say, “Since you like to fight so much, I thought maybe you could, like, put your ability to some use.” He’s wearing such a bizarro, incomprehensible expression, I wonder if I’ve treaded too close to his space somehow—if I’ve violated his perimeter. Who am I to tell him he should box?

  But then he nods, shakes his head. “Yeah,” he says. He smoothes his hand over the cool leather surface, smiles that little smile that melts me every time.

  He slides his hand inside, flexes. “Yeah,” he repeats softly, and the word sounds comfortable.

  It suits him; it’s right.

  It fits him like the glove.

  Joey

  I

  squeeze

  my fingers inside the glove.

  Feels snug it’s

  warm.

  It’s like settling into cushions on a thick cozy couch it’s a place to lay my hand and

  rest. A

  refuge a

  padding

  from all the knocks my hand gets self-inflicted though they may be.

  So I guess it’s

  protection

  from

  me.

  Now that’s funny.

  Dorothy

  He sits for a while resting his gloved hand on his lap, on his bare thigh. He’s quiet. It’s almost like he’s meditating. I let him be.

  After a bit he smiles again, and he says, “Thanks, Doll.”

  “You’re welcome,” I say. “But there’s more.” I raise the third gift, the other small one. I dangle it in from of him, trying to entice.

  He tugs the glove off, puts it down next to him. He accepts the gift, unwraps. His finger slits into the tape this time. The paper makes a wrinkling sound as he unfolds it.

  What looks like two rolls of surgical bandage in black fall into his lap. “Wraps,” I say, in case he doesn’t know. He gives me a brief ‘duh’ look before turning to what he’s holding, the other thing that was inside the paper—a gift certificate for ten boxing lessons at the local muscle gym, Iron Land. “Jesus,” he says, staring at the words. “This had to run you some real bucks.”

  I
shrug. “You’re worth it.”

  He says, “I could never ….”

  I touch his arm, sink my fingers against his skin. “Don’t do this,” I say. “Don’t turn this into something ugly. I don’t care what you can afford to get me, just like you didn’t need or expect any gifts. Just enjoy it, Joey, okay? That’s your gift back to me, if you enjoy this.”

  Our familiar electricity tingles between us, and he relaxes. “Okay,” he says.

  “So, you want me to wrap you up?”

  “You know how?”

  “Sure. George—that’s the boxing instructor—showed me when I took my lesson.”

  “You took a boxing lesson? Why?”

  “What’s the matter, afraid I’ll kick your ass?” We both laugh. Then I say, “I wanted … I wanted to know what it was like to punch things.”

  “You like it?”

  “Uh, no.”

  He chuckles. He knew darn well I wouldn’t. “Why not?”

  “Well, for starters, it felt very confining in those gloves, and they never seemed like they were on right. It was just about impossible to get a grip in them. And it hurt to punch! George said I was hitting with the wrong part of my hand, but I just couldn’t get it. Then there was that speed bag. Talk about humbling, I felt like a complete spazoid trying to hit it. George said I’d get better with practice, but there are some things you know you’re just not cut out for. And anyway, it was just too much work, all those moves—too much to concentrate on. Yeesh.”

  “That’s a relief,” he says. I unravel one of the wraps, and direct him to reach his arm out straight, spread his fingers wide. I smooth the wrap around, around, loop it around in tiers, coating his hand and wrist so it’s taut but not tight. He says, ““For a minute I was afraid you were gonna leave me to headline in Vegas.”

  “I’ll leave the championship fighting to you, Rocky.”

  Joey

  She’s like a nurse treating her patient she’s

  bandaging my

  wounds. That’s how it feels like she’s

  blanketing my hand—my

  motley mutilated

  poor

  excuse

  for a hand.

  She winds it she

  winds

  it she lays it

  on me

  over me she

  covers me in

  tender

  layers.

  Safe

  I feel safe. Comforted. It’s like when I wore the cuffs

  when I held my own hand.

  It’s like wearing the cuffs without the

  cold