Chapter 37: Everybody Wants SomethingA few more drinks, an iermiime ter, still sitting in our booth, druhan before, the crer, busier, the tre of its voiow here, now there, but always loud, f the two of us ever clether as I smiled up at Harry, holding eye tact for a moment lohan was necessary before coyly dropping my gaze down to my drink. The ruby swirl of my gss seemed captured in the deep crimson of my glossy fiips. I marvelled at how easily I now held the narrow stem of the gss, the feminine cliy nails as I cradled the drink in my palm. I gnced up again through the thick veil of my eyeshes, and blushed to see how ily he was watg me.

  “The Bean Being? Yeah, I like that pce,” Harry tinued as we shared our experie the ibsp; “I’m surprised I never saw you there.” If his hand occasionally massaged my shoulder or pyed with my hair--well, I pretended not to notibsp; I was struggling to pretend to not notice many things by this point: the fact that I was really a guy and my muted his intimate touch, the appraising and amused eyes of strangers, and where this whole strange game was iably heading. The heady mixture of stress, self-disgust and alcohol ying havoc with my head--I felt arigle through my body, an almost drug-like euphoria that left me feeling capable of doing . . . almost anything, it seemed.

  I nodded, struggling to suppress the urge to giggle hysterically at the absurdity and difficulty of carrying on a normal versation. “Me too. Started going almost every day. I was a bit worried about money? You know, at first? But when I found out I could pay the same way I opened doors--I mean, just a touy hand and cha-g?--it was like, shopping spree!”

  Harry’s thumb stroked the side of my smooth, hairless arm. “Do you even have any idea how much they’re charging you?”

  I shrugged. “Nope! Don’t care. I’m not footing the bill, so why should I?”

  He shook his head. “Put it this way. Even I think the prices here are eous.”

  “Oh, e on, Harry! You’re a rock star.” I picked up my wine gss and held it up in mock salute. “You’re like . . . ribsp; Super rich!”

  “Exactly,” he said. He pyfully ruffled my hair. “Let’s just say you’re lucky you’re cute enough for me to pick up the tab tonight.”

  I giggled. “Lucky me!”

  A long sip of wine hid my disfort at his stant toubsp; Men are very tactile--their hands are everywhere on a date, stantly reminding you of their presence, of their iion; of their trol. The drunker I got the easier it became to ignore his expert hands ay body--or rather, ignore how they made me feel. I have no doubt that a real girl would’ve been moist in the crotd all over the guy by now. Unfortunately for Harry, his deft ministrations did nothing good for me. I mean, yeah, sure, he was my hero and all but that wasn’t going to have me batting for the other team, you know?

  Turning back to Harry, I noticed that the lull in our versation had given him a far-away look in his eye, staring off across the bar without really seeing anything. I gave him a little jab with my elbow. “Hey Harry?” I said. “What you thinking about?”

  He looked down and smiled. It was a strange smile, small and a little sad and quickly gone. “Right now?” he answered. “I was thinking about things I’ve seen and done, dy, pce I’ve been, people I’ve met. I’ve had a long, full life. But mostly?” His arm around my shoulder tightened in a warm hug, and his voice took on a forced gaiety. “I was thinking about you.”

  “Why?” I asked in a small voice.

  His gaze was captivating. Oh, I knew what was going on, where this was heading. The guy yer, real smooth and all, and he was totally setting me up for the kill. In some bizarre way it was awesome watg this guy at work--even if I was the target. I mean, what a thing tell your friends--if I had any, that is--Harry Longman pulled me in a bar!

  “I’ve been living here for almost a year now,” he said. “And it’s been a very long, very b year, dy. I’ve explored as much of this pce as I care to, and gotten to know more people than I wish, and . . . I’m bored.” He sighed. “It’s been nearly two years since I’ve written anything: not one line of verse, not a sie of a song.”

  “I’m sorry,” I said in a soft voice, and the thing is: I truly was. It wasn’t something I could really rete to; I’m no artist. But I also khe ache of denying an important part of oneself, of feeling it struggle to escape, of sensing it wither and die. There were parts of myself I’d suppressed over the past decade, aspee, I guess—that didn’t fit in with the life of being David Saunders.

  Again Harry smiled, and his eye sparkled. “Oh, but don’t be, dy,” he said, and his arm at my shoulder drifted to my neck, gently massaging my skiween forefinger and thumb. “This st week, since meeting you--I’ve started writing again.”

  “That’s wonderful,” I sighed, trying to deny that his touch at my back felt good. How could this be happening?

  “It is wonderful,” he said. “You ’t uand how wonderful it is, dy. I tried to deny my loss at first, vinced myself it was a short break, that the creative juieeded time to replenish. But the longer I stared at the bnk page, every time I picked up a guitar or sat at the piano, and couldn’t py anything but old songs--I knew, deep down ihat I was finished. An old dog with ories to tell. And oh, how I raged against that truth! Distrag myself with alcohol, with religion, drugs and . . . women,” he said, and his other hand took mine is his.

  “Like me?” I said. “Girls like me?”

  “Not like you,” he said. “I’ve never met anyone like you, dy.”

  “Harry,” I whispered.

  He turo face me without releasing me from his encirg arm. His haly cupped my and tilted my head up towards his. I stared deep into his eyes, dark and lost. Something inside of me tightly bound and buried deep fluttered and struggled and fell away. My hand ched and trembled at my side.

  His lips met mine. Faint stubble rubbed like fine sandpaper against my . Again I breathed in his st--it had the robust character of a fine aged wine. My soft lips pushed up against his, their paint a thin tacky veneer between us. His fihreaded through my hair aly held me close. My lips parted almost involuntarily . . . only a little but enough: a sigh, and the tip of my tongue darted out, almost hesitantly tasted his lip, pulled back.

  “dy.” Harry’s voice was almost a troan.

  “Yes,” I agreed, my voice soft, our mouths so close each word flowed like delicate warmth across the other’s lips.

  Harry’s hand fell away from my head, traced the path of my spihrough the thinness of my gy top, slid around my side aed, for just a moment, atop my breast before almost relutly falling away. I pulled away and he fell ba his seat and stared at me.

  “Who are you?”

  My haed softly on his knee. I shrugged, amazed at how delicate and feminine I could make the gesture, surprised at how in trol I felt. This was seriously wrong; I had just kissed a man on the mouth; part of me felt like a teenager again, lost and fused; but mostly I felt a strangely drunken apathy to what had happened. “I’m just a. . . .” I swallowed nervously, tasting the truth of what I was about to say. “Girl,” I finished, amazed and quietly sied at how true that statement seemed to have bee.

  Harry shook his head vehemently. “No. There’s nothing ‘just’ about you, dy. You’re unlike any other woman I’ve met.”

  I couldn’t deny the truth of that.

  “Something about you messes with my head,” he said, one fiapping at his temple.

  “And you with mine.” My hand drifted up to rest against his arm.

  “There’s something about you,” he said, and the way his eyes drifted ay body, taking in my breasts, my smooth arms and sleek legs, long hair and earrings, finishing with a lingering appraisal of my eyes, sent an anxious flutter through my belly. “Something different from the irls I’ve met here. The way you dress and talk--and the way you act--the things you say--there’s a diy in you I don’t uand.

  “I’m very sensitive to the music of a person’s voice, dy, to the rhyme and rhythm of their body and nguage. And right now, I’m looking at the girl sitting across from me, a very pretty girl in very sexy clothes, but there’s something--discordant--ihing she does.”

  I tapped one finger against my lip. “There is?”

  He nodded slowly. “Yes, like a video in which the singer and the song don’t quite sync up.”

  “We’re in a hospital,” I reminded him. “We’re all a little . . . broken, I guess.”

  “Are you?” he asked. “Are you damaged goods?” The way he said it, with a hint of a smile on his weathered face, but with sorrowful eyes that seemed genuinely ed at the prospect that the young girl sitting across from him could be in pain, nearly made me regret that I couldn’t be what he thought I was. I realized then that I had to get away from Harry. Suddenly I felt that I was losing trol of the evening and became afraid of where it might end.

  “Maybe a little,” I answered. “No more than you, I’m sure.”

  “But I’m very damaged, dy,” he said. “More than you know.”

  With my head tilted one side, I smiled at him: it was a small but warm gesture, b on coy. I wo what game he ying. My hands drifted to rest, fingers spyed, against his chest. “Tell me, then.”

  He stared at me for a long moment. His mouth opened as if he was about speak, but then he quickly looked away. He tried to hide the brief appearance of grief and rage that twisted his features, and when he faced me again he seemed fine. “I exaggerate,” he said, and grinned, a tentative and sheepish expression that despite its falseness looked surprisingly boyish on his weathered fabsp; “I’m fine--really. In such pretty pany? How could I not be?”

  “Are you, Harry?” I gazed at him levelly. “Are you okay?”

  “I am tonight.” His strong arms gathered me close, bato his fortable embrabsp; My head rested against his shoulder and I sighed tentedly. “You have no idea how gd I am that you were here these st few weeks.”

  “Me too,” I said.

  “You want to get out of here?”

  I momentarily tensed in his arm. Ba the city, hitting the bars with Tom, hunting women: I knew how the game worked. Get a girl to this point? Sit with her, buy a few drinks, cuddle close ahat kiss? We both knew where this road ended. Ask her to leave the bar with you--there was only one pce left to go. Unless I broke away; this was my ce . . . I forcefully rexed bato his embrace.

  I couldn’t leave him at this point. Harry was trying to tell me something, had been trying all week to reach a point where he felt fortable enough with dy to share something private and important with her. To abandon him now would be unfivable; it would be a betrayal of a friend.

  I gave a mute nod and collected my purse. I stumbled a bit as I stood, steadied by Harry’s strong arm on my elbow. I wasn’t that drunk--I really wasn’t--it was the shoes, the pointy toe ping painfully, the heel taller and slimmer than I was fortable in. Fuck, what the hell was I doing?

  We threaded our way through the bustling crowd ahe Bacchus Bar. The night air was brag and cleared my head a little. A small shiver passed through my body. An outfit that seemed sensible enough this afternoo me exposed to the chill wind that breathed over us.

  “Cold?” Harry asked. Hell, in a sed he’d be me his jacket.

  I smiled up at him and shook my head. “I’m fine,” I said, though I felt anything but. I suddenly felt half-naked and ashamed of what I was wearing. Get it together, I told myself. You’ve been at this for weeks now. Just a little longer.

  “Would you like to head to my--”

  “How about a short walk?” I linked my arm through his. “It’s a beautiful night.”

  Harry took a long, quiet moment to stare up at the sky. For a moment he seemed to drink in his surroundings, the muted sounds of the bar behind us, the stilting spread of stars overhead and the cute young thing hanging off his arm. His eyes were distant and a faint, wistful smile tugged at his lips. Presently he returned and his gaze dropped down to mine. God, I felt an unfortable tugging i the way he looked at me--his look was so sad, so clearly yearning for something unattaihat it nearly left me breathless.

  “It is, isn’t it? It really is a beautiful night,” he said. “e with me; I want to show you something.”

  We walked in silence, both lost in our own thoughts. I leaned heavily on him, gaining a sudden insight as to why some girls wore shoes they could barely walk in. It didn’t take me long to figure out where he was bringing me, and a secret smile crept onto my fabsp; The old dog. Some people really do love routine. I remembered my first night at the ider a sky much like this one, rag towards my new home in aric cart, K sitting ahead of me. For a brief moment the headlight had revealed a private se: a man with a guitar and his cute te-night quest.

  He brought me to a pleasant, leafy arbour, sheltered against the wind. It was about fifteen minutes distant and we walked in silenbsp; Drinking in the geous night-time beauty, the silence so profound and deep, I struggled to simply enjoy the walk. The pain in my head and his hand on my ass didn’t help. I felt poised on a knife’s edge, on a stiletto’s poiween debilitating disgust and drunken, slightly mad delight; mase embarrassment trasted with these learned femiions; and I focussed on the simple, siruth that Harry needed my help. Without that stant reminder I’m sure something would have snapped.

  We sat beh a rge tree, leaning back against the trunk, staring up at the sky through the rustling leaves. Harry’s arm was around my waist and again I leaned my head against his shoulder. He told me a story. I barely took note of the details, lost in the mellifluous rumble of his voibsp; Three weeks ago, with that irl, did he tell the same story? As he talked his haly and unsciously stroked my side, a few times daring to drift as high as the soft under curve of my breast. He probably copped a feel or two. I wouldn’t have felt it if he had. The prosthetics had died a few weeks ago, skin tourning grey, sensitivity gone. My tits were all but dead weight now.

  As his story ended we dropped bato silenbsp; He was struggling to tell me something and I was tent to allow him to get there in his own time. Once again I frohe role I pyed. My mi sliding away from the thought. Tomorrow dy was going to disappear and I’d sink into the new male life K had carved out for me. It was a certainty that I’d never see Harry again. And yeah, I felt the all-too familiar pang at the loss of anood friend, but it also made tonight’s embarrassment easier to bear.

  “I’m not sure why I brought you here, dy.” Lost in my own thoughts, his voice almost took me by surprise. His words were tainted with sadness. I didn’t want to see the look on his face.

  “Why is that?” My voice was soft, encing.

  “You’re not the first girl I’ve brought here, you know. To this tree, at night.”

  I smiled. “I’m sure.”

  “It’s pathetic,” he said. “Nothing ever happens. They’re taken in by the fame and--”

  “You say that like it’s a bad thing,” I interrupted. “I certainly was.”

  He shook his head. “No, you weren’t.” His eyes watched me seargly. “You’re not here for the rock star. You’re not here for the poet. You know those things about me but it’s not why you’ve stayed by my side. What I ’t figure out--what I like about you, dy--is that I have no idea why you’re here, right here, right now, with me. What is it you want?”

  “Why do I have to want something?” I asked. “Why ’t I just enjoy being with you?”

  “Everybody wants something,” Harry insisted. “_Especially_ you. I’ve never met someone so intensely yearning for something; your whole being thrums with that desire.” His fiips stroked the length of my exposed leg, and a shiver shot up my spine as surely as if he’d plucked a guitar string. “I doubt you know what it is you want, but it drives you, brought you here--keeps you in my arms even now.

  “It’s not sex,” Harry said, his smile only slightly mischievous. “You tremble like a virgin at my every toubsp; Money? You kept trying to buy rounds and paying for our dates. Fame? You became embarrassed every siime you spotted people in the bar talking about us. Those are the big three. If you don’t want those--then what?”

  “You fot ohing,” I said, smiling coquettishly (I think) as I tapped him oemple with one elegant fingernail. “Maybe I am a virgin.” What the hell was I thinking, dropping a line like that?

  “I hadn’t thought of that,” he said quietly. Smiling, his hand reached up to csp mine. He held it briefly against his cheek, then closer to his lips, and finally kissed the bay hand, softly, and again my knuckle. I watched in a kind of horrid fasation as he slowly kissed his my forearm.

  “Harry,” I protested softly, ao pull away.

  His hand closed tight around my wrist.

  “Harry?” I asked, surprised.

  “I o know, dy,” he said, and when he looked up I saw such desperate need in those dark and lost eyes that it sent an anxious tremor through my stomabsp; “No teasing, no flirting; what the hell do you want?”

  I stared at him. I felt the wind py ay bared flesh and heard the faint rustle of the leaves overhead. The strong perfume of a nearby midnight garden rode the air and mingled with the taste of wine and strawberry on my lips. His shape was a dark cut-out against the scattered glimmering lights of the hospital behind. My head began to pound again. My heartbeat reverberated loudly in my ears, deafening. I felt hot--burning and flushed; almost dizzy. I swayed back from his grasp and this time he let me go.

  “I just wao . . . ,” I mumbled, scrambling a few feet away. “To thank you, Harry.”

  “dy, are you . . . ?”

  I stared past him. “Yoing to miss me when I’m gone,” I said, in another woman’s voice.

  Author's Notes:

  If you're impatient to read on, you find ter chapters at FM S. You also find everything avaible on Patreon: patreon./fakeminsk, as well as fanart and a few side projects.

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