Paul's first impression of the morning was the scent of Rachel's shampoo on the pillow.
Still mostly asleep, he reached over to pull her body to him, but his hand only slid across emptiness. Lust flickered and died. He knew she was gone.
He lay there shutting out the faint morning light with his eyelids, dreading the sound of his alarm. Drawing his legs up, he hugged the extra pillow. Now he could smell her skin.
He thought.
Of things said and unsaid, nights of hunger and sweat and sticky sheets, shopping for persimmons at the farmers market, embracing in the shower and letting the water course down their bodies.
The cat jumped onto the comforter and snagged a claw. Damned stupid cat.
He reached out and shut the alarm off with two minutes to spare. The cat had freed itself and was nestling into the back of his knees.
The sky showed gray and dead through the bedroom window.
He crawled out of the sheets and sat on the edge of the bed. He looked at his hands on his bare thighs. Not much different there.
He got up and walked to the bathroom without thinking. He found the coffee and cups and filters where they were supposed to be. He even remembered where the cat food was, though it was different from last time. And it was a cat, a noisy, hungry, claw-snagging cat. Last time it was a small dog.
Paul tried not to think too much, but it was impossible not to remember. He could still see the fear in her face, hear the animal desperation in her voice, like a rabbit screams when caught by a coyote.
He looked at his hand. The knuckles stretched white against the skin. The spoon handle cut into his palm. He deliberately relaxed his fingers and scooped the coffee into the filter.
The weekend trip had been her idea. He couldn't dredge up any guilt about that. He had even stopped at the washed-out bridge. It had been day, the sky overcast like this morning, but the rain had stopped. As they drove the backcountry road to their favorite winery, over the din of Rachel singing along to Patsy Cline, Paul heard something that made him pull over. They walked up the slight rise and watched the flood waters smash through the jumble of wood and asphalt that had been the bridge. Then the road collapsed.
Paul grabbed a root and watched Rachel slide towards the water. She screamed and screamed. He couldn't do anything. He never could.
The police found her body an hour later. Only an hour. They asked him to identify the body, but it wasn't a body. It was Rachel. He wanted to throw up. He wanted to cry and shout and beat his head. He only brushed her cold cheek with his fingertips.
And here he was. A cold, gray morning, with coffee brewing and a cat purring loudly as it ate. He could still smell her skin. She was gone, but he knew she'd be back.
Her scent was always the same. Not a perfume or a soap, but the bare-skin smell of a woman as you kiss your way up from her belly.
Her voice changed. Her hair changed. One time she was five-feet-four-inches tall. Another time she was blind. Yet another time she worked in the DA's office.
He didn't remember the first time. It had been so long.
Years could go by before they met again, like the fifteen years after the war.
Sometimes he would recognize her. The signs would be almost too obvious, like the time he'd slipped on the wet floor of the hotel lobby. She'd helped him up and they spent the evening just talking in the lounge. Then she would surprise him. He had been so sure of the cello player, but Rachel played French horn.
But the only real surprise was how and when it would end. Shot by a mugger downtown. Killed in an accident by a drunk driver. Dying in her sleep from a blood clot. There was the time they'd been running off to a friend's party in the city. They jaywalked through an ivy-covered median. She'd yelped and pulled a used hypodermic needle from her calf. The anxiety and final agony of AIDS had been the worst yet.
Every time, Paul tried to make the most of the hours, days, or years they would have together.
He had given up asking questions. The churches didn't hold any answers. The oblivion of drugs and self-abuse only left him tired and strung out by the time she found him again. And she always found him.
How long do you really have with the one you love?
Paul knew it would be forever. He bent over and retched his coffee onto the floor.
Pakeha