"so I just had a piece of God in my hands?" "Yes." Noah reached down into the water again, and this time brought up a foot-long fish. "Too big?" he said. "Too big!"... Me little ones slip down more easily, is that it?"
"Much easier," Joe said, and reaching into the waters plucked out two handfuls of the tiny fish. His encounter with the 'shu had taken the edge off his pickiness. Plainly these blank-eyed minnows were of a much lower order of being than the creature that had studied him so carefully. He could swallow them without concerning himself about the niceties of it. He downed two handfuls in as many seconds and then found himself something a little larger, which he bit into as though it were a sandwich. The meat of it was bright orange, and sweetly tender, and he chewed on it careless of how the thing thrashed in his grip, tossing it back only when one of its bones caught between his teeth.
"I'm done for now," he announced to Noah, working to ease the bone out.
"You won't drink?" Noah said.
"It's salty," Joe said, "isn't it?"
"Not to my palate," Noah said, Lifting a cupped handful of Quiddity's waters to his lips and sucking it up noisily. "I think it's good."
Joe did the same and was not disappointed. The water had a pleasant pungency about it. He swallowed several mouthfuls and then waded back to the shore, feeling more replete than he'd imagined possible given the fare.
In the time he and Noah had been discussing fish and God, the entire procession had arrived at the crack-which was indeed growing larger: It was half as tall again as it had been when he'd stepped through it-the members of the procession now gathered at the threshold.
"Are they going through?" he said.
"It looks that way," Noah replied. He glanced up at the sky, which though it had no sun in it was darker than it had been. "If some of them remain," he said, "we may find our crew among them."
"For what ship?"
"What other ship do we have but this?" Noah said, amming his palm against The Fanacapan.
"There are others in the harbor," Joe said, pointing along the shore towards the city. "Big ships. This thing doesn't even look seaworthy. And even if it is, how the hell are we going to persuade anyone to come with us?"
"That's my problem," Noah said. "Why don't you rest a while? Sleep if you can. We've a busy night ahead of us."
"Sleep?" Joe said. "You've gotta be kidding."
He thought about getting a blanket and a pillow out of one of the cabins, but decided it wasn't worth being lice ridden for the little snugness they'd afford, and instead made himself as comfortable as he could on the bare stones. It was undoubtedly the most uncomfortable bed he'd ever attempted to lie upon, but the serenity of the sky made a powerful soporific, and though he never fell into a deep enough sleep to dream, he drifted for a while.
Around four on Friday afternoon, while Tesia and Phoebe were getti ng to know each other in Everville, and Joe was lying under a darkening sky on Quiddity's shores, Howie Katz was sitting on the doorstep with Amy in his arms, watching a storm coming in from the northeast. A good rainstorm, he thought, maybe some thunder, and the heat would break.
The baby had not slept well the night before and had been fractious for most of the day, but now she lay contentedly in his arms, more asleep than awake. Jo-Beth had gone up to bed half an hour before, complaining of an upset stomach. The house was completely quiet. So was the street, except for the neighborhood dogs, who were busier than ever right now, racing around with their noses high and their ears pricked, all anticipation. When he'd found a better place for them all to live, they'd get a mutt, he decided. It would be good for Amy to have an animal around as she grew up, as a protector and a playmate.
"And he'll love you," Howie whispered to her. "Because everybody loves you." She grew a little restless in his arms. "Want to go lie down, honey?" he said, Lifting her up and kissing her face. "Let's take you upstairs."
He tiptoed up, and laid Amy down in the spare room, so as not to disturb Jo-Beth. Then he went to take a quick shower.
It felt good to put his head under the cool water and soap off the sweat and grime of the day; so good that he sprung a hard-on without touching himself. He ignored it as best he could-shampooed his hair, scrubbed his back-but the water kept beating on it, and eventually he took himself in hand. The last time he'd made love to Jo-Beth she'd been four months pregnant, and the attempt had ended with her crying and saying she didn't want him touching her. It was the first indication of how problematic the pregnancy was to prove. During the next few months it sometimes seemed to him he was living with two women, a loving twin and her bitch-sister. The loving Jo-Beth didn't want sex but she wanted his arms around her, and his comfort when she wept. The bitch-sister wanted nothing from him: not kisses, not company, nothing. The bitch-sister would say: I wish I'd never met you, and say it with such conviction he was certain she meant it. Then the old Jo-Beth would surface againusually through tears-and tell him she was sorry, so sorry, and she didn't know what she'd do without him.
He'd learned to curb and conceal his libido pretty well during this time. Kept a stash of skin magazines in the garage; found a soft-core channel to watch late at night; even had a couple of wet dreams. But Jo-Beth was never far from his imagination. Even in the last two weeks of her term, when she was enormous, the sight of her remained intensely arousing. She'd known it too, and seemed to resent his interest in her: locked the bathroom door when she was washing or showering, turned her back on him when she prepared for bed. She'd reduced him to a state of trembling adolescence, watching her from the corner of his eye in the hope of glimpsing the forbidden anatomy; picturing it later when he was jerking off.
He'd had enough of that. It was time they were man and wife again, instead of shy strangers who happened to share the same bed. He turned off the shower, roughly dried himself, then wrapped the towel around his waist and went into the bedroom.
Thunder was rolling in, low and cracked, but it hadn't woken Jo-Beth. She lay fully dressed on top of the bed, her pale face silvery with sweat in the gloom. He went to the window, and opened it a crack. The clouds were bruised and fat with rain; it would only be minutes before they loosed their waters on the dusty yard and the dusty roof.
Behind him, Jo-Beth murmured in her sleep. He went back to the bed, and gently sat down beside her. Again, she murmured something-he couldn't make out what-and raised her hand from her side, grazing his shoulder with her fingers as she did so. Her hand moved on to touch her mouth, and then, as though her sleeping self had realized somebody was sitting beside her, returned to his arm.
He was certain she'd awaken, but she didn't. The faintest of smiles appeared on her face, and her hand went from his arm to his chest. Her touch was feather-light but intensely erotic. All the more so, perhaps, because her unconscious was allowing her to do what her waking self could, or would not. He let her hand dally on his chest, and while it did so he gingerly pulled at the tuck of his towel. His erection had raised its head, eager to be touched. He didn't move; didn't breathe. Just watched while her hand wandered down his hard belly until it found his dick.
He exhaled as quietly as he could, luxuriating in her attention. She didn't linger at his sex any longer than she had at chest and belly, but by the time her fingers had moved over his balls and on down his thigh he was so aroused he feared if she returned there he'd lose control. He looked away from her fingers to her face, but the sight of her troubled beauty only heated him further. He closed his eyes, tight, and tried to picture the street outside, the storm clouds, the engine he'd been working on yesterday, but her face kept finding him in his refuge.