Mother!
I cry.
Diver’s Moon by E. M. Arthur
My oncologist squeezed my hand and pronounced me in full remission. “I’m sorry, Skyler,” he said, “about Danni.”
Danni had been my live-in nurse when I was too weak to get myself to the john. She was a youthful cliche of blonde, buxom beauty. My wife, Andrea, spent a lot of time with her. When my body betrayed my marriage, Andrea found comfort in Danni’s arms.
“I couldn’t have known when I recommended her,” the doctor said. His narrow face went red with embarrassment. His hand sweated in mine.
He’d saved my life, but what did he know about my missing soul? What did he know about losing my body, a body that could grab the rings and rotate an iron cross into a dead still handstand? What did he know about watching your wife make love to another woman as a gift to you when the best you could manage was to hold your limp member in an emaciated hand?
“No,” I said. “You couldn’t have known she was a lesbian.”
He pulled his hand back and hid it in the pocket of his smock. “I knew about that,” he said. “It just never occurred to me that she and your wife would, well, leave you.”
“Yeah,” I said. “Took me by surprise too.” We stared at each other for a long awkward moment.
I broke the silence. “Thank you, doctor,” I said.
“Maybe you should get away for a while. Take a good long vacation. Go someplace new, someplace where there are no reminders you were sick.”
“Maybe,” I said.
“Someplace where you can enjoy being healthy.”
I nodded, left his office and headed home to face my emptiness alone.
I pulled my Subaru wagon to a full stop at the intersection where Martin’s Court crosses Black Diamond Way, the street that ends in my cul-de-sac.
Dark windows from across the paved circle stared at me. My grey, split-level ranch nestled in behind my weed-covered gardens and my brown, gone-to-seed lawn, accused me of failures. I sat in the August heat for a moment, white-knuckling the wheel. Hot beads of sweat rolled down my neck and under the collar of my shirt.
I couldn’t pull across the street and drive up to that house of betrayals. When I was 34, I had a thriving business coaching gymnastics. My teams were winning. My body was my best asset.
At 35, I was old. I’d lost nearly a hundred pounds lying in a bed in that accusing house. I’d vomited in every room. My body had betrayed me, then the insurance company dumped me. I’d had to sell the gym. Finally, there was Andrea and the sponge bath that had gone too far.
Andrea only wanted to help me. My nurse had wanted to help us both.
I banged my head against the steering wheel. I wanted to drive the memory of that night from my head. It was too late. The images, the smells, the sounds rose up and filled me again. Danni had come to my room. She lit candles and burned incense. She put a card table beside the bed, draped it in a linen cloth, and set out a basin of warm water, some sponges, and scented massage oils. She pulled her blonde hair up and clasped it with a tortoise shell clip, then she took off her skirt and her white, button-down blouse. Beneath, she wore only her tan, cotton underwear, and a blue sport bra. “Don’t want to get these wet,” she said, dropping her blouse to the floor.
She’d given me sponge baths before, but she had never taken off any clothing. “Andrea?” I asked.
“She’ll be along in a minute.” Danni sat down on the bed. Long-fingered hands dipped a sponge in the basin of warm water. She squeezed the sponge until it stopped dripping. Then she pulled back my sheet.
Shame for my ruined body filled me. I felt like the sponge in her hand, like an empty, seeping, brownish lump.
Andrea came in from the bathroom. Andrea. Dark and succulent, my wife, my friend. She was half Mestizo, and her skin was molten bronze. Her dark eyes caught the flickering candlelight. She wore my green terrycloth robe.
“Danni’s going to show me how to give you a special sponge bath,” she said. She opened her robe and let it fall. White silk panties, stockings, garters, and bra made her skin all the more exotic. I wanted to lift a hand and touch her. I wanted to push Danni aside and pull my wife to me, to give her my love.
I tried to sit up. Danni’s hand was firm. She used the sponge to press me back. She stroked my neck. “There, now,” she said. “You relax and enjoy. Let us do the work here. We’re taking care of you, not the other way around.”
Andrea sat on the side of the bed beside pale Danni. Andrea leaned over and kissed me. Her breasts, cupped in white silk, pressed against me. Her breath was warm and sweet. The perfume I’d given her for our last anniversary promised me her love.
“Like this,” Danni said. She handed Andrea a second sponge. She wrapped her pale hands around Andrea’s dark fingers. Together, they squeezed the sponge. “Keep enough water to dampen the skin,” Danni whispered. “You don’t want the sponge to scratch.”
I watched my wife do as she was told. I felt her sponge on my neck, on my face. Relax, I told myself. This may be the last time you experience anything like this. God, I tried to relax. But part of me wanted to rise, to give, to be more than a recipient.
Danni guided Andrea through my cleansing. It was warm, long and slow. Danni wrapped her arms around Andrea to better guide her hands. Danni’s white arms embraced my wife from behind. “Can you feel the warmth?” she whispered to my wife. Andrea looked into my eyes. She seemed to be asking me if I was OK. I wanted her to be happy, to have what I couldn’t give her. I forced a smile.
Andrea nodded.
Danni kissed her neck, nuzzled her beneath the ear, beneath the dark, silken ringlets of hair. I saw the goose flesh rise on Andrea’s arms.
I moaned. I reached for myself.
They laughed. Together, they moved me farther onto the bed.
Danni lifted a bottle of oil from the table. She opened it and poured it onto Andrea’s open palms. The scent of patchouli and vanilla filled the room. Danni worked the oil into Andrea’s hands and forearms. She placed Andrea’s hands on my shrunken chest. Andrea slipped a leg over me. She sat above me like she had so many times. She looked down at me, her eyes both sad and filled with desire. Deep inside her dark eyes, I saw pity. God, that hurt more than anything else I saw that night.
Danni worked on my feet, slowly massaging, oiling, and working her up my calves and thighs.
I watched Andrea’s face. I felt Danni’s hands between my legs. I prayed I would respond. Then I realized Danni wasn’t reaching for me.
Andrea gasped and arched her back.
Her bra fell away, released from behind. Her oiled hand went to one breast. A pale hand came around her from behind and took her other breast.
I felt Danni moving her fingers between my legs, beneath Andrea.
Andrea leaned forward, giving Danni more room to work.
“Andrea?” I asked.
“Oh, shit!” she said.
“Here,” Danni said. She pulled Andrea off my hips. She helped her out of her panties and stockings. Andrea tugged at Danni’s sports bra and panties.
I rolled on my side, trying to reach for my wife.
Danni pushed me back. She took my limp member in her oiled hand. “He wants to help,” Danni said. She helped Andrea lift a leg and slip it over my oiled chest. She carefully settled my wife into position so my tongue could reach her rear. “Gently,” Danni said. “You take it easy.”
I nodded.
Danni put a pillow under my head. She slipped a finger into Andrea. When she pulled it out, she let me lick it. It tasted of oil and the familiar spice of my wife. I closed my eyes and savoured the taste.