Under Her Skin

By Wednesday Adams

It's blood, children.

Except that it isn't, not always.

Sometimes it's lust.

And sometimes it's a pull so deep you can't do anything except follow your desire like a damned pussy-whipped lapdog.

So I pad along, ten paces behind her. I stop when she stops. I run when she runs. Then I lie patiently waiting, knowing eventually she'll give in, not to me, but to the animal inside herself. Then we fight and fuck and tear each other apart, like cats screaming in a ball of fluff and fury.

Sometimes it's like that.

But sometimes I have to coax my way in.

I have to reach inside, slowly, carefully willing her open. Picking the lock with my nimble fingers, first one, then two, beckoning her towards me. One more finger, twist and turn and the lock flies open. I'm inside; all four fingers now and the door's open wide. Once you invite me in, you don't have to ask twice. In slides the thumb, then the wrist, then I close my fist tight.

I'm pushing deep inside her, feeling her pulse race against my skin. I can hear her heart thumping through the tiny ribcage. I can see the almost imperceptible twitch of the artery in her neck. I want to bite. I want to drink. I want to rip the flesh from her bones. I want to shove my hand up inside her chest and wrap my fingers round her still beating heart.

But I don't.

Because sometimes we like to dance.

We circle around each other, moving closer. I feel the brush of skin on skin, hers warming, mine cooling, temperatures rising and falling with every step. We sway together, snake charmer and snake. Her body sings to me, mine answers, silently. She takes my hand and she leads me in.

I lift her knees; wrap her legs around my waist, thrust her back against the wall, trying to press deeper, trying to reach so deep that I touch her soul. I want to coil myself around her and never let her go.

I want to take her. I want to make her mine.

So sometimes we have to burn.

There's a darkness inside her that no light can penetrate. The eyes are the windows to the soul, they say. I look into them and all I can see is black.

But even cold stone can make a spark. We twist and turn, flint and firestone, until the fire starts. Then we burn hot and fast, magnesium bright. Dark chasing light: light chasing dark. A frenzied yin and yang, spinning like a fiery Catherine wheel.

And we spark and crackle and spit until the fire burns out.

Then the light in her eyes fades again. And she's gone.

~

She's in my heart, in my lungs, my bile and my blood. But I'm no more than an irritation under her skin.

The bruises that blossom under my fingertips wither and die. Their soft purple petals never last from one night to the next.

But my bruises last a little longer.

She's buried deep inside my cold dead heart and the marks she makes will never fade.

 

~Fin~