The first hike of 2.0
I show up where you are and your eyes are happy to see me but you shake
your head. "I told you to dress appropriately, silly."
I'm scared, but I let you help me rectify the situation. My soul
feels naked too, that's what's scary. You see all the voices in
my head play across my face. "No negative inner voices allowed
today. You're beautiful." You can tell I don't believe you,
but I try.
You grab the sunscreen and help me apply it, and even that utilitarian
touch feels so good because you honor me. It's been so long, if
ever, since I've been truly honored.
We head toward your favorite rock, our favorite, but we don't stop
there. You say you have a surprise place, so we keep
hiking. The sun feels so good on my skin. I love the
freedom. I feel fear slowly slipping away. It's flat enough
that my wheelchair is okay for now. It is so beautiful
here. We talk about silly things and we don't talk. I tell
you that I got hit by a car a couple of years ago, so now technically
I'm nonweight bearing for now, although I'm working on getting stronger
again. You say you can handle it, and to stop worrying.
After about 45 minutes in various beautiful terrain, I hear a sound
that I love. Water. A waterfall. We sit and watch it
for a while. You tell me you'll be right back. I watch you
until you disappear from sight. Suddenly I remember something and
it shakes me. I wonder if you remember. You're the only one
I've ever told.
Sure enough, when you come back, you smile. "Let's go see what it
looks like from behind." Tears start streaming down my face, but
you just smile, understanding. You pick me up and carry me a
little ways to a shallow cavelike place behind the water where you have
laid a blanket. Again with utmost honor, you lay me down and
place me on the side facing the water. You lay behind me holding
me and watch it with me, seeing the rainbows and getting lightly
splashed. I think about all that's changed and how happy I am to
be back near you. Water is so strong and free. Like
me. It fills me.
You nuzzle into my neck, and ask me if I trust you. I nod.
There's no fear now, for now, for once. You tell me to close my
eyes. I do, and soon there is some kind of soft cloth around
them. A blindfold. I shiver, but not from fear. I'm
amazed you remember. You are definitely the only one that I've
told you that I'm curious about removing some senses to heighten others.
I feel you move away from me. I shiver from the lack of your heat
and slight fear because I don't know where you are or where you are
going. I'm so vulnerable here. I need you, in more ways
than one.
Just when I feel really panicked, I feel your hands rolling me over on
to my stomach. Then, with your fingertips, you touch around my
neck and whisper that it's so beautiful and that you love it.
Then, you plant small kisses where your fingers just were, repeating
the same whispered phrases.
My entire brain and body surges to life. Oh my God, you're
tracing me. You remember tracing. Reading my thoughts, you
laugh into my neck. "Of course I do, silly."
You take my hair gently out of its braid, and play with it with your
fingers, amazed that it is now mostly down my back. It's my
purest form of rebellion from her. You realize that, and
congratulate me, tell me against my hair that it is beautiful and proof
that I am strong. I almost believe you that time.
You continue tracing down my back, telling me that every spot you can
touch and kiss is loved and beautiful. No it's not, I try to
think. It is bent and crippled. But the tracing is breaking
down my resistance to the soul truth, and you know you're
succeeding. I feel your smile on one of my lower cheeks.
After thoroughly tracing everything you can reach when I'm on my
stomach, always affirming beauty and/or desirability out loud, you roll
me onto my back. I still can't see anything, but I can hear
everything intensely, the water, your breathing, your whispers, my
heartbeat.
Your physical nearness disappears again, but the fear is gone. I
hear you kneeling on my right side near my head. "Open your
mouth, my little bird" you whisper. I do, and in a little bit, I
smile. It's a grape. You keep feeding me this way, with
little pauses in between.
After one of the pauses, I receive a kiss instead of the expected
fruit. I am startled, but after a second, I return it
wholeheartedly, not desperately yet, just completely there. I
feel your surprised smile. Well, I think laughingly, I told you
I'm not the same little girl anymore, not by a longshot. Again
reading my thoughts, you laugh "that you did" when the kiss breaks.
You are holding me, and I reach up to return the favor, but you tell me
to keep my arms relaxed. You resume tracing, this time whatever
you can reach from the front, with the same out loud
affirmations. When you get to my breasts, we both feel some
response, but that's not what you're after, not what you're
doing. Not yet. I feel so alive that it is exquisite
torture. You are being deliberately slow and thorough.
When you reach my belly button, I really respond, and I laugh.
This is the spot I used to think of when we mentioned the phrase soul
spot. Because any attention there, which it never gets, makes me
absolutely crazy. We both are drunk on my laughter, and you keep
up the torture, holding me down so that I can not squirm away.
When we both need to breathe you continue down, skipping the obvious
next part and concentrating on tracing my arms and legs.
When you are done tracing every other inch of my body you can reach,
you stop for a while. Everything is heightened, and I wonder what
will happen next. I know what I need, for once, but I don't know
if it is mine to ask for now. I gave you so much pain
before. I hate myself for that, and I know I don't deserve it.
I feel you disagreeing with me. And all of a sudden, I know I do
deserve it, and that you are waiting for me to ask for it, to demand it
and take it.
So I say "will you touch me? Please touch me." And I hear
your triumphant laugh. You have won. We both have.
My body responds instantly to your touch. It has been so long,
and everything is so heightened still. I'm afraid that climax
will come too fast and then pain will take it away as usual. But
you are so slow. So exquisitely patient. You have nowhere
better to be. And you expect me to ask for what I want. I
don't know what I want. I lie. I want circles. Slow
circles. Let it build so that I don't have a choice but to give
it to you. Amazing. You move with my mind. Like you
can hear me. Just before climax catches you stop.
Groan. What the fuck are you doing to me now?
I feel something small and cold in me which takes some of the need away
because of the startle. Then it is gone. Slowly, but also
quickly, you trace up my body with your hand, and then are by my head
again, telling me to open my mouth. Once again, it's a grape, but
it tastes differently than usual.
"That's what you tastes like" you whisper. I'm amazed. It's
really good. I ask you if you would like a taste as well.
You emit a combination chuckle and groan, and then leave the vicinity
of the head on my shoulders to go back down.
I wait, expecting to feel another grape, but I don't. Just when I'm not expecting it, I feel the tip a tongue.
Oh my God. Oh fuck. You're tasting me. Nobody has
ever, not even one who claimed undying love. Called it
gross. That thought flies away, as do all others. I've
never even dared to really dream about this. Never knew what it
would feel like. But you are mimicking your former slow
circles. Eventually there is a suction feeling that I have never
before experienced and I explode, but not with pain. Still, you
don't stop. You let me, make me, I ride it out further than ever
possible before. Every time I think the pain will come it
doesn't. Every time I think the ride is over it continues.
And you're happy. I can feel your joy at giving me this. I
want to say thank you but all I can do is yell rather
incoherently. I love that I'm able to be loud and free, and I
hope you understand.
Much later, fully spent for the first time in my life, I lay beside you
on the blanket. I try to reach for you to return a little of the
joy, but you whisper that this one was about me, and that there will be
many other hikes. So I kiss you and hold you.
You take off the blindfold and I see a mirror. A full-length
mirror. You move around behind me, though still holding me, so
that my view is not obstructed. I look at myself for the first
time ever, and can't help but say "I am beautiful."
You smile. "I win"
We both do. And we are at peace. Neither knowing exactly
where this is going this time, but we will go there together. And
we will worry about the journey back tomorrow. We fall asleep
behind our baptismal water, under our blanket of stars.
~Amber~