Not even inspired so much as stolen from Girls. Title comes from Heartless: the Story of the Tin Man, which includes the song Yours Alone and which will break your heart as easily as it does mine.
Enjoy.
Tin Man
'I just need to sleep next to someone tonight.'
– Marnie Michaels, It's About Time.
It's become a ritual: he'll stay up and sip scotch so long that blood vessels begin to pop in his eyes, staring at graphs projecting growth and pitches projecting into the silence. Then comes the soft knock at the door, which hesitantly opens before he can answer yes or no.
She always looks a little awkward, as if she told herself not to come (she did), that she's being stupid (she is), that she has other options (she does). She traces lines on the carpet with the toe of her pump, sandal, slingback. Her lipstick is fading at the end of the day, peach, cherry, plum. He doesn't know whether she wears her hair down every time she comes because that's the way she wore it during the day, or because she pulls the pins, clips, band out and tucks the offending article into her purse before she reaches his door.
"I know I have no right to ask."
Tonight, her dress (gown) falls in a straight white line from neck to ankle, like a streak of lightning. There are flowers around her shoulders but no further down, and her sleeves fall to the wrist and seem as if they'd like to keep on going. She is hiding inside all that light, all that delicacy.
He says nothing and stands to the side to let her in.
He doesn't need to direct her to the bedroom.
No longer hesitant, she strips, laying her dress (gown) reverently over a chair. Her lingerie is nude and as minimalistic to reduce the appearance of lines. In the doorway, he waits, watching, not commenting, until her head is on the pillow and her body beneath the sheet.
Then he lies behind her, beside her, one arm over her arm, criss-crossing or running parallel, and encloses the dainty spikes of her fingers inside his fist. He does not get under the sheet. He does nothing more than shuck his shoes and loosen his tie, and breathe where she can feel him breathing.
"I don't like sleeping alone."
"I know."
They're sleeping together, he tells her over breakfast, before she rolls her eyes and leaves with her glass of orange juice still half full.
It's only ever a matter of time.
Fin.
