Question

He blushed softly, when for the first time he revealed some of his body to me. Standing before me to behold, in plain pants that spoke of some gentle, simple quality in him, I stared. How could this be? His scarred skin jilted my eyes in a million directions, at a million little details to see, and as my sight roamed him, he flushed in that delicate, embarrassed way. In an ashamed way. And I, in turn, felt ashamed, that I should look at him as if to say, "What are you?"

I looked down. "You know...," I started. I looked up to see him looking askance at me, and I wanted to turn away in shame, for accusing him of something horrible with my eyes. But I didn't.

When he said nothing, I went on. "I have a scar somewhere on my back, from being slashed years ago. But I don't quite remember the location." His eyes spoke nothing but questions to mine, and I wanted to provide answers for him so badly that it pained me. I turned around and took off all the clothing that covered the top half of my body. Now I felt the heat of embarrassment.

"Could you find it for me?" My head was down, and since I faced away from him, I couldn't see his reaction. But I heard him come closer to me until I felt the warmth that radiated from him. Then I knew his hand came up to cautiously touch my skin, as his hand was slightly cool for whatever reason, but it felt nice against my near-feverish body. What was I thinking? My head swam in stray thoughts, and the next thing I became aware of was that I faced him again, and his arms were wrapped around me, as mine were around him.

Some scratchy sensation pricked me at my right breast, so I pulled away some and looked down; it was the grate that was on his left breast (and why was it there?). I glanced at him; he glanced at me. I couldn't say anything, because the words stuck in my throat, but I got the feeling that the same thing had happened to him. Here we were, in some lonesome room together with our lonesome selves, standing too close and staring each other down. What was expected next? I don't think we knew, but we had to guess.

Licking away the suddenly dryness of my lips, I went forward and kissed him. But it was a quick, millisecond kiss, one that should have been meaningless and forgetful. Yet he started, and his mouth fell slightly ajar, and he looked at me with wide blue eyes that almost looked clueless. But I knew better. I knew he wasn't truly surprised. And he knew that I'd do it again too.

So for knowing this, he kissed me instead, with a longer and more careful method. Our eyes, with our heads tilted so that our noses didn't have to meet at the ends, were kept open for a second; in this moment we saw each other in that kiss, and maybe something clicked for us. Our eyes then shut, and we shuffled our feet to be a bit nearer, and we held on with our arms a little tighter than before.

Since he was closer to it, I walked myself forward and him backward until the backs of his legs bumped into the bed. I kept moving, so he was forced to sit down. This was when we broke apart, and looked at each other again, I gazing down at him, and he staring up at me. What we didn't want to say was that we knew what would happen in the short time to come, so instead, we, as calmly as we could, watched each other. Neither gave in for the longest time, so we ended up watching for what seemed forever. But I finally admitted my defeat and sat down next to him. However, I never let his eyes out of my site, and his followed me as well. We watched, we looked, we stared, we gazed.

Did we give in, then? I suppose one answer would be yes, but then another answer is just as likely no. We did not bare our souls that time, for it would have been too much to ask. But did we say, in that quiet, calm moment, that maybe, that perhaps, given a chance, we might care to one day?

Well, that is not for me to answer alone. That is our answer to give.

And so that's yours.