I don't know her name. She has a lot of reddish brown hair, I think it's called Chestnut-like the tree. It falls around my head like a veil. Her skin is pale and it's cool to my touch as I caress it. I am lying down inside a haze. Someone has laid me out, like death. I am almost dreaming.
There is a shroud around us, which shimmers like a cobweb as if a soft breeze were blowing through it. I can't see through to the other side. Maybe we are alone; maybe we are the only people in the universe; myself and this beautiful woman above me. I can't remember who I am any more; I am just a sensation, an object, a body. I am barely alive.
I feel her wind her legs around mine, her soft flesh pressing into my cool flesh till there is no space between us as far as our waists. Her heart beats against my ribs. Her blood does not warm me. I offer no resistance.
Glancing down at my body, I see that I am naked too. Passive, naked and weak as a newborn baby. Is she an angel? Am I blessed to be chosen by an angel? She is holding my face gently in her hands and I cannot avoid her eyes as she lowers the rest of her body to meet my own and encloses me. She smells of lavender, she smells of desire. I crave her touch; I hunger for her body. Enmeshed, entangled and woven together we writhe and moan our way to the fulfilment of our lust. We are matched for length, a perfect fit.
I am not in control here.
Yet, we sigh together as a sign of completion and we relax, synchronised. In my mind's eye, I see clearly sperm meeting egg, fertilisation, and the promise of new life and it saddens me.
She presses her sweat dampened cheek to mine; her eyelashes stroke my jaw as she closes her eyelids. Her hair falls around me like tiny snakes. I feel the muscles of her mouth form a smile. She does not let go.
I still don't know her name.
Beyond the silence, I hear soft weeping. I ignore the salty tears that drip into my ears. My heart feels no elation, no satisfaction. Within the tightness of my spasming chest, it feels betrayed.
A name speaks itself to me borne on the tears: Mabus.
I close my eyes but the weeping continues.
