4. ANAHUAC
He remembers:
One moment of epiphany on the banks of the Rio Grande as red dyes seep into his skin in sweeping arcs of fire and rebirth. In between the biting pain of the needle/nail and the burn of the salve rubbed into the slowly forming tattoo he realizes exactly what it is he's getting painted into his skin. Not just some dumb bird that can't stay dead.
Midnight that night, still lying on his stomach with the salve stinging over his entire back, he hears the cloth door cover rustle and smells a dusty, adulterated version of her perfume. He doesn't reach for anything, just lays there with his head on his clean forearms and waits to die.
He keeps breathing while she touches, first with a glove—clean, he can feel the lack of grit and is surprised—then with the back of her nail. Fingertips only after a long three minutes, full palm only at his shoulder blades. She tells him it's beautiful and his weakness drops onto his clean skin.
He stays on top because it's the only way it will work and looks into her eyes—those eyes he misses loves hates so much—and they're clean to start with and clean to finish. She stays beside him, beautiful fiery naked, and whispers to him about indulgence and addictions in some stupid attempt to convince herself.
He interrupts with her fingers on the phoenix's eye. Love.
She stays until the next dawn. He shows her what life could be like—how simple, with just adobe and water and wool. She walks with him through the village, maskless and quiet, reapplies the salve instead of the tattooist's assistant. It is so much like home, before confessions, until that animal inside her rakes claws under her skin as she rides away. He resigns himself to being here without her forever and watches the assistant and her shimmering black hair.
But that night she comes back without her mask—still has her sword, smart girl—and speaks softly to the tattooist, who nods and leaves them both. She traces the phoenix again and kisses him again and tonight he takes the lead like he hasn't in a long time.
He falls asleep with his head pillowed on her stomach and wakes up on his forearm with the assistant rubbing the last salve into his back. He lets the assistant finish before he tears through the village.
She is nowhere and with no one and his weakness starts to claw at his brain before he returns to the tattooist's and sees soft inky black spreading upwards over tanned skin. The panther is all curves and muscle and its tail curves just slightly onto her left hip; its right forepaw stretches across to the soft flesh that has never been a love handle above her right hip. She watches him with molten golden eyes and smiles just a little. Next to her head, smoke trickles up from a bowl while the tattooist forgets to breathe and drives the needle into her skin.
He understands and waits outside, washes himself and eats some sort of midmorning meal. Later, he takes a small portion of meat and corn and waits still. The assistant takes in one plate of food; he has a feeling that the tattooist is still hungry when the assistant brings the empty plate out.
The stars are up when the tattooist comes out and he goes in tentatively. She is drowsing on the table, the ink set and dry and warm. He brushes her hair back and smiles down at her barely opened eyes.
So many reasons she could've done this and he wants to know, so badly, but most of all he wants to know why she moved it. He doesn't ask, just runs his fingers through her hair to make up for the sixteen months that he hasn't.
She's almost asleep when she tells him, softly, and he almost laughs with the superficiality of it. Because she doesn't want the stretch marks to ruin it.
He cries and cries and kisses her and cries and three days later, he follows her out of the village with his hand held tightly in hers. Her sapphire is the same color as his eyes and he feels stronger than the sun. And it's hopeless and useless because she'll never listen to him, but he thinks Carissa would be a good name for a girl.
Happy 4th of July!
Hey, if anyone is on Livejournal, I just got one: http/deemn. me! I'm all excited about it. It's all shiny and new. It's like Christmas in July!