The Last Exile, Chapter 27
Eleven bullets in the gut, but it was that kitchen table that finally landed him in the hospital
Zion, circa 2199.
The morning passes by without them, languid like smoke settling across a marble floor. The air is still and hot. Wakefulness weaves in and out, small islands of near-consciousness that he can hardly separate from sleep. Her lips press on his chest in strings of pearl kisses, and he threads her hair through his fingers. She might say something – his name, a phrase of endearment?- as she arches and curls around him into a new configuration of limbs, blankets and clothing, but it is lost forever, like so many of his dreams. He wants to respond, but Neo is vaguely aware that he is too heavy; his muscles cannot yield to his desire to move, yet his mind is dizzy, light, and loose. Somehow, he sees himself from above, holding her close and safe, a man with a home, secure and therefore able to provide. It is a strange weave of protectiveness and an imprecise notion of domestic responsibility that tells him to pull her closer. But he cannot act; the mind and the body are separate in this nebulous limbo, making him uncomfortable and anxious, stubborn to succumb to the exile of rest.
She is awake, too, if only barely, touching him everywhere and murmuring in his ear, something melodious but indistinct. He hardly knows what's happening before she takes him in her hands, playfully at first, then properly – nearly expertly – dissolving his torpor in firm, solid waves. He hums, eyes closed, until a gasp is pulled from his throat. Liquid fire. Her tongue traces a line along the underside of his penis. Heat pools in deep, almost lazy kisses – here…there… now here again… mercilessly unrushed, almost casual. When he can take no more, they make love sleepily on their sides, his chest pressed against her back, his outside leg bent over her hip. Their skin sticks together, sweaty in the heat as he fondles her breasts and follows her hands as she touches herself, then lets him suck on her fingertips. It's slow and gentle rocking, inconclusive, semi-conscious, at times motionless. He isn't so sure he isn't dreaming it- though he doubts his own creativity. His unconscious could never invent something so wonderful.
It might be minutes or years later when his eyes open again, and Trinity is sleeping with her knees drawn up to her chest, as a child would sleep. She cuddles a pillow, smiling faintly, her sharp features rounded by the muted light of a desk lamp that flickered on hours before. Neo watches her for a long time, caressing her under the covers, over every place that betrays her femininity and softness. She is transformed, but he thinks the change is entirely in himself. He wasn't really a man before this, he was barely even alive. He thought he didn't know how to love, he thought he must lack some kind of genetic prerequisite for romancing women. But what they've done… what has passed between them required no effort, innovation, or aptitude on his part. He simply doesn't know any other way to be with her. What they have is as natural, as awesome, as biologically fundamental as birth.
When his mouth finds its way to her lips, she welcomes him by kissing back, rolling over to pull his face towards her breasts. Well, good morning to you, too, Trin. They entwine, and her scent mixes with that of bedwarmth and fresh laundry. He burrows deeper, lower, following his curiosity down to her tummy, tickling around her navel with his tongue. In the blanketed shadows he is able to see what was abstract and mysterious the night before. Now it's real, textured, detailed- the deep curve of her waist, the startling whiteness, a sickle-shaped birthmark above a triangle of raven curls. He traces his fingers over a pattern which adorns the left hollow of her hipbone. "You have a tattoo," he observes, pushing the sheets back to study the design more clearly.
"Mm-humm." She plays her fingers across his shoulders, not yet fully awake, her voice heavy and smooth. "You like that?" she purrs.
Neo grins onto her skin, at the intersection of three interlocked pointed ovals – a small triquetra inked in black to symbolize her namesake. "It suits you."
"I didn't choose it. I don't even remember getting it. Goddamned…bastards… hazed me." He finds his way back up in time to see her eyes flutter open. "The army doesn't go easy on the girls," she says.
"Tell me about it."
She gives him a strange look, and then laughs. "Oh, Neo, you're not a girl. You're… my Lady."
"What!" he objects. "No, that isn't what I meant. I meant, tell me about it. About the tattoo, for God's sake." Though it is wonderful to see her laugh, "Oh, shut up."
Trinity does no such thing, keeping her lips curled in an impish grin. She says, "I broke the record for the jump test. The tattoo was… a gift of esteem from my male colleagues. Then they threw me, stark-naked and shit-faced, into the private hot spring of who was then the most influential old bastard on the Council..."
"What was the record?"
"It had been three attempts. I did it in two. In ten years, nobody has ever matched me." She waits for him to correct her. He waits for her to correct herself. They smile. "Until now," she concedes softly.
"Lonely at the top, isn't it?"
"Tell me about it." She chuckles a little, and there is a pause where Neo finds himself searching for words. His first impulse is to flatter. He wants to tell her how beautiful she is when she wakes up – that he is losing himself in her limpid eyes, lopsided hair and throaty voice. He could make love to her again right now – she should know that, too, just in case she is holding back on his account. But mostly, he wants to tell her how good it was for him – last night, and again this morning - that he's never had better. That she's a genius… or perhaps simply well-schooled?
Trinity is sitting up and looking through a small cubby hidden in the rock around them. He watches her, realizing that he is enduring his first bout of romantic jealousy – it's surprisingly intense, considering he doesn't know exactly whom he is jealous of. A phantom ex-lover (or lovers?) – anyone who has touched her before him. But surely, not the way he has. No, not anything like that.
"I've been saving this stuff for a special occasion," she says, carefully rolling some dried leaves to a thin cigarette, then sealing both ends. "You won't have anything this good around the city anymore. Not among soldiers, anyway."
Apparently, she didn't return from her ill-fated scavenge empty-handed. She sold some of it, she says, to buy herself a nice little cave, out of the military barracks, which are some of the worst living conditions in the city. She gestures around. You like it? This is how a Zionist drug dealer lives. Well, not really. She has to admit, she gave most of her stuff to the orphans for free.
Neo chokes on his first drag. "What?"
"The orphanage and hospitals distill the leaves to make certain medicines," she says dryly, taking the smoke and inhaling deeply, leaning her head back as she savors it. "They're starved for funds and plagued with pretty much everything else. Fucking embarrassment. They'd be better off in the pod. I'd send them back if I could."
"I'm surprised to hear you say that."
"Oh, well… things here are… complicated."
Trinity gives him the rest and stretches out like a cat, reaching up to touch the rock above them. She musses her hair, and shudders to suppress a yawn. "That'll help with your headache."
"How do you know I have a headache?"
"You do, don't you?" She kneels behind him and rubs his shoulders, beginning a massage that is far from tender. It is an effort no to cry out and jump away. "And muscle pain. It's too many imaginary workouts. We need to get you to the gym."
The thought of physical exertion worsens the dull ache in his limbs – it throbs all the way to the bone. "I like my men ripped," she whispers. "So they can keep up with me."
"You're disappointed so far?"
Her breasts press into his back as she wraps her arms around his shoulders. "It was wonderful." She kisses his neck and squeezes him tightly. "But we're just starting. It's just the first time. I'll never have my fill, Neo. Not of you."
She sends him for a shower, resisting the temptation to join him in favor a few moments of solitude. Neo gingerly picks her skirt and his pants out of the bathtub and hands them over. "What the hell are these doing in here," he wonders with a mock outrage. "Don't you have a laundry bin?"
She hits him and sets the clothing to soak in the sink. The bathroom is nothing compared to the bedroom. And later, when she drifts into the kitchen for coffee, Trinity finds his sweater in her boiling pot. Still naked, she slips it over hear head and smells him in the cuffs. Feels him in the warm weight of the fabric. Hears him singing in the shower.
She's the real thing
The real thing
Even better than the real thing…
Child
She smiles and shakes her head. Idiot. As if he can hear her thoughts, he sings louder, and further off-key. She tidies up their mess, and then starts on some breakfast, though it is already past noon. Her answering machine is filled with messages, condolences from other crews and Zionist friends. She stands at the stove with her steaming coffee and presses play, listening to the tape as she distracts herself with other things. There are a few baskets and notes outside her door – fresh bread, herbs, nuts, worry beads and mourning dolls. She sets the food on the table, though she isn't sure she'll be able to eat it. But it would be sinful to waste, and somehow wrong to give it away. So she finds a pan and simmers the mix in some water and carefully toasts the flatbread. It'll be nice for Neo to try it, after all he's been through.
So she is only passively listening to the succession of solemn voices playing over the crackling speaker of her answering machine when one message catches her attention. Not words, as her mind refuses to absorb them. It's the voice- the cadence and tenor, the rhythm of the sentences that is as unmistakable as it is impossible. She cuts her finger on a butcher's knife and swears, shaking it vigorously in the air as she hits the replay button.
Trinity. It's me. If you're there, pickup.
She hasn't heard the man's voice in nearly a decade and he introduces himself with an it's me.
I probably shouldn't be calling. But they said you'd been hurt. They said… they're saying a lot of things. I had to call. I had to know you were okay. Listen, listen to me… I want to talk to you, in person. Please call me. But don't call the office. My private number is-
Trinity erases the message before Daniel can finish, and leans back against the counter, her first two fingers pressed to her lips. She scowls and shakes her head, flummoxed at his timing. It is as if he can sense she has been thinking of him. How uncanny that she'd just been telling Neo about the swimming pool- what was it? Ten minutes ago? That hot spring had been the private Jacuzzi of Daniel's father, and after her comrades took her clothes and tossed her in, the councilman's seventeen-year-old son chased them away with an armful of rocks. Then he dove in to 'save her.' That's how they met. He thought she was drowning. She thought he was an upper class asshole who wanted to corner her until the police arrived. It didn't help she was drunk. It certainly didn't help that she was naked. She remembers bits and pieces only - that the water was steamy and sizzling, like hot champagne. She remembers he tried to rescue her with his eyes closed to preserve her dignity. She remembers it was like a hapless game of Marco Polo, and that when he finally caught her, she took a swing at him, missed, and fell into his arms.
In eight years she has scarcely thought of it. But it seems fate is determined to remind her.
"What's burning?"
"Oh, damn it." She rushes to the stove and flips the flatbread, which is charred black. She shakes her makeshift stir-fry. "Sorry. I'm… I'm a terrible cook."
"You're Martha Fucking Stewart." Neo is fresh and wet, wrapping an arm around her waist from behind. He kisses behind her ear and then pokes the tip of his nose inside. She squirms, and he chuckles. "Mmm. I'll have a Spanish omelet with bacon. Cream cheese on my bagel. Pulp in my orange juice… and a chocolate Pop Tart."
"Oh, stop… please…" She shuts her eyes and giggles as he laps at her earlobe like a dog. "Don't remind me of what I'm missing!"
"You're bacon me not to, hm?"
"Neo!"
"Oh I'm sorry, muffin. That was hamming it up a little. But breakfast puns are just… too easy. One could even say they're…"
"They're over-easy?"
He laughs and kisses her properly on the lips. "Yes. Exactly that. They're over-easy. You're getting good at this."
"Hm-hum. We're quite the pear. Orange you impressed with me?"
This seems to spark something in him, and the stir-fry is very nearly burned, too. They share it out of the pan, and eventually lapse into feeding each other, though they both agree that this is 'too much,' and they should be ashamed of themselves.
"Nobody has to know," he says, offering her another spoonful, his free hand cupped underneath. She opens her mouth, and he kisses her instead. "So gullible."
"Neo, please, I've…"She thinks about it, and realizes something as she feeds him a forkful of charred breakfast. "…I've never done this before. Hold still."
The One laughs, and leads her to the table, pulling her into his lap. "I'll be good," he promises, bending their sporks into the proper shape. His eyes – promising of boyish mischief – are innocent and charming, playful and challenging, eager yet casual, as if they'd been doing this their entire lives. Trinity takes her utensil with a knowing smile, recognizing this as an extension of their game. She kisses, and caresses playfully as he feeds her, gratified by his growing excitement, warmly pressing against her thigh. It's the laughing and whispering that drives the tempo of her heart forward, that brings about more fervent lovemaking, which moves from his chair to the kitchen table in a fit of mindless passion, untold joy, and superior lack of coordination.
That is to say, of course, Everlasting Love.
-13-
Maybe it isn't necessary to mention that that particular encounter ended with our falling off the table. Because up until that point, Trin, it was damn romantic.
Look on the bright side. Who else can boast to have seen Zion's prison and hospital within 24 hours of his first visit?
It certainly wasn't our best night, or our best morning- but I don't think I ever loved you quite like that again. I don't think I could, Trinity. I think, I gave you something that night that never came back to me.
Then I still have it. Yes, I know what you mean, though I don't know how to name it. Only that it has manifested itself as so many things, over many years – courage, joy, strength, sorrow. I suppose I'd call such a thing Potential. I see it in myself. I see it in you. I see it most in Rorie.
Beautifully, it propagates.
Zion, circa 2219.
"Beautifully, it propagates."
Neo reads the last line of their story to her, a mess of hair on his chest, under the covers. "Hmmmm," is his wife's satisfied reply. "I'm a fucking poet."
He covers her head with his hand, over his still pounding heart. "I love you."
"I'll bet you never saw it coming."
"What do you mean?"
"This…" She snuggles closer, tilting her head to murmur against his neck. "Marriage… propagation."
"Oh, I thought you were talking about that paragraph you snuck in about your ex-boyfriend." He imitates her in a high-pitched, raspy voice, "Oh, I was so drunk I can hardly remember a thing, but his daddy's pool was like hot champagne!"
"Yeah. Maybe I should send this page to Daniel so he can fill in the blanks."
Neo gabs the booklet and pins her down, pretending to be enraged as she laughs. They wrestle and kiss and call each other names, then take turns throwing their love story, page by page onto their rack of burning candles. It would have been perfect had Rorie not run in with a bucket of water, screaming fire! on her way in and screaming nothing particularly coherent on her way out.
"Beautifully, it propagates," Neo quotes, still clutching a pillow over the cause of his daughter's terror. "How much you wanna bet this ends up in the book?"
"Or on some therapist's notepad."
"By the way, we need to get our story straight about the computer. She had stuff on there."
Trinity kisses him on her way to the shower. From the bathroom she hollers, "I say we blame a carelessly opened email, and then get her something extra special for her birthday."