Lonely Waters

Alex finishes undressing; jeans, socks, briefs go into the laundry bag. He checks his T-shirt. Too much blood. Won't do with a good wash, this one will have to be burnt. He drops it in the sink with a sigh. He unstraps his prosthesis; that goes to the top of the clothes pile.

He reaches for the shower faucet, turns it on and waits with a patient hand for the water to be warm enough. He steps into the tub, closing the glass door behind him. Doors are fine. He doesn't like curtains, they always stick to your body. And anyway, he's used to splashing a lot, water all over the place.

He wishes he could swim in the liquid curtain falling along his tired limbs. He quickly washes; he'd like to enjoy it longer, but he can't grant himself a proper foaming soap. Not that money matters, it hadn't for a long time now. But any fine or special scent following him would be a threat. With a shiver of disgust, he remembers that once he had to wash and shampoo with dish soap - just to leave nothing but a detergent smell in the place where he had to *work*.

All the same with cologne and after-shave. Only the most common and easy-to-forget brand for him.

He's quickly done with the shampoo as well.

At last, he can enjoy the good part. He lifts his face toward the shower head, and with his right arm clutched at his chest, he lets the water pour on him, like a warm summer rain. He tilts his head, feeling the hot pounding in the hollow of his collarbone, massaging his sore muscles. 'Should be fine to leave his exhausted bones between trusted hands.

Alone. He didn't really choose to live that way, or did he? He can't even remember how it was, years ago, before he became everybody's target and walking death at the same time.

His stump itches a little bit, he raises it into the steaming flood. At least this time it's the remaining part that expresses itself. He hates when his missing hand, or wrist, or elbow remind him of their spectral presence. To scratch in the thin air never was a solution.

This is recent enough to be remembered. But trying to imagine a body close to his, hands on his flesh, lips on his mouth, is becoming harder and harder as time goes by. A few years ago, he still could summon memories of ancient lovers. Ghosts don't bother him. Dead are dead, full stop. But today he can just try to imagine how love-making was. Even fucking. For so long now he's grown used to lying down, hugging himself, his knees curled up, pretending that *somebody* is spooning him at night.

He leans back against the tiled wall, offering his chest to the drenching flood. He softly massages his ribs, and slowly moves under the running water. It feels like somebody else's fingers; he has no real control over the drops, he merely stretches a little bit under their soft stings.

He almost never strokes himself when washing. A shower is too pure a feeling, he doesn't want to 'spoil' it. He prefers to imagine he's going diving. He can't allow himself the sheer pleasure of skin- diving anymore; he wishes he could, but beside having to be in the right place at the right time, it would be a foolishness to expose himself that way. He always goes down alone, relying only on his diving-knife. This one was never used for any deadly purposes, except for urchins, and once, for a sole he pinned right to the sand. Cooked it on the beach on an improvised fire. Not very good, slightly burnt, but it was *his* sole.

Jerking too has become less satisfactory with passing time. He can't depend on single sensations these days. His hand reminds him of none but his own, and he needs wilder fantasies to come. He doesn't dare think of too tender acts, he really feels very badly after them. Better to walk on the hard side, the pleasure comes and vanishes quickly, and his sleep is undisturbed then. But trying to think of somebody caring for him is unbearable, it's like he's losing something each time.

He bets the water is going to run cold in a few minutes, better to leave the tub. Yet he turns once more to face the wall, leans his forehead against the white tiles, and lets the remaining hot water tenderly run over his back; ethereal caring hands that soothe, comfort, understand.

He curses himself. He's waited too long; the water is still tepid, but his eyes have betrayed him, and tears run on his cheeks along with the droplets falling from his short dark hair. He bites his lower lips, and his right fist repeatedly hits the wall, until the physical pain overcomes the bitter squeeze inside his chest.

Get out of here, Alexeï. Anyway, you know that tomorrow things will be worse. And the day after tomorrow all the same.

Back to the anonymous motel bedroom, draped in an equally anonymous bathrobe, he sits down on the mattress' corner, and hits the remote. On the little TV set, a pompous man with 'shrink' written on his forehead is explaining to a very attentive and widely smiling lady that people who usually shower several times a day show a hidden tendency to suffer supposed sins, and suffer the illusion that they can wash away the wrongs they have caused in the past, searching forgiveness. He even quotes Lady McBeth.

Alex turns the TV off, and very purposely he throws the remote to crash against the opposite wall. He absently brushes his wet jetblack hair, unwraps the robe, slips under the cold sheet. He switches the nightstand lamp off, and tightly takes hold of the cold pillow. Then he gently sucks his knuckle, closing his soft lips around it, trying to summon faded memories behind his lowered eyelashes.