The Pisces
Page 36

“I want you too,” I said.
“We shouldn’t do it here,” he said. “Not on the beach at daylight.”
“What do you want to do?”
“Okay,” he said. “Let’s go.”
But he began to finger me, first tickling my clit just a little, then teasing my hole. I was already soaking wet.
“Come on,” I said into his mouth.
“Okay,” he said, fingering me harder.
“You’re finger fucking me on the beach and you’re a very young man. This is your first time fingering a girl. What do you have to say about that?”
Of course it was not his first time. But I wanted it to be.
“I’m finger fucking your beautiful vagina and it’s my first time. You’re the most beautiful girl I’ve ever seen. I can’t believe it. I can’t believe I get to finger you.”
He intuitively knew exactly what to say to have me writhing. Or perhaps I planted the words in him, as so much of what our lovers do and say is imagined. We turn them into who we want them to be. We fill in their bodies and words for them.
He pulled out his finger and sucked it, then put it in my mouth.
“Taste yourself,” he said. “You are delicious.”
“I am?” I asked. I nibbled his finger a little.
“You are,” he said. “But it’s not safe here like this.”
“What should we do? Do you want to go back in the ocean?”
“Not particularly.”
“So then let’s try again.”
I rolled over, out from under the blanket, and stood up. Then I brought the wagon over to him.
“Okay, hold it very still,” he said, and hoisted himself on backward. I covered him up in the blanket. This time he stayed on.
As I pulled him across the beach, there were just a few stray joggers and assorted weirdos nearby. His blanketed tail jutted off the wagon, but it wasn’t the strangest thing to happen in Venice. No one seemed to notice or care. It wasn’t like I was smuggling a dead body.
36.
I wheeled him up to the side gate of Annika’s house.
“Wow,” he said, gaping up at the glass structure. “The other place I was in was just a wooden shack.”
“Yeah,” I said. “My sister’s place is really nice.”
I could hear Dominic barking from inside. I had never heard him sound so loud and unhinged.
“Oh God,” he said. “I forgot you had a dog. I’m very frightened of them.”
“Dominic is really sweet,” I said. “But I can put him in another room if you want.”
“Please,” he said.
I went inside. Dominic was baring his fangs.
“Okay, chill,” I told him. But he growled and showed his gums to me. I also saw that his penis was out, the red lipstick of it extended from its sheath. I knew this happened to dogs when they were angry or excited. Why was he so agitated?
“Come here,” I said, and he began to whimper. “You’re going to go in this room.”
I opened the door to my sister’s pantry and put in his food dish and water. Then I dragged him in there by the collar. He put his head on his paws and his tail between his legs, but when I went back outside he began barking maniacally again. I didn’t know what to do. This was not the glowing bubble I had envisioned.
“How scared are you?” I asked Theo. “Maybe if he just comes out and meets you.”
“The problem is that if he attacks I can’t get away.”
“He won’t attack,” I said. But I had never seen Dominic this irate and I wasn’t sure.
When we imagine a situation—when our hearts decide this must happen—we will go to any lengths to make the fantasy happen. In my fantasy there was no barking. There was only me and Theo on the soft sheets and a universe of silence.
“Wait one second,” I said. “I’ll be right back.”
I remembered I had seen some doggy tranquilizers in one of the kitchen cabinets for things like airplane flights. I got two pills and hid them in a treat, then went into the pantry and stuffed it into Dominic’s frothing mouth. Two was double the dose. Was I awful? Would I be punished? Next I turned on some music, something ambient of my sister’s, a soft electronic yoga chant meant to soothe the most stressed-out human or animal.
“He should be quiet soon,” I said, coming out the side door.
Then I realized that Theo was still in the wagon.
“Oh God,” I said. “I’m sorry, let me help you out of there.”
He smiled nervously as I pulled the wagon into the house. In my visions, Theo would be able to go anywhere on his own. He would be part Paralympic champion and part giant snail, easily gliding from room to room and up the stairs. But there really was no way of getting him up there.
“Maybe we can relax on the sofa,” I said, pointing.
My sister’s sofa was white and I felt nervous about getting it covered in kelp, sand, the sheen of sea dirt that accrued and attached itself to Theo’s tail. I was covered in the beach and ocean salt too.
I took the blanket off of him and laid it on the sofa. He flipped himself onto the floor and began to drag himself over. I felt proud of him that he was unashamed to do this in my presence, to let me see him so vulnerable. It was adorable—him flopping around out of water, trying to be strong for me, arms straining. Who was this magic creature in my sister’s home? How had this even happened?
He hoisted himself onto the sofa and lay down on his back.
“What’s that?” he asked, pointing to the big flat-screen TV.
“It’s a television,” I said. “It projects images and sound. But right now it’s off. It’s sleeping.”
“Do you enjoy it?”
“Not really,” I said.
“Come over here,” he said.
I got on top of him. We kissed each other with open mouths, sucking at each other like we were eating mussels. Then we kissed slow and gentle. I noticed that Dominic had stopped barking. How long could Theo stay with me? Would we be able to bend time in any direction we wanted, or would reality have to come snapping back? As long as we still had one more moment I felt safely enshrouded by a womb of light, protecting me from the nothingness. But as I lost myself in his kissing, I felt a strange darkness creep through that barrier and overwhelm me. I was part of him again, twins again, and I felt the surge of the ocean—the real one or maybe the ocean of consciousness—but this time the ocean was scary and dark, and I couldn’t breathe. I felt nervous, responsible for him, like I needed to pretend I was fine. He flipped me over. Now I was trapped under a strange fish.
He stopped kissing me.
“Are you okay?” he asked.
I was the one who was supposed to feel comfortable, in this home, on land. It had been so brave of him to come, to do something so risky, but it was me who was suddenly afraid. I lied and said I was good. My sister’s home looked like a strange submarine to me, spinning in a vast ocean. There was nowhere for it to land. We kissed some more, but I was being consumed by terror and scared that I would float away or drown.
Just let yourself go, I said to myself. I wondered if the darkness and sadness were coming from him or from me. I stopped kissing him again.
“You have experienced great sadness,” I said.
“Yes,” he said. “But I suppose we all have.”
“But you’re so intuitive. I can really feel you, I can feel the way you feel. You feel other people’s pain, don’t you?”