Silk

2.

Monday, another lazy short day that the winter-brilliant sun, warm and washed-out honey, made lazier, took its own sweet time getting up over the top of the mountain. Filtered down through the trees and all those TV towers, into the house, first the windows on the east side where Spyder and Niki were still sleeping sometime after noon. Spyder woke first, her arms around Niki, holding her close, and the sun hung itself on the wall over them, big yellow-orange splotch like a saint’s nimbus or halo, and Spyder watched it closely, suspiciously. Niki was snoring, not a loud ragged boy snore but the sort of sound a cat makes if its sleep is uneasy, and Spyder held her tighter.

She could feel the world still slipping away around her, not the jolts that had come at first; a slow, steady creep now that didn’t ever stop, or slow down, or get any faster, no matter how hard she held on. No matter that she’d sealed up the room. No matter that she watched the trapdoor to the basement to be sure it stayed closed. Spyder looked away from the sun spot on the wall, buried her face in the clean smell of Niki’s hair. Robin’s hair had always smelled of ammonia and hair dye, and Niki’s hair just smelled clean, like hair and baby shampoo.

“Wake up,” she whispered, too quiet to actually wake Niki, pressed her lips against an earlobe, gently tested the steel rings there with her teeth.

“Wake up, Niki,” a little louder this time, just a little, and Niki mumbled something through her sleep and curled into a smaller fetus. Spyder kissed a spot on her cheek, next to her ear, felt the downy hairs there brush her own rough lips.

And that sensation again, less and less time between them every day, dizzy naked feeling, like she was falling and there was absolutely nothing anywhere beneath her, or above, like she’d fall forever. Spyder squeezed Niki, held on, waiting it out, the sensation, the sudden, hollow certainty, perception her doctors would have called delusion, or just panic attacks, and then tell her to take more pills to make it stop. And she wanted it to stop, but she wanted it to stop because it was over, because she’d found a way back, a way to put everything back right again, didn’t just want to take pills that made it harder to feel, harder to trust what she felt and saw and heard, and knew.

And then it was gone again and there was only Niki in her arms and the sun on the wall, the itch beneath her skin that she couldn’t ever reach.

“Niki,” she said. “Wake up, please,” and this time Niki rolled over and stared up at Spyder. Sleepy dumb grin, and she rubbed at her eyes.

“Hi there,” she said and nuzzled against Spyder’s T-shirt, nuzzled in between Spyder’s breasts. “What time is it?”

“I don’t know,” Spyder said. “Not too late, I don’t think. Are you hungry?”

“Mhmmm,” and Niki kissed her, slipped her tongue quick between Spyder’s teeth, and she was still surprised, even though Niki had kissed her so many times, and it still made her think about Robin and feel guilty.

“I meant for food,” she said, and Niki kissed her again, put her hands underneath Spyder’s shirt, small cold hands against Spyder’s chest, waking up her nipples, making them hard. “Coffee,” Niki said, and Spyder frowned.

“I don’t drink coffee.”

“Never mind then,” and now her head was under the shirt, making Mr. Fiend’s face bulge way out like he was pulling himself free of the cloth and silkscreen ink. Niki’s mouth, warm and wet around her left nipple, teasing tongue, tooth play, and Spyder kissed the top of her head through the shirt.

Niki sucked her nipple harder, wrapped both arms around firm muscle and the little bit of fat on Spyder’s belly. Spyder let her own hands wander down Niki’s back, no shirt in the way, just a bra strap before the small of her back, skin like satin, so much softer than Robin, no hard edges, no bones showing through.

And instead of the bottomless feeling, Spyder felt something else, something almost like the way she’d once felt with them all here around her, like things might be all right, if she could be sane a little while, careful, and then Niki’s fingers were inside her boxers, tangling themselves in her thick pubic hair, her sex cupped in Niki’s hand like fruit. Aching tingle when Niki’s middle finger brushed her labia, velvet probe, and then slipped inside. Spyder shivered and there was simply no way to hold Niki close enough, to take her in and bind that sense of security, of oneness and belonging, so it wouldn’t bleed away, wouldn’t desert her, leave her dangling between the nowheres above and below and within when it was over, soon, when Niki pulled her hand away, pulled her head from under the shirt and went to make coffee. Everything was always already over before it began.

Niki laughed beneath the bulgy shirt and switched to Spyder’s right nipple.

“Niki,” Spyder said, “you’re not go

“I wasn’t pla

And Spyder looked back up at the sun on the wall, an inch or two lower, maybe, like the hand of a clock, sand in glass, nothing left behind as it passed. Except a cooling place if she put her fingers to the wall above it.

“I’m sorry,” she said. “I know you’re not thinking about going anywhere. Everyone always acts like it’s go

“I’m okay, Spyder,” Niki said, and the way she said it, Spyder could almost believe she knew what she was talking about. “We’re go

“I want to tell you some things,” and now Niki’s hand did move away, left Spyder empty and damp between the legs, but she kept talking. “Not yet, but maybe tomorrow. Maybe soon. They’re not good things, but maybe if we both know them…” and then she was too afraid to say any more, and so she just stared at the sun on the wall, slipping down, like the world was slipping down. Falling, like the world was falling.

“Anytime,” Niki said. “Anytime you’re ready, I’ll listen. And I’ll still be here when you’re done.”

“We shouldn’t make promises,” Spyder said. “It’s bad luck, I think.”

The second time Spyder woke up, the sun was down, twilight tuned down almost to night, and she could smell Red Diamond coffee and something cooking. She reached for Niki, but found she was alone in the bed, and the spot on the sheets where Niki had lain curled next to her was cold. Like nothing could be left behind but body heat and the vaguest impression of arms and legs and heads in pillows. Spyder crawled out of bed and pulled on a pair of old Levi’s, one of the buttonholes on the fly busted so her plaid boxers showed underneath.

She found Niki sitting cross-legged on the kitchen floor, some of Spyder’s tools scattered around her. “Hey, sleeping beauty,” Niki said, and Spyder poked her in the ribs with a big toe. Niki slapped her foot and went back to what she was doing, stripping black rubber insulation from copper telephone wire with a pair of needle-nosed pliers, straightening the strands of wire again.

“I’m pretty sure I can fix this,” she said.

Spyder didn’t comment, went to the stove and lifted the lid on one of the pots.

“I found a bag of pinto beans in the cabinet, and a can of turnip greens,” Niki said, then began twisting the severed ends of the phone line back together. “Too bad we don’t have stuff to make corn bread.”