Secret Bird
by Politic X

Part 10
See part 0 for header information.


She sighs.  "Are you waking me up?"

"No."  I whisper.  "Go back to sleep."

She does, for a minute.  Then her eyes open again.
"Hey."

"Hi," I squeak.  I'm dumbfounded by her beauty.

"You're staring at me."

It's impossible not to.  I'm mesmerized by her
eyes, drifting open and shut.  I love her lips.  I
brush them tentatively with my own and let them
rest there for a moment.  It's impossible not to
stare because she's the most beautiful and brave
woman I've ever known.

We kiss, and she falls asleep again.

Sometime later, I wake up, and our hands are on
each other.  I don't know who started it, but it's
tender and soft until our mouths lock together.
Then our hands are rough, fast and desperate.

I'm too hot, and I sit up, needing air.  Dana rises
to meet me, scoots up close and wraps her legs
around my waist.  Her palms are flat on my back,
and something about this touch makes me feel strong
and protective.  I hold her, stroking her hair, and
we kiss.  And this kiss is not about sex at all.
And every kiss after is not about sex at all.

"This is incredible," Dana breathes, her lips on my
clavicle.

"This is love," I tell her.

-----------------

I'm sitting on the sofa with my arm crossed around
one knee.  I have on one of Monica's t-shirts and
nothing else.  My hair is slicked back wet, I smell
like soap, and there are angry red marks on my
neck.

Monica's sitting in the club chair again, with her
legs crossed at the ankles.  She has on a robe and
nothing else.  Her hair is a damp mess, she smells
like shampoo, and there are angry red marks on her
neck, down her back and across her hips.

We stare at each other.

No sound has come from the guest bedroom for hours.
Stephanie and her companion are asleep.  It's
almost 5:30 in the morning, and Monica and I
haven't slept very much, but I don't think either
of us cares.  We kept waking each other up with
touches and kisses until, finally, we gave up and
put on a pot of coffee.

And so here we sit, drinking.  Monica smokes and
watches me stare at her.

I don't know about this woman.  She's beautiful,
kind, and smart.  She doesn't play games, she
doesn't lie, and she doesn't wear a mask.  There
have been other women, pretty and sweet and
trustworthy, but they aren't her.  No one's ever
been her.

She said she's in love with me, and I don't doubt
her.  Not really.  It's just that the image of
Marty Cheron, dark-haired, dark-eyed, with his hand
on her chest, claiming her heart, burns me.  It
nags at the back of my mind.  I want to look at the
photograph right now, to see if the expression on
her face is the same as the one I've seen tonight,
to see if she loves us the same.  I have to know
who he was to her.  I have to know that I'm more
important.

"Are you okay?"  Her voice is soft.  She's finished
smoking, has put out her cigarette and sits with
her hands folded across her stomach.

I shake my head, no.  No, I'm not okay.  I won't be
okay until I know that she's mine, and that no part
of her belongs to that man or anyone else.  I may
not be okay even then.  I may burn like this
forever.

She rises slowly, wincing.  I know she's sore; she
should be.  "What is it?"  She walks to me.

I stare at her, wanting her.  I see Marty Cheron
with his hand on her breast.

She stands before me, tall, sleepy, and beautiful.
I place my cup on the coffee table and reach up,
opening her robe.  She shudders.  My hand reaches
between her legs.

********

Dana's showering again.  I'm on the roof.

I came up here to open her loft-warming present.
I'd forgotten all about it until I put on the
coffee earlier.  I wanted to open it somewhere
private.

I rub my fingers over the paper, take the ribbon
between my hands, and pull.  I wonder what kind of
gifts Dana gives.  It looks like she had the flat
box store-wrapped, and I wonder if that means
what's inside is as impersonal as the paper that
covers it.

Or maybe it's very personal.  "You might want to
open it later," she said.  Why?  Maybe she's bought
something that will give me an indication of how
she feels about me.  Maybe what I'm holding is what
she thinks of me, what she thinks I like or what
she thinks will touch me.

"It's an ashtray.  A huge one."

I whirl around to see her laughing.  And what a
sight she is.  Her face is scrubbed free of makeup.
She's wearing another one of my t-shirts - the
other having become soiled - and a pair of my
jogging pants under her leather coat.  The t-shirt
is a bit big on her, but the jogging pants are
ludicrous.  They're scrunched around her ankles.
She has on the shoes she wore last night - chunky
ankle boots - and she looks ridiculous.  I decide
immediately that I really, really like sloppy on
her.  And I want to kiss her.  She looks more
rested than I've ever seen her, despite not
sleeping much last night.

"I'm kidding," she chuckles.  "Open it."

I look again at the paper.

"It's not much, Monica.  Not enough for you to
ponder like this."  Her eyes are looking up at me,
and her teeth are white, biting her bottom lip.  "I
didn't know what to get you," she says shyly.  "I
didn't know you well enough.  I still don't."

I close my eyes and slowly reopen them, and she's
still here, and she smells like my soap and my
shampoo, and she used my toothbrush this morning,
and she's wearing my boxer briefs and my jogging
pants and my t-shirt, and I kiss her.  I'm so happy
I could cry.

"Open it.  Get it over with."

I never would have guessed what's inside.

"It's a hex sign," she says, her lips twitching.

I nod.  I know what it is, but I've never seen one
like this.  I've seen them in ceramic - large white
disks that hang over doorways of barns and houses
in the Pennsylvania Dutch Country - but I've never
seen a stained-glass one.  "Do you know what it
means?"  I ask her.

"It's supposed to bring you good luck and peace."

I nod again.  I need to sit down, because tears are
blurring my eyes and I don't want to drop it.  I
sit down right there on the spot and lift it out of
the box - it's larger than a dinner plate and
heavy, leaded glass - and I cast the box aside so
that I can hold my loft-warming gift up to the
sunlight.  After a moment of silent gratitude, I
begin pointing to the parts and explaining their
symbolism to her.  I circle the rosette, whose
leaves are in varying colors, with my fingertip.
"The flower represents good luck.  It has twelve
petals, one for each month of the year."

Dana kneels beside me.

"Everything in it means something, even the colors.
Blue is tranquility and peace, white is faith,
yellow is health, purple represents something
sacred."  I look at her.  "Red is passion."  I
trace the rosette.  "It's outlined in black to hold
all of these elements together, and black's also
the color of protection."  She's looking at me, not
the hex sign, but I keep on anyway, because I want
to tell her what she's given me if she doesn't
know.  The artist went to great lengths to
incorporate a lot of symbolism in the piece, as if
there was someone important he wanted to protect in
every possible way.  I point to the circle that
separates the inner part of the rosette from the
petals.  "The circles represent continuity, the
life cycle and everlasting love."  Our eyes meet,
but I don't expand on this particular bit of
symbolism, because it's doubtful that she bought
the piece of stained glass for that reason.  I know
why she bought it.  It's my favorite part of the
artwork.

"The doves symbolize peace and happiness.  That
they're crossed over each other represents true
friendship."  The doves are inside the rosette, in
the center.  They look away from each other, and a
heart is centered between their heads.  My throat
is scratchy and my voice becomes hoarse.  "The
tulips symbolize faith and trust in mankind."  And
for this reason, the tulips are my favorite part.

Her hands are on mine, she's easing the heavy piece
back in the box, and then she's touching my face
and kissing me softly, her hands running through my
hair.  "You're amazing," she murmurs.  Oh, she's
opened up so much since yesterday.  So gentle.

"This was your hex," I tell her.  "I told you that
story about Svetlana canting a hex on Irina.  You
came here last night to cast a spell on me, didn't
you?"  I'm teasing her playfully, but this means so
much to me, it's so wonderful, that I'll never
forget it.

"It's corny," she says at once.  "Anyway, you're
the one who cast the spell."  Her voice is shy, and
a blush rises to her face.

"It's not corny at all."  I hold her loosely in the
chilly breeze, on the cold roof.  "It's beautiful."
I say, looking over her head at the blueness of the
sky.  "So is this day."  She looks, too, and we
slowly stand and gaze out at the city.

I walk to the edge of the roof, lost in my
thoughts.  I'm listening to the music of noon in
Georgetown; church bells are ringing.  The smell of
grilled seafood wafts to us on the breeze, making
me hungry.  And I feel so alive that I'm certain I
can catch the atmosphere in my hands like a little
bird and release it back to the sky.

Dana's lost in other thoughts.  "So.  Think you
could stick with me for a while?" she asks in a
tentative voice.

'No,' I want to say.  'A while isn't long enough.'
I inhale and exhale again, and decide that such
emotion might frighten her away.  She's more
vulnerable than I've ever seen her, and I don't
want her to fly off.  "I don't know.  There's the
work thing."

She arches her right eyebrow, the one that arches
the highest.

"Getting you away from it," I say.

Her eyes slip over my body.  "I suppose you could
seduce me away."

"Really?  Once a week?  Saturdays, maybe?"

"Sundays, too, possibly."

"Mondays?"

She looks to the sky, as if considering her
schedule.  "I think most of my Mondays are open."
Her eyes move back over me very slowly.  "And
Tuesdays are never bad."

I smile and stretch my arm out to her, touching my
fingertips to hers.  "What about hump day?"

Her lips twitch and then purse.  She's trying hard
not to smile.  "Oh, I'll give you my hump days."
She curls her fingers around mine and she stares at
our hands.  Her face takes on an almost bashful
look.  "I'll give you every day you want, Monica."
And then her eyes are boring into me, direct and
intense.

"I'll take all of them," I tell her, and raise our
entwined hands in victory.  We've escaped this
emotional wasteland.  The sky is beautiful blue,
deep, inviting, and pure.  I tilt my head up and
stretch my other arm out.  The breeze blows through
me and washes me, and I don't feel quite as stained
as I did yesterday.  Even though D.C. is still
soulless and cold, it will be my home as long as
it's her home, for as long as she lets me love her.

And maybe one day we'll leave here and go to a
place where the air is sweet and clean, and the
land is covered in trees and green, green grass,
and there are no conspiracies and no lies and no
mysteries and there are no secret birds locked away
because they're all free, singing and soaring.

Like love, uncaged.

THE END,
'Secret Bird'
by Politic X
politicx@aol.com



### The End ###