Short Fiction - Dialogue With Snakes pg 4[1][2][3][4][5][6][7][8][9][10][11] Kit looked away. "Eat what? The dining room was closed." "They picked up some stuff in town. You'd already taken off. Clara said she saw you coming this way. Want something? We can go back." He moved closer, and his hands wandered up her arms. "I could eat you," he said, lowering his lips to meet hers. Kit hardly saw his face. She felt herself detaching again, and tried desperately to hold onto the sensation of his body pressing against hers, his mouth on her mouth, his hands entwined in the hair at the nape of her neck. She broke the kiss, turning slightly, lingering for a moment with her lips barely resting on his cheek. He smiled. Their fingers locked and she brought one of his big hands to her mouth and kissed it, looking into his eyes. "Go back?" she asked. "Only if you want," he replied, holding her eyes, and then, in a whisper, "I want you." Kit looked down, brushed another strand of hair off her face and laughed. Her stomach growled loudly. "Way to break a romantic mood, Kit." Al kissed her hand quickly. "What?" she said, grinning. "Since when is being ravished in the woods romantic? Just after a heavy rain. And by an actor to boot. Romantic, my ass." "Yep," he said and ran his hand down her back. "Tell me about it." Kit laughed again, feeling forced, then leaned her head into his chest, doing just what she knew was expected of her to balance Al's affection with her reluctance. She was not really in the mood for any of this - the adventure was in front of them, the Forest - and she was tired of living with the little secrets in her life, like Al, sneaking around behind Khala's back. "We've probably been gone long enough. You don't want anyone worried." Khala, she thought. Why didn't she feel any guilt? How did Al feel? Maybe they were both just horrible, amoral people. No. It was another example of how lazy they were. Guilt takes too much energy, too much thought. Khala was not worth worrying about - was Al? She looked out at the Forest and felt the tickle of hair against her neck, stirred by a rogue breeze. "Hey," said Al. "Don't go away." He touched her face. "I hate it when you do that." She touched his hand, and lifted it off her cheek. "Go back. I still want to look. It would be bad if we came back together. Everyone knows what a romantic place the woods is. Especially when you'd have to lie in three inches of water to fool around." He nodded very seriously, and took two steps away before breaking into a huge smile. "Meet me behind the mall at midnight, baby," he said, "I show you a real good time. Bye." He left. That uncomfortable mix of emotions welled up in Kit - fear, anger, resentment, sorrow, joy - She watched him for another moment then turned back to the site. Did she ever know what she was doing? Sometimes everything she did seemed like a dress rehearsal for something else, like life was a pale image of something she saw only in her dreams or out of the corner of her eye. What was she left with after time with Al, besides another reason not to take her life into her own hands? Al at least made her feel like she was part of the human race for a while, safe and normal. And she felt the world going away again, that feeling of being isolated, no matter how many people were around her, like no one really could tell she existed. The Forest - The site sat in front of her. The place that they had come two hundred miles out of their tour route to see. Everyone had agreed that the entire company would divert to Atrauk instead of going their separate ways for the two week break. They had toured most of northern Ontario and into Manitoba, and would continue in Saskatchewan after the holiday. Everyone, eating like usual around the same table, tech congregated at one end, the actors at the other, gossip thick like pollution in the air. She should have gone somewhere else. She should have gotten away from them for a while, maybe broken with them altogether, started on the plans she'd half-made over the years of how to turn her life into a fulfilling experience instead of the constant boredom it was. But the Forest - Al, she thought. The feeling of his hand on her face was fading, and she brought her own fingers to her cheek, trying to remember. Al made her real when he was there, or a little more real. Where would she have gone, anyway, if she hadn't come? It wasn't as if she even had a family to return to. And the Forest - [1][2][3][4][5][6][7][8][9][10][11] back to jenstuff
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