A Handful of Fire

by Alexis Alvarez

  “No, I don’t.” I keep my patience. “And I don’t think Michael does, either. But you do. That was just an example. I made that up. Of course, you’d say something real, Gabriel. Okay?”

  “Yes, of course. I’m sorry I snapped.” His voice is formal. I look at that picture again, wondering if he feels sadness when he looks at it because he’s lost his wife, or the boy Michael used to be. Both, probably.

  “So here’s another possibility. Another made-up one. Michael. When I come home from work and see you here, working on your math, I get happy just to be together. Seeing you is the best part of my day.”

  “That’s sappy and overdone. He’d hate it.” Gabriel turns his back and talks to the window. “I don’t speak like that, and he knows it.”

  Frustration bubbles up in me. “So talk like you talk, then, but say something meaningful to him. It’s the verbal equivalent of buying flowers for a girl you like. It’s his… love language.”

  “His love language?” Gabriel scoffs and turns to face me. “He’s too young for that kind of love.”

  “Nobody’s too young for love.” I touch my scar. “Not romantic love. Just—love. Affection. He’s starved for it, and he’s the one who starved himself. He was so upset and scared about the cancer that he turned off that part of his heart. I think you turned off, too. Now I know this is hard to hear, and harder to do, but you need to turn your heart back on, and that will be the key to reawakening his.”

  I shudder a little bit, because even though I believe my words, I can hear the unfortunate similarity to Dr. Phil. I wait for it, tense, fisting my fingers beside my thighs, but he surprises me.

  “Oh, Shai,” he says, and I hear something in his voice that I’ve never heard. When I look at him, to my surprise and shock, he’s crying. He suddenly comes and tugs me into his arms for a fierce hug, and I tense up, then wrap my arms around him, too.

  “It’s okay,” I tell him. “It’s going to be all right.”

  I’ve never been this close to him before, and it’s exhilarating, even though I came to comfort. His arms are hard with muscle, and his back is flat and taut. He smells like cologne, faint, and his own male essence, and his breath is coffee. Being in his arms is better than I’ve dreamed.

  He’s bent his head down to mine and his arms are around me, too, holding tightly. I feel his fingers splay out across my back, and a weird part of my brain is relieved and excited that I wore my best bra, the lacey one, because—well, because. I suck in a breath. His mouth is right by my neck and I can feel the warmth of his lips, and when he speaks, the reverberations tickle my skin in a good way.

  “Shai, I’m scared,” he tells me. “Every single fucking time I look at him, I feel this incredible rush of love that’s so powerful, it terrifies me. Because I can’t lose him. If I lose him, I’m going to fucking fall apart, and I’ll never come back together, and I can’t let him see that.”

  “I know,” I tell him, and I feel my eyes well. “But he already knows it, Gabriel. Just because you never said it? He still knows you’re scared. And he’s scared, too. It’s okay to tell him. It will make it better. Just—talk to him. Tell him you’re insane with worry because you love him so much, but that you’ll always love him no matter what. You don’t care if he goes back to school or fails his essays. Even if he dies, you’ll still love him, forever. That it’s okay to be… him. To be Michael. Just tell him all of it.”

  “How can I say all that without looking like a weak idiot?” His voice catches.

  “Oh, Gabriel.” I touch his cheek, and press, looking into his eyes. “Saying all of that won’t make you weak. It will make you strong. This is a kid who’s had honest talks about radiation burns and poisonous chemicals. He’s seen things in the hospital that would send most adults running for their whiskey and Xanax, you know? He can handle it. Talking about this will build the bond between you. Sometimes, when you bring the ugly monsters out into the open? They pop and go away, like soap bubbles. Gone.”

  He nods, meeting my gaze. “Okay. Okay, Shai. Okay.”

  I smile, a tremulous movement of my lips. “Okay, then.”

  The moment stretches out, infinite, and he uses his thumb to stroke away a tear from my cheek. His touch is gentle and warm, and he lets his finger linger, drawing it down my cheek. “Don’t cry, Shai,” he whispers, a rough, ragged sound. “I didn’t mean to make you cry.”

  I laugh. “Gabriel.” But my breath hitches when he puts his hand on my neck, not tightly, just resting there, and then runs the back of his other hand down my cheek, picking up more tears, and then winds his fingers through my hair at the back of my head.

  “Shai?” His expression isn’t sad anymore. I recognize desire when I see it—it’s something I’ve gazed at often enough in the mirror. “Yes?” He raises one eyebrow.

  “Yes,” I whisper back. It’s unprofessional, I can’t do it! I shouldn’t do it—but at this moment, I don’t care about anything but the look in his eyes and the feeling in my heart.

  He smiles, then puts his other hand into my hair on the other side of my head and pulls me to his mouth. He stops just before our lips meet, and we stand there, breathing into each other. The feel of his fingers on my scalp, on the back of my neck, makes me delirious with desire. I lean in and part my lips, and when our mouths meet, I close my eyes and melt into him.

  He kisses skillfully, teasing me with his tongue, holding my face with both hands. I like his easy dominance, the way he directs the action, biting my lip, exploring me with his tongue, pressing his mouth to mine with perfect pressure. I might not be getting enough oxygen and I don’t care.

  Our bodies press up, my hips into his long length, and I feel him hard against me. Without thinking too much about it, I reach down and grab his ass with both hands and pull him closer to me, and he growls into my mouth and kisses me harder, his hands rougher on my body, too. He runs his palms over my shoulders and down my upper arms, and I moan my appreciation, and then he grabs me by the waist and I feel his hands on my ass, then my sides, and he grazes my breast.

  I push into him: Yes. More, and he palms my breast and wraps his fingers around my breast through my shirt. He runs his fingertips over my body and finds the nipple, hard through the fabric, and squeezes. I whimper, but it’s a sound of pure pleasure, and he knows it, because he does it again, and again.

  “Yes,” I murmur into his mouth. “Gabriel,” and he pulls me to his lips and glides one hand under my shirt and under my bra, teasing my bare skin with his fingers, and I moan in pleasure, pushing up into his hand, letting him know how much I like this.

  “Shai,” he murmurs, and I nod a little, my hands busy exploring his arms and shoulders, his lean waist, his powerful chest. I want to feel his bare skin, too, so I pull at his shirt, releasing it from his pants and belt, and slide a palm up his abs, pushing into him as I touch, wanting to be as close as I can. When he pulls me against him I can feel how hard he is and I wriggle my hips, pumping against him, letting him know I appreciate his length, his girth, his strength. He grabs my hand through the fabric and squeezes and whispers, “Fuck, Shai, baby,” and his voice sounds ragged.

  My breath comes in pants. I slide my palm down his abs, over his belt, and down the front of his body, stopping to cup and rub. God, he’s hard. Iron. I outline him with my fingertips, tracing his shape, squeezing him against his body. He growls again and bites my neck, hard, and I whimper. That’s the spot that drives me wild. “Again,” I urge him. “Please,” and turn my neck, baring myself to his teeth.

  “You like that?” His voice is pure sex. He licks along my neck, kisses softly, making me squeak, and he bites down and sucks, and my knees go weak. The sparks of pleasure from his mouth travel to my nipples, making them tingle, and to the spot between my thighs that’s already releasing moisture, craving his touch.

  “Yeah, God, yes, I love it,” I whisper, grabbing his head with both of my hands, tugging his hair, pulling his mouth against my skin. “Bite me. Suck me. H
ard. Please.” I’m lost in his taste and his feel, just wanting more. I’m not thinking of anything right now. I’m just existing, and it feels so fucking good. I’m living in the moment, a beautiful, exuberant moment. This is my magic, and I need to grab it with both hands for as long as I can hold on.

  “Shai,” he manages, and bites harder, and I cry out, driving my hips against his, an invitation, a demand, a plea. He has both palms on me, mating our bodies, and he bites me, sucks me, moves to my lips, sometimes moving one hand to my breast, then back to my ass.

  We’re both breathing hard now, and our movements are frantic. We’re rougher. Any minute now I’m going to rip off his shirt. I’m going to whisper in his ear that I want him to fuck me, to make love to me, to fuck me hard. I’m going to beg him to lick me, to bite me on my naked hip, to touch me between my thighs, to spank my ass just once so I can hear the brilliant crack and use the sharp bite of pain to enhance my pleasure. I’ll beg to put my mouth onto his cock, and I’ll suck and lick with all of my skill and desire, wanting nothing more than to rock his entire fucking universe, and then to have him drive into me and fill the emptiness in my soul with his hard, pulsing body, to give me even more of this joy, because this is the most amazing feeling I can imagine, and I don’t ever want it to end.

  But there is a knock on the door. “Gabriel? I have the mail, and you asked me to remind you when it was a quarter till. Mark Dillard will be here in fifteen minutes.” It’s Natalie. Usually she just comes right in.

  The world around rushes back in and the passion recedes, a tide pulling back, but fast. Sped-up motion. A stop-action film shown so fast that you can’t even understand what’s happening and need to ask the teacher to rewind, once and again.

  Gabriel steps back from my body and keeps his eyes on me as he calls back, “Thanks, Natalie.”

  She must have gone away, because there is silence from outside the door, but the mood has disappeared, a rubber band that snapped and flew away into the wind.

  “Shai.” He runs a hand through his hair, which is mussed from my touch. His lips look swollen, like mine feel. I run a finger over my mouth and lick my lip.

  “Gabriel, I—”

  He breaks in. “Shai, I’m sorry.”

  “Sorry?” My eyes widen and I step backward, crossing my arms over my chest.

  He looks away. “I took advantage of you when you were just trying to help. I shouldn’t have done that. It was inappropriate. You work for me. And hell, I’m still with Arielle. ” He shakes his head. “God, please forgive me.” He busies himself with his shirt, tucking it back into his pants, smoothing wrinkles.

  I should be horrified by what just happened—what I did, kissing Gabriel, was against the American Psychological Association’s code of ethics. There’s even a specific section on it. You do not get sexually involved with family members of clients! You just don’t do it. It’s not allowed, because a therapist could lose their objectivity if they get involved with a patient’s family in an intimate way. I know this, and I believe it, and I’m terrified that I’ve turned into a person who breaks the important rules.

  But the other part of me, the part that’s starved for intimacy, isn’t sorry at all. It was heaven. It was magic. It was candy and blue skies and crystal pools and a surprise day off of school. It was finding a box of diamonds in an old attic, and getting to keep them, no questions asked. It was a genie in a bottle, unlimited wishes. It was orange soda on a hot day, it was the smell of cut grass, it was everything I ever wanted.

  He’s sorry? I put my hand to my mouth. I should be, too, I know it, but I can’t summon up anything but regret over stopping.

  He looks away, straightening his shirt, and his voice is clipped. “Shai.” He takes a deep breath. “What you said, about Michael. Thank you. It was hard to hear, but—I needed it. I’m going to try. Please. Shai?”

  I look at him, wordless, and there’s a plea in his face. “I can’t—I don’t want to lose you as Michael’s therapist. You’ve helped him come so far, and there’s still so far to go. Don’t leave… him. This won’t happen again. I’ll keep things professional.”

  I want to say that he’s not messed up, he’s normal. I want to say that I want it to happen again and again, many times again. But I don’t.

  I nod. “I’m committed to Michael.” My words come out fierce and I rub at my eye. “Yes, I’m sorry, too. I need to be professional. I should never—it’s not—we can’t. This can’t happen again, of course.”

  “I know. I know that, and I should never have even… besides, Arielle and I—” He stops. “It’s complicated.”

  I nod. Yes, it is.

  “So I’ll work on being more—emotive. With Michael. Thank you.” His voice is low. “Thank you for having the courage to tell me to my face what I’m doing wrong. I know well I’m not easy to talk to, sometimes.”

  “You’re welcome.”

  Our kiss—the one that rocked my mind—is something that needs an apology? That makes me feel empty, a brittle shell. It’s like the skin a cicada leaves, something ephemeral and transparent, the kind of thing that shatters into dust and takes off into the wind, following the kiss.

  “I guess I’ll go.” I gesture at the door and blurt out the first thing I think of. “It’s time for Michael’s Spanish tutor. He’s working on the difference between estar and ser.”

  “Okay.” He looks down at his desk, then sits. “I have work to do.” He lifts the lid of his laptop, and the blue light illuminates his face with a cold glow. His worlds are in front of him again, and I think he maybe wants to climb through the screen into them, to escape to a place where there is jolly confusion and noise and honking horns and people clinking glasses on moonlit terraces, a place without cancer and all of its myriad minions and emotions.

  When I leave the room, he barely lifts his head to nod. He’s already a thousand miles away.

  To be, and to be. Estar and ser. One is a thing that always changes, the other is a thing that always is. He’s estar. Always adapting, adjusting. He hasn’t yet found his ser.

  The kiss lingers in my mind, in the air between us, but he doesn’t bring it up, doesn’t touch my lips again. I thought things would be sad and awkward, but it’s like that kiss awakened something good that flows every time we are together. He’s warmer when we meet, letting his eyes linger on mine, giving me smiles that light up his face, transforming him into someone who’s happy.

  “Shai,” he says, gesturing to a chair, as I enter his study for our weekly debrief meeting. It’s identical to his, except it’s blue. “Herman Miller wants to embrace you in the comfort you requested.” His eyes are locked onto mine, and for a second I think it’s him. He’s the one who wants to embrace me, and he’s afraid to say it.

  “I always like to have my butt cupped in style.” I smile, enjoying the teasing tone in his voice, then stop myself. Okay, yes, we kissed, but he backed away. Well, we both backed away. I can’t get involved with the father of a client. It’s unethical, and I don’t want to do anything to jeopardize my career or Michael’s recovery.

  “It’s all right.” He grins at me. When I bend to pick up my laptop case, I think he’s looking at my ass. Fuck, and good. What do I want?

  I open my screen and point. “So here’s the proposed schedule, which I emailed to you.”

  He nods. “The Robotics Club is a great idea, Shai. It’s just that I have a meeting with clients at that time. I can change it, but it may take a few weeks to switch over.”

  “That won’t work. He needs to be there from the first meeting, because they’re building from the start. He can’t miss it.”

  “Hmmm. Well, I’ll ask Natalie to take him, maybe. Or I can hire a sitter to take him. If I can find one.”

  “Or I’ll do it.”

  We both fall silent, and I add, “I mean, it can be—therapy, you know? We can go other places besides the beach. I can help him integrate into the environment, provide on-the-spot coaching in case he needs help
interacting with the other kids. It can be part of my job here.”

  He furrows his brows, puts his fingertips together. “So, additional therapy hours, or to replace the current hours you spend with him?”

  “Additional.” I’m rash and I don’t care. “Just for the few weeks until you rearrange your schedule. It can—” and this isn’t exactly my call, I should be checking this with Allison, “—be no extra charge. Part of the therapy program that we provide.”

  He nods slowly. “I don’t care about the money, Shai.” He tilts his head. “Yes, why don’t you do that. Michael responds well to you. I think that you taking him would be good.”

  My heart leaps. “Great! So, the first meeting is tomorrow. I’ll be by to pick him up around 3:30 p.m., okay? Because it’s from four to six p.m. I’ll bring him back right after for dinner.”

  “Good.” He smiles at me, a broad smile that makes me melt and swoon inside. Then he switches topics. “Can I show you something I’m doing for Michael?”

  “Yes, of course.”

  He stands and leads me through the house to the back yard. “It’s back in the playhouse, in the yard. Do you want to get your coat?” He takes it from the rack and holds it out.

  The day is cold but windless. The snow looks almost blue-white in its pristine swathes over the yard. There’s dormant grass under there somewhere, but for now it’s just low, billowy dunes of pure white, dips and curves highlighted with gray shadows.

  When we get to the playhouse, an octagon with a cone roof, he tugs the door. It’s stuck, either from the cold or a poor fit, and it comes loose with a screech of wood on wood and a dull pop. The snow hisses as he pushes it back with the door. He gestures to me, and I step inside, ducking to get under the low entryway, built for a child. Once inside, though, it opens up like a secret puzzle box. There are crayon pictures of dinosaurs on the wall, a platform, a climbing rope and ladder. Old toys with a soft layer of dust, like a dried-out fungus that long ago gave up its lock on life.