by Lace, Lisa
“Okay, then. You should probably stop using the harsh soaps that are provided and use a much gentler natural soap. I’ll give you the name of a supplier on Earth that can have some shipped to you and I’ll give you some of mine in the meanwhile. Have you ever heard of oil pulling?”
“No,” she said shaking her head. Elara looked overwhelmed at the amount of information spilling out of me.
“You should try it. It could clear up your eczema for good.”
“Really?” Elara said, looking like she wasn’t sure if she should believe me or not. “I’ve had it my whole life, you know.”
“Yep. I believe it. And you can get rid of the bacteria that have been causing it your whole life just by oil pulling. Take a spoonful of oil — coconut oil is the best, they have it at the store here — and swish it in your mouth for twenty minutes morning and night. Then brush your teeth as usual. It can clear out bacteria in your mouth that might be migrating elsewhere in your body and causing problems. It’s been known to cure eczema, as well as a lot of other things.”
“Wow, great. I’ll try it.” She looked excited.
“I’ll make up a bunch of labrador tea for you. Wash your hands in it three times a day. When your hands have dried, put on some coconut oil. It might help,” I said. I was in my element.
“This is great. Thank you so much, Kenna.”
“No problem. It feels good to be useful again.”
“You don’t feel useful right now?” Elara said, looking at me curiously as we hiked through the bush. I was looking for a marsh I knew was around here. There was sure to be labrador tea growing.
“Don’t get me wrong,” I said. “I love Dar and we’ve been happy together most of the time I’ve known him, which I must admit hasn’t been long. But it’s been so crazy I haven’t been able to settle into any kind of work. And I’m the kind of woman who needs something to do. I’m not good at just sitting around, you know?”
“I know. I’ve got to be busy too.”
“How’re the calculations going?”
“We’re almost done,” she said, sighing. “I’m kind of paranoid. The lives of billions of people are hanging on whether or not we’ve done every calculation correctly. I’ve had everyone recheck them five times.”
“Five times?” I laughed, incredulous. “Are you serious?”
“I’m extremely paranoid. What if we get one subtraction wrong or something and it’s my fault that everyone on Earth and Susohn die? Or the galaxy becomes uninhabitable because of a big black hole in the middle?”
“At least we won’t be slaves,” I said, joking. Then I got serious. “Look, I admire your attention to detail, Elara, but it’s time to stop checking and start doing.”
“I know. I know.”
“The scouts reported that the alien ships stopped coming in, then started up again, then stopped. Right now there are about four hundred ships near the wormhole. They’re waiting for something.”
We came to the marsh I was looking for and I spotted the low growing labrador tea immediately. I squatted and began pulling off the elongated ovals. They were thin, tough and had medicinal uses.
Elara sat down against a tree.
“I’m scared of making a mistake and having everything all go to shit,” she said.
“You’re awesome at your job, Elara. You’ve already done your best and then some. What else can you do?”
She nodded. The little collection bag I had brought was nearly full and I started on another one. I wanted to give her several bottles full of the tea.
“So, Elara, what do you have your degrees in?” I said, changing the subject. I knew that she held several.
“I wanted to study psychiatry for a couple years on Earth. And I did part of a degree before I realized that it was not for me.”
I smiled, wondering how she had even managed it for two years. She did not seem like a people person.
“That’s when I went into astrophysics. It’s a lot less complicated.” She said this with a completely straight face and I stopped picking to stare at her.
“You heard what you just said, didn’t you?”
She grinned at me.
“Comets are far less complicated than people.”
“I’ll give you that,” I said, standing up. “All right. I’ve got enough here. We can head back.”
“Thanks, Kenna.”
“For what?” I said.
“For the talk and taking me to this place. I haven’t had anyone to just chat with in a while.” Her face was earnest as she thanked me and it warmed my heart.
“My pleasure,” I said, smiling. I genuinely enjoyed her company and I hoped that we would be friends. As long as we didn’t all die in the next few days, of course.
When we got back to the complex, I made the tea and delivered it to her, along with an extra jar of coconut oil I had lying around and a bar of natural soap.
I met Dar on my way back to my room.
Seeing him coming down the hall made my heart stop. Sure, we had made love recently but it had felt a little fake. The real Dar was hiding inside this man somewhere, afraid to come out. I wanted him back. I had cried almost every night since he had lost his memories. The moments when he regained his mind were even worse because that’s when I remembered everything I loved about him. Then he was gone again, just like that. I wondered if I would ever have him back. Right at that moment, I promised myself that if I got him back I would never, ever take him for granted.
“Kenna,” he said, smiling at me. “I was just looking for you.”
“You were?”
“Yes,” he said. “Would you show me around?”
My stomach dropped. I knew what he wanted. He wanted me to take him to places where significant things had happened here on Dobu. He knew that we had met here. He was hoping to jog his memory.
I grimaced. I had had enough of that sort of thing.
“Please?” His eyes were begging me to help him. What would his sheeranla do? She would help in whatever way she could. “I know it’s been hard on you, Kenna. But there’s no one else I can ask.”
Why was I being so snarky? He needed my help. I should stop being so selfish.
“It’s fine. Not a problem. I’ll give you the tour,” I said, trying for nonchalance. “Come on. This is a pretty small place. It won’t take long.”
“Great. Thanks Kenna,” he said and started heading to the main entrance.
“Wrong way,” I said, turning and going in the other direction. “All the fun parts of the complex are over here.”
*
“First stop, the party room,” I said, indicating it gracefully with my arm. “This is where we met.”
I looked around. It was just an empty conference room with a bar at the back. It had seemed a lot more exciting that night I had come here, way back when. I shook my head, thinking about how my boss had wanted me to try and figure out what the Susohnnan were up to.
“You should have seen me in my first ever Susohnnan outfit. I thought it was quite scandalous.”
“Why were you wearing a Susohnnan outfit?” he said, confused. So, I explained my whole spy scenario and he smiled at the thought.
“You let me take you home?” he said. “Weren’t you worried about having sex with an alien?”
“I was. I had never done anything like that before. But I decided it was time for me to have some fun and live it up a little. I had spent the previous years of my life just getting by and I was tired of it.”
I watched him look around the room. It was clear he didn’t remember anything.
“Besides, we had chemistry together,” I said. “It was there from the beginning. Come on. Next stop, your fake room.”
It turned out that the fake room that Mana had set up had been in one of the sections destroyed in the bombing.
“You can’t see the room but you can imagine what went on inside since you’ve already had a taste,” I said. I blushed. I couldn’t believe I just said that.
“Yes, and I can’t get the taste of you out of my head,” he said, stepping closer.
I backed up hastily.
“Now, now. I didn’t say that to get you all riled up. We’re supposed to be staying away from each other,” I said. “Remember?”
“I remember we were trying and failing,” he said, pursuing me as I retreated.
“Good point. But still…”
“Most of the remembering I’ve done has been when I was in your arms, Kenna,” he said, finally backing me up against a wall. He pressed his body into my personal space until we were only an inch apart. “You wouldn’t want to impede my progress, would you?”
He leaned down until our lips were almost touching, then he stopped.
“May I kiss you?” he said.
And I stood for moment, thinking about it. My breath coming short and my pulse racing. Did I want him to kiss me? Of course I did. Was I going to let him kiss me? Well, that was another matter, indeed.
“Dar…”
“That doesn’t sound like a yes,” he said, sighing as he stepped back.
I smiled at him.
“Come on.”
Next I took him to the lab where we had a previous encounter. He looked around the room.
“What happened here? It’s just a lab.”
“Well, I guess after my prowess in bed…”
“Kenna.” he growled out a warning not to tease him. I wondered briefly where he was in his mating cycle.
“You couldn’t get me out of your head!”
“I know the feeling,” he said, moving over to the exact spot where we had done it on the counter. I blinked. Was he remembering?
He ran his hand over the counter.
“You know,” he said. “This is the perfect height.”
I looked at him, eyes wide.
“Sorry,” he said. “You were saying?”
“You couldn’t find me because I was human and I wasn’t in your database. So you searched for me.”
“On foot?”
“Yes. All over the complex,” I said, giving him a half-smile. “One day you caught up to me here.”
“I did.”
“I was leaving out this door and you called me. I turned around even though I was already late for work. Our attraction was so strong it felt like something was physically pulling us together.”
I walked towards him and he watched me. When I got to him, he waited patiently for me to make the first move.
“You said, ‘I’ve been looking for you.’ I couldn’t believe it. I didn’t even know you were the king yet. But you were this sexy, gorgeous guy and I had no idea why you would be looking for someone like me.”
“Kenna.” he growled again and I could see he was upset that I would say that.
“What? I still don’t understand it.”
In one fluid movement, he lifted me on to the counter and stepped between my legs, claiming my lips and taking my breath away — just like he had the last time we were in this room. For a guy without his memory, he sure acted in a similar fashion as in the past. Then he pulled away suddenly, startling me.
“You are amazing. Intelligent. Beautiful. Caring. Funny. Incredible in bed.” He punctuated each word with a kiss. “And I may not remember why I fell in love with you the first time. But I know why I’m falling in love with you now.”
I held my breath, gazing into his eyes.
“You’re falling in love with me?” I whispered.
He nodded.
“Why?”
“Because you’re exactly right for me. Because we fit together perfectly. Because you’re my sheeranla. Because I just can’t help it.”
“Dar, don’t say those things.”
“I will say those things, Kenna, because they’re true. And if I never get my memories back that still will not change the way I feel about you.”
“We are so fucked,” I said, pulling his face towards me and kissing him senseless. And as it turned out, the counter was still the exact right height for a quickie.
DAR
After our session on the counter, I needed to make love to her properly, in a bed. Even though I had only just had her, I couldn’t get enough of her. We practically ran back to my room. I pulled her by the hand to my bed.
Slowly and deliberately, we undressed each other until we were both naked. She was so beautiful. I memorized every curve and sensation. Who knew if we would be alive tomorrow or if I would ever make love to her again.
We sat on the bed, staring into each other’s eyes. I traced along her lovely cheek and down the graceful line of her neck. I swept my hands down her slim arms and back up, moving along her torso next. I brushed down her sides, barely grazing her soft, round breasts.
I knew this somehow. Her body was familiar when nothing else was. I didn’t remember her in my head, but I remembered her in my heart.
I leaned forward and kissed her with all the love I was feeling. When I pulled away, she studied me as if trying to understand.
“Dar?” she said. “Is that you?”
I nodded, not exactly knowing how it was possible but understanding that in my heart I was myself.
We kissed deeply again and then I dropped soft, delicate kisses all over her face, down her neck and on to the smooth skin of her chest. I laid her on her back and she stretched her arms up over her head. The sight of her healed hand reminded me that she had almost died. It made me appreciate this moment even more.
Then with anticipation, I closed my lips around her hard, round nipple. She moaned when I did and I suckled her. Oh, to be with this woman was heaven. I dropped my hand to her mound of dark curls and slid my finger in. She was so silky smooth and slippery that my finger went right up and inside.
She gasped and I pumped my finger into her a couple more times before pulling it out to rub her clit in tiny, light circles. I switched to the other breast and she arched into me, as if begging me to take it deeper. I took as much of her breast into my mouth as I could, sucking and nipping in a frenzy, making her hips buck with pleasure.
After a few minutes, she pushed me away and spread her legs wide, and taking hold of my erection she guided me to her entrance. Then she stopped and looked at me as if waiting for something. I froze. What wasn’t I doing that I had forgotten? After a moment, she spoke.
“Do you want me, Dar?”
“Yes,” I said. “Of course I do.”
She nodded and rolled on to her right side and I saw there was a triangle that had been carved into her beautiful flesh creating a bright red scar. I hadn’t noticed it when we made love before. It had been dark in the caves. I frowned at the sight. It must have been terribly painful.
“Kiss it, Dar,” she whispered.
I stared at it.
“Why did you do this to yourself?” I said, tracing it gently with my finger. “Why would you do this?”
She looked at me without saying anything, no expression on her face. Then I knew.
For me. She had done it for me.
I searched her eyes, trying to understand. And that’s when I felt a hot, desert wind blow over me. The sand got in my eyes and mouth and I knew I was going to die buried here. Then I saw Kenna stumbling across the sand towards me. A moment later, she was pulling up her dress and asking me to scar her leg. We both stared at the deep cut that had already been made in her hip.
“What the hell happened to you out there, Kenna?” I said.
“What did you say?” Kenna said, her eyes shocked and filled with hope.
I was back in my bed. There was no desert. No sand. No hot wind. Only Kenna’s beautiful naked body beside me, waiting for me to make love to her.
“Dar. What. Did. You. Say.” She repeated enunciating each word and looking a little wild.
“I said, what the hell happened to you out there, Kenna.” I repeated.
“That’s what you said to me after I completed
the ritual. Do you remember?”
“I saw the desert. I saw you. And the scar,” I told her. “I remember this.”
And I bent over to kiss her scar. She sucked in a breath when I did.
“I never thought I’d ever feel you do that again,” she said as I positioned myself between her legs.
“Kenna,” I said, gazing into her eyes. “I have to relearn your body all over again. I hope I’m not disappointing you.”
“Not possible,” she said, her eyes shining with tears. Then she lifted her hips so that the tip of my shaft was barely entering her sweet warmth. And oh so slowly, I eased myself into her tight depths.
Fuck, that felt good. I was home. I was finally home.
“Yes, yes, yes,” she said, under her breath, her eyes closed.
I hadn’t even moved yet but already I felt my orgasm building. I held back, knowing that she had to come first. It was important. I didn’t know why but I knew that I wasn’t a proper male if I came before she did. Taking my time, I plunged in and out of her and her body answered, arching against me in wild response.
Slowly, I thrust in and out, enjoying every movement, every gasp, and every whimper she made.
“Please, Dar. Faster,” she begged but I kept rocking into her steadily, taking the speed up slowly. I could tell it was making her insane. She was writhing and moaning under me but I didn’t speed up yet, knowing that the longer it took, the better it would be.
She was panting and begging me and finally I decided it was time. I drove into her harder and faster and she wrapped her legs around me and hung on. We kissed passionately as I continued pounding into her. A sweat broke out all over her sweet skin and she cried out as her orgasm started.
Then her body convulsed and she moaned as the pleasurable spasms shook her. I felt her muscles clenching around me and I sped up, driving into her harder and harder until I exploded inside her, filling her. I jerked involuntarily several times and then lay still.
Her hips bucked a few more times and then she was finished, too. She wrapped her arms around my back, holding me close to her.
“Don’t go yet. I want to remember how this feels.”
I stared at her. We might die tomorrow when they attempted the destabilization. I loved being inside her and — not knowing if I would ever get to do this again — I wanted to remember, too.