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I was sitting across from him at the desk. He asked me how I had been doing, I asked him the same thing and he shrugged his shoulders, he had been doing well, he bit his lip slightly. We were talking calmly, laughing. I don’t remember exactly what was said or what jokes were made. I was admiring his neck, the very beginning of his chest, each part of his body was alive, requiring the same amount of love as an entire individual. He was a crowd of all these parts of himself, such a delight to my eyes, a magnificent spectacle, I think I almost shook my head in disbelief. As for my health, I was doing well for now, not better but not worse, stable, which was satisfactory. I apologized for my behaviour during our first meeting, for my inability to speak, to communicate, and he assured me not to worry, that he understood how hospitals can be daunting. You’re so beautiful is what I wanted to say, but I simply smiled instead. I was so happy. I was flirtatious, I wanted him to know. He knew, but I couldn’t tell if he was flirting back. I thought he was; he was staring precisely at the very centres of my eyes, at my pupils which were expanding in response as they were staring back, welcoming, inviting and invasive at the same time. I think he was naturally flirtatious, unintentionally. Magnetic, he couldn’t help it. His playfulness wasn’t specifically directed at me. He was fundamentally charming, that was all. Or maybe he was just engaging, curatively, for me to feel better about myself, this was all for the good of my health.
Suddenly I became sad, I thought of Mark and I hoped he would take me back, not even sure that he had let me go after the incident of the morning. I imagined myself living with him and continuing as I had been, with a dream on the side, crushed by the certainty that its coming true wouldn’t spoil a thing, quite the opposite, but a dream nonetheless and I conceded that I would be more alive thanks to it. And I loved Mark, too, I think. I looked at the time and realized that so much of it had already passed. He asked if I was in a hurry and I apologized, I tend to apologize easily, I said no, not at all, on the contrary. I looked at his ring. He saw me do it. I will look at your hands, listen to your heart and your lungs, and then you’ll be free. He stood up and came to sit next to me. I was feeling faint, I couldn’t wait for him to touch me. I realized I didn’t even need to undress him, but the thought of it made me do it, even if he had been naked all this time, his warmth and aura unsurprisingly transpiring through the texture of his shirt and taking the room over completely. He was naked all around me, and I was losing my mind. I wanted him more than ever; his nakedness felt so familiar, so electrifying and so pure. If I reached out I could touch him, and I didn’t know when I would see him next. I would gladly make myself sick just to be near him again. I thought of the 22 words and was looking for a way into them, and all the while he was looking at my hand until he was looking into my eyes with my hand still in his, and then he gave it back to me, and I was disappointed in myself that I was too busy to notice, because as the moment passed I wondered if it was only imagined. It was discouraging how frustrating I could be. He placed the stethoscope on my chest, and I seemed to control myself admirably well. Until I grew fed up of holding back. Keeping the lid on my emotions was exhausting. My heart started to beat fast, I let it, fast but evenly, and then faster and also stronger. Very high speed. I think at some point it even skipped a beat or two, and it was so extraordinarily fast that it made me blush, and I am pretty sure he blushed back. I looked around to check that I wasn’t just seeing colourful clumps of protein floating freely, but he asked that I focus back on him, breathe in and out, pace myself. And the rhythm slowed down a little then, and that is precisely when I heard them, extracted from their 22 sequence, words 7, 8, 9, and 10. Of course they were placed in a new sentence, but I can’t remember the order, the verb, the significance. And maybe they didn’t mean anything, or maybe they did, or maybe it was up to me to assign them a meaning, to find an implication.
Except where stated, all material copyright © Emmanuelle Dauplay.