Nothing but Your Skin - Cathy Ytak [9]
“Because I don’t want to sleep!”
Your laugh made a night bird fly from one tree to the next. I laughed, too, and I realized that, before you, I never laughed. Everything was sad: my dad’s footsteps in the hallway, my mom’s nagging, and the whole angry world around me. “Hurry up, make up your mind! You’re driving everyone crazy! Quick, Louella, quick!” Nothing made me smile or made me happy. I was surrounded by colors that didn’t get along. Only the snow made me feel calm. But I never laughed. You made me laugh, Matt, and that night in the cabin, I felt like a bird, flying from one tree to another, from a frozen lake to a mountain sleeping bag. I said, “It’s a good idea, we’ll have to wait until the ice is solid. And until the moon is full…well, not totally.” I waited a moment, then I came up close to you and I whispered, “Not totally because when the moon is full, I have my…” It’s hard to say that to a boy, he might be embarrassed, or disgusted, or…I don’t know. Does a boy know that about girls? “I’ll have…um, my period.” I must have turned red, but it was so cold that my face was already red and it wouldn’t have shown.
You said to me, “Having your period doesn’t mean you can’t make love, but…what about a few days before the full moon? Would that be okay?”
“Yes. A few days before, yes. Will the lake be frozen enough?”
“I hope so.”
“Will it be nice out?”
“I hope so.”
And at night, under the covers, in my bed, in my room, I thought about your words, and your words touched my skin, became fingers, lips. I thought of you, I felt you on me, and the pleasure I gave myself was already ours.
And the day came. Just like that. You said to me, “Tonight would be perfect. Because, you know, I’m going to leave on my apprenticeship and I’ll be away for three weeks. Three weeks is a long time. The lake could melt all of a sudden. Or the weather could turn bad. So tonight would be perfect.”
And I replied, “Yes, tonight would be perfect.”
We didn’t talk much on the path through the forest. It was a dry cold, very dry. I kept my gloves on, and you did, too. Our shoes crunched on the snow and seemed to be saying tonight, tonight, tonight. Tonight we’ll have time to love each other, tonight we’ll have time to touch, tonight we’ll take our gloves off…
“Are you sure it will be warm enough in your sleeping bags? What if they get wet from the ice? And if we make it melt?”
“Don’t worry, I’ll bring a big plastic tarp to put under us, and we won’t get cold, that’s for sure. We’ll be hot, very hot. Hotter than you can imagine, Lou.”
“What time will we meet? I’ll have to sneak out. And I can’t let the dogs hear me.”
“Do you think you can do that?”
“Yes, if I’m careful. I’ll open the window quietly, I’ll slide out, I won’t need to take my skis or my snowshoes, the snow is hard enough that you can walk on it without sinking. I’ll come to the edge of the lake.”
“Yes, Lou, and I’ll be waiting for you.”
“With your big sleeping bags?”
“Yes, with my big sleeping bags, a tarp to put on the ice, and a condom.”
“You won’t forget the condom.”
“No, I won’t forget.”
Night came, and I snuck out of the house. The dogs didn’t bark; they didn’t hear anything. The moon was almost full, but not completely. It lit up the snow and the snow sparkled. When I got to the edge of the lake, I saw you, and my heart started to beat stronger. The sleeping bags were thick, you had zipped them together, they fit perfectly. We took them under our arms and walked onto the lake. There was a light dusting of frost on the ice that kept us from slipping. You could see the moon’s reflection in places, and the whole night wrapped around us. We walked silently all the way to the middle of the lake, far from the shore.
“Will anyone be able to see us from the shore?”
“I don’t think so.”
“What if the ice melts?”
“It’s way too thick.”
Then my questions disappeared, and the world outside disappeared, too. We slid into the sleeping bags, we zipped them up, and, in the dark, we let our bodies tell their story. Sometimes, the frozen