Page 86 of Soft Flannel Hank

A card flew out of the deck and hit him in the chest before falling to the table face down. He turned it over and saw a couple entwined. A man sat on the ground, and another person straddled him, their legs wrapped around his waist. His face was buried against their heart, and they had their arms wrapped tightly around his head as they looked upward with their eyes closed, a blissful expression on their face. All set against a backdrop of stars and a big crescent moon.

“The Lovers,” Esther whispered, barely audible, and a log shifted in the wood stove, causing the fire to crackle wildly.

He looked at her. Three feet of wood separated them, and Hank wanted to grip the table and flip it, sending her cards up into the air to flutter down to the braided rope rugs like lazy, fall leaves. He would cross those three feet and drag her up out of her chair and consume her. He would hold her so close and press himself so hard against her that she wouldn’t be able to tell where her cells ended and his began. He would wrap himself around her like creeping ivy and root there.

He’d opened the wounds. He’d let her poke her fingers into them, assessing their depth, their grain, their scar tissue. And she was still here. Sitting in front of him. Looking like she wanted to crawl across the tabletop and curl up in his lap like a cat. Like she wanted him to keep her.

But Hank was so tired.

Tired from talking. Tired from the emotional autopsy. Tired from the memories of his pain and his loss and his complicity in all of it. Tired of wanting Esther so desperately that he felt it in his teeth. And tired of the fear that she would leave him and take all of the light with her when she went.

He stood, and Esther rose out of her chair as well, the cards forgotten on the table.

“Hank,” she said again, her voice tight. He heard it. He knew it for what it was because he felt it echoing in his heart along with the grasping, ravenous desperation he’d felt since he’d first laid eyes on her in the diner.

“I’ll see you in the morning,” he said before turning for the couch, something Nat had found at an estate sale. It was from the sixties, low and long and not terribly comfortable. But Hank laid down on it, turning so that his back was to Esther.

He closed his eyes, even though he knew he wouldn’t sleep. Not yet. Probably not at all tonight. He heard Esther put her cards back in her backpack. Heard her put the dinner away uneaten. The apple crisp too, he thought. The cabin door was locked. He’d checked it when he’d come in.

The lights flicked off, and as darkness collapsed into the main room like a curtain dropping, Hank heard the doorknob to the bedroom turn.

“Goodnight, Hank,” Esther whispered.

“Goodnight, Esther,” he whispered back, and the door closed.

17

Esther lay on her back in the double bed, staring at the ceiling. It was chilly, and she had the quilt and fleece blanket pulled up to her chin. The windowless room was pitch black. A vault. Literally. It made sense, since Nat had to take his day rest somewhere, but knowing that fact didn’t stop the feeling of that deep, inky darkness collapsing around her.

The clock on her phone read that it was nearly two in the morning. She’d been laying in that bed for hours, listening to the muffled night outside and desperately wishing that she wasn’t alone.

Meanwhile, in the other room, Hank probably wasn’t sleeping any better than she was, having crammed his body onto a too-narrow couch because he was afraid to let her touch him, afraid of what she would do if he tried to touch her back. If he tried to keep her.

Esther had been hurling herself, body and spirit, at him full send since the very first night she’d met him. He’d caught her every time, clutched her against him, and then pushed her away to arms’ length. If not farther. But while he might be afraid to let her love him, she was afraid of never getting the chance.

After counting to one hundred for the fifth time with no luck, she unplugged her phone, wrapped the quilt around her body, and used the light from the screen to guide her as she opened the heavy door and padded out into the cabin’s main room.

She saw the dull glow from the wood stove reflected in Hank’s eyes. He was on his back, his hands folded over the round swell of his belly, legs crossed at the ankle.

Hank sat up quickly.

“Esther? What’s wrong?”

That was the million-dollar question, wasn’t it? Because the truth was that nothing was wrong at the same time everything was wrong.

“I—I couldn’t sleep,” she answered.

“Are you okay? Are you cold?” Hank asked, and the concern in his voice made Esther’s heart feel like it was being sucked under by quicksand.

“I’m fine. I mean, Iamcold, but I’m okay. I just—”

I just wanted you to hold me.

“I can find you another blanket,” he said, standing.

Hank walked toward her, a hulking shadow in the dark. Esther held up her hand, and it made contact with the center of his chest. She heard his sharp intake of breath.

“I don’t want another blanket,” she whispered.