Page 38 of Road Refugees

She jawed on my mouth too, sliding her tongue against my upper palate. Lifting one of her hands, she rubbed the back of my head. I was cocooned in a strange combination of joy and grief at discovering her still alive. She could’ve been dead from poison mushrooms, and it was I who had pushed the idea of mushrooms on her . . .

When we detached, panting in each other’s faces, I couldn’t bear the inquisitive, questing look in her eyes. My ego bloomed to know that she panted for me, but I couldn’t face her, so I buried my face between her breasts.

Heaven! She was fucking named aptly! Taking giant handfuls of each boob, I mashed them against my cheeks, in seventh heaven. She began crying, “Oh—oh—oh—” and clinched my leg in a vise grip between her powerful thighs. She humped me with intensity, her arms now splayed in the pine needles over her head in a symbolic gesture of surrender, even shimmying her shoulders to drown me in a torrent of tits.

But when I moved to clamp my teeth over her taut nipple poking through the sports bra, she sobbed so loudly I was certain I’d hurt her. Reluctantly, I raised my head, my prick pulsating against her thigh. Propping herself on her elbows, she looked at me as though I were an out-of-focus font. Panting. Breasts heaving. And I was the moronic culprit, my crooked jaw hanging askew.

“Oh! Town! What happened to me?”

I helped her to sit upright. “Did you take mushrooms?”

“Oh God no, I wouldn’t do that until I had them analyzed them properly at the house. You never know which one could kill you.”

“Then . . . ” I picked up the flask that by now had slid free from her pocket.

She clutched at it and began, out of habit I suspected, to unscrew the cap. I put my hand gently on the bottle, saying, “You know, you don’t need that. You don’t need to be afraid of me. I’m not going to hurt you.”

Blinking, she looked taken aback. “Oh. You think I need to drink because I’m afraid?”

“Something like that. You’ve been honest about using it to numb yourself from your husband’s abuse. Well, I’m not like that, Heaven.” I sort of chuckled. “In fact, I’m kind of the opposite. I drank so much to kill the physical pain in my back, but also the emotional pain of losing a wife. Now I have to soldier on without it.”

She shrugged and unscrewed the cap anyway, taking a slug. “It’s just a habit, Town. I’m sure that once my entire ego realizes I’m safe from Orson, I can go places without it.”

“That would be good. I’m not a snobby holier-than-thou preacher, but it’s nice to be master of my own desires. Not to be compelled to follow the dictates of booze.”

Another slug. “Yes, you’re right. You are being a preacher.”

I stroked her face with the backs of my fingers. “I’m sorry, my angel. I’m just a Type A personality. I need to impart my wisdom. And I am wondering if you could be diabetic.”

That made her freeze. “Diabetic? What makes you think that?”

“I’ve heard that if diabetics drink too much, they could pass out, like you did in the middle of the highway.”

That gave her pause for thought. She looked so at home in the forest, her tawny hair falling in lush curls around her elbows. “Hm. I’ll have to ask Maddy about that.”

“You don’t believe me?” I jived her. “I’ll make sure Maddy gets you an appointment. Just a simple blood test.”

She looked me in the eyes. “Of course I do. I believe any man who kisses like that.” Swiftly she added, “And that isn’t many. Hey, where’s Linus? He came here with me. I was stuffing his backpack with shrooms.”

I stood so as not to shatter her ears and two-finger whistled. A rustle came from about half a mile off through the pines, easy to hear on that dead quiet day. We both looked in that direction, and I helped Heaven to stand. As I had a permanent, high-pitched hiss in one ear, I wasn’t surprised when Heaven found him first.

“Linus!” she cried with glee, rushing toward the unseen furball.

So I rushed too, and we soon found the dog, sort of twisting around on his hind legs like he was doing a hula hoop. Heaven grabbed his front paws and I hugged his neck.

“Linus!” I said. “Don’t ever go running off like that.” I was surprised that he hadn’t stayed with Heaven when she hit the ground.

Heaven let go of his paws, and he skipped ten paces off, then looked at us.

She said, “He wants us to follow.”

I should’ve known that. It was my job to control him and be the alpha, yet it was much harder than it sounds. We can talk and communicate with our family and friends using words. We can express our feelings. That’s impossible with a dog, so the gulf can be a source of enormous frustration. Dogs exist in the physical world, and we exist in the emotional one. Our world is fantasies and feelings. Theirs is urges and scents.

This was one of those conflicting times. I just wanted to get back to camp with them, yet Linus was clearly trying to show us something. And with Heaven’s insistence, I had no choice but to tramp crookedly through the forest, several yards behind them with my cane. So that’s where I was when I heard a trickling creek where Linus and Heaven seemed to be headed.

They didn’t wait for me. The creek bed wasn’t very steep, but covered in pine needles, as I saw when Heaven slid. She was down before I even neared, shrieking, “Town! Town! Town!”

Eternally frustrated with my disability, I started the slide into the darkened creek. Linus even nudged my elbow, like, “What’s wrong? What’s taking you so long?”