“This time, you can come while I’m kissing you.”
“Prentice –”
“But you’ll be naked,” he went on.
“Prentice –”
“And so will I.”
“Pren –”
She didn’t finish his name because he kissed her quiet. And he remembered he used to do that all the time too. And he remembered how much she liked it when he kissed her.
Because now, immediately, as she had done twenty years ago, the minute his tongue touched hers, her soft body melted into his.
And he kissed her a lot. And he did it everywhere.
And, much, much later, when they were both naked, he was rocking deep inside her tight, wet silkiness, he knew exactly what she looked like with her hair spread across the bed and her body underneath him, Prentice made her come while he was kissing her.
And that, too, was phenomenal.
* * * * *
Fiona
Fiona was back in the place she went to when she died.
She hadn’t been there in ages.
It was nice enough.
Well, actually, it was lovely. With a gently rolling stream, trees in fragrant bloom, abundant wildflowers, the grass so green it nearly hurt her eyes and it was so thick, you could sleep on it.
There was a big tent there, made of silk, next to an apple tree, its blossoms carpeting the roof of the tent and all around. The flaps of the tent were opened wide and inside there were soft rugs, a comfy armchair with ottoman next to which there was a ready supply of the grisly crime novels Fiona liked to read. There was also a lovely guitar she could play and a big bed with a downy mattress, stacks of pillows and a fluffy duvet.
Fiona was real there. She walked with her feet on the ground, she didn’t float. Her body was solid, not see-through. She could feel things and move things without concentrating.
And there was night and day and she slept there.
She went there directly after she died and she thought, at first, it was heaven.
It was heavenly enough but she was alone and she didn’t think heaven would be eternal solitude. That would stink, and heaven, in her mind, didn’t stink.
But she’d been tired back then, tired from fighting the pain and tired from knowing what her body’s weakness was doing to her family.
So, when she first arrived, she slept a lot. And she slept well. And she got used to no pain and tiredness (but not to being dead).
Then one day she was walking along the stream and trying to figure out the different scents of the trees (because what the bloody else was there to do?) and zip, all of a sudden she was a ghost in her great room watching Prentice and Jason, both looking handsome but haggard, in dark suits, and Sally, looking confused and exhausted, in a pretty little black dress, coming through the front door.
At first, she didn’t know she was a ghost and thought she’d been granted a reprieve.
She was back, she was in her home, she had no pain and there was her family.
It didn’t take long to realize they couldn’t see her because, looking down, she could barely see herself and that she was dead, dead, dead because they’d just arrived back from her funeral.
It did take awhile for her to get used to this cruel twist of fate but she did and she’d been with them ever since. She spent her time haunting them (of course), being pissed off (of course) and learning how to materialize and dematerialize, not only in her house, but anywhere in the village.
She tried to go somewhere else, like Los Angeles where she’d always wanted to go but she couldn’t leave the village even in the company of, say, Prentice or her sister Morag when they left town. Any time she’d try, she’d automatically dematerialize and end up back at the house (which also pissed her off).