Clear, warm waters and azure skies did nothing for her.
There had been a holiday, once, where she had sat on one of those white sanded beaches whilst grinning Caribbean boys brought her drinks under a "made in china" palm parasol.
The heat, even in the shade, was sapping.
Slipping into the artificially clean water did nothing to alleviate it. Rather, it only compounded the problem. She'd felt her pores closing in protest.
Warm water was no great thing, she discovered, when the humidity was so very oppressive.
She'd sat, miserably, in her room for two weeks, the ceiling fan creaking and moaning on its highest setting, reading book after book and not remembering a single word of any of them. All she remembered was the way the pages started to stick together, the paper soaking up sweaty thumb prints and sealing the words away.
*******************
Spray hit her lightly in the face and she screwed up her eyes and nose, grinning in delight, opening her mouth a little to taste the salt.
This was the sea she needed.
The blue, black beast swelled and rose before her, white horses colliding, falling over each other, racing to be the first to hit the sharp shingle, tear across the glossy stones to lie prone at her feet before being pulled out into the depth again.
Each time they came a little closer, until they finally began to nip at her toes.
She balanced, barefoot on a large grey rock and let the water come to her.
Under her breath she mumbled to herself. Half lyrics, snatches of poetry, words she'd forgotten she knew.
"Congenial, congenial, con...geen...ee...aaaal..." She tasted the word, on her tongue, her lips, set it free past her teeth then said it again just because she liked the way it felt in her mouth.
The sea was lapping at her ankles now and although the water was frigid, it was still only early spring, she stayed perfectly still, just letting sensation wash over her.
The spray on her skin, the salt on her lips, the wind that tore at her hair and pulled tendrils loose so they whipped around her face, the numbing of her toes so that she could barely feel the smoothness of the rock under her.
She felt his breath on her neck and started ever so slightly.
"You're muttering to yourself again."
"I am?"
"You know.... In Japan they'd hate you for this. Staring at the sea, muttering, they'd say you were bringing bad luck to the fishermen."
She laughs a little and he puts his arms around her, pulling her to rest her back against his chest.
"Good job I'm not in Japan then."
"Quite."
They say nothing for a while, only stand as though fused together, watching the waves move in, the sky turn a violent shade of pink as the setting sun hit the dark clouds on the horizon.
"Dark soon." She sighed. One part of her was upset, the other grateful for the small house they had to go back to, just a few steps from here.
Closing her eyes she thought of the little log burner that would be flickering away in the darkness of the kitchen, of the tiny bedroom, barely enough room for the bed, the window there that was always splattered with salt crystals.
She shivers a little in the cooling air and he holds her tighter.
"Want to go back?"
She shrugs lightly and leans her head back on his shoulder.
His lips, grazing her neck, make her skin break out in goose bumps, as though his mouth commanded it to rise, to meet his touch.
"Want to go back?"
She shakes her head a little, eyes fixed on the waves before her, body slowly tingling at his kisses, his tongue, his teeth, and still only on her neck. The chilled air makes it feel like all her body heat has abandoned her and now only comes to the surface where he touches.
His hand moves up her chest and runs up and down her throat, finally tightening just under her jaw.
"If you don't want to go back we'll have to stay here."
He bites her neck gently and a tiny moan crawls from between her lips in response.
While his teeth graze her skin he pushes his fingers into her mouth, just the tips to the first joints. She runs her tongue over them and tastes the bitter chemical of white spirit, soap and paint.
Pulling round to face him she brings his hands to her face again and kisses them.
"You've finished working?"
He nods, looking past her into the gathering dark at the edges of the horizon.
"Then its over." He glances sharply at her but his expression softens, all the hard edges seem to slide from his face and she can't bare it.
Instead of speaking she stands up on tiptoe and twines her arms around his neck, pulling him close for a kiss.
Nothing matters now.
She loses herself to the elements, the spray of the surf, the bite of the wind, his tongue probing her mouth like he wanted to devour her, eat her from the inside out until she was nothing.
Not even a husk, a shell.
Just a suggestion of a ghost
Nothing at all.
Her lips were crushed against his teeth painfully and she thought she tasted blood, but only pushed her own mouth harder against his.
She wasn't crying.
It was only the salt on her face that stung her eyes.
He pulled away a little and cupped her face in his hands. They surprised her as always, these hands. Large, clumsy looking, but she'd watched him command them into creating beauty from the chaos of paint and canvas.
He ran the pad of his thumb under her eye and she took a deep breath and smiled.
"I want to go in now."
He said nothing, only pulled her to him so that their walk across the beach and back to the cottage was awkward. If observed, they would have looked like two invalids helping each other across the slippery rocks.
The cottage, tiny and defiant, its walls stained with salt, its wood work rotting.
The cottage.
The retreat.
They'd worked here, he at one end, her at the other.
But now it was over.
He didn't turn on the lights, only the glow from the log burner kept full dark away. She stood in the middle of the room as he left her to pour a drink.
Under her feet the bare stone of the floor felt clammy, almost living, like at any moment she might feel a dull pulse under her arches.
Hopping from one foot to another at the thought, she glanced over and saw him watching her..
"Are you cold?"
She shook her head and took the glass he offered from his hand.
He hesitated then raised his.
"The cottage."
"The cottage" She whispered back, then added, "Serendipity."
He nodded, his head nothing more than a dark shadow before her in the weak light. Reaching for her, his hand gently stroked her face, she closed her eyes and leant into his touch.
She thought his hand trembled lightly.
Her own hand came to cover his and hold it firm.
"Serendipity." He whispered in her ear, making her shiver.
Draining glasses they set them aside and stood facing each other. "Do you remember?"
She did.
"Remember how we tried to stay away, tried to deny it. The cottage took the decision away from us."
Part of her wanted to say it hadn't, that they could go somewhere else, that what they had could continue elsewhere.
She didn't though.
Away from the cottage it might become something else. Something dangerous, something solid and consuming.
The cottage existed in another dimension, acted like a buffer between real life and the ethereal. No matter how much they wanted to they couldn't be together, not away from these damp and swollen walls, the leaky roof, the mildew on the book shelves.
She took his palm and pressed it to her lips before placing it back on her face.
"I still haven't seen what you've painted."
"Tomorrow."
Neither of them vocalised it. That there wouldn't be a tomorrow for her to view the painting.
It had been a ritual of theirs for five years.
He'd labour away in his room, she in hers. In the end he would invite her in to view his work.
He painted huge landscapes under skies that made you afraid to stand too close. Brooding clouds that seemed to swell away from the canvas, harsh sick sunsets of pink and black, the land below them washed out in safe greys and greens, browns and blues. She imagined herself torn between clinging to the bare earth and letting go, being hurled up into that terrible sky and burned away as she hit the first harsh ray of sun that forced its way through.
She both loved and feared those paintings, but couldn't imagine looking at them anywhere else but here.
Standing back from her he placed her arms down by her sides and started to unbutton her shirt.
************
The first time they slept together was a fumbled and guilt ridden affair.
After, they had lay in the bed together awkwardly, hardly touching. Her face was flushed with embarrassment and shame.
He'd lent over her to get his cigarettes and she'd almost recoiled.
"We shouldn't have done that." He said, lying back and blowing smoke away from her considerately. "The biggest mistake you can make is to try and replicate what you already have."
"What?" She took the cigarette from him and inhaled, making the tip glow furiously.
Smiling he traced the outline of her jaw with his finger, then over her lips, making the frown twitch into a small smile.
"You and I are not meant to fuck like this." He took the cigarette back from her, one more drag, then crushed it out on the saucer he'd put on the bedside table for that purpose. "That was how you'd fuck your husband. It was .... Nice."
She was torn between irritation and a creeping thrill.
"Don't talk about my husband." She went to get up and he grabbed her elbow, pulling her back to the bed.
They looked at each other, her scowling, him smiling, his gaze amused but stern.
