The rain moves in again; this time with the promise of a longer shower. We stand inside the doorway, just out of reach to the probing, but warm drops and survey the sky. Maybe, we'll get lucky. Perhaps the clouds will pass quickly as they have all day and we can move back outside and finish the tasks at hand.
The comfortable closeness we share becomes steamy as the heat and humidity in the room increases. Summer showers are remarkable in their smells, sounds and ability to change the taste of the air.
As you stand close, I can feel the heat radiating from your arms and chest. We're dripping from the surprising swiftness of the shower and, as we lean in the doorway, my mind shifts from thinking about the weather to breathing in your scent. It's a damp smell with other foreign notes: sawdust, motor oil, dry grass. It's an odd combination but wonderfully masculine and distracting.
We move further into the room, winding around the detritus of the garage, moving away from the sheet of water that leaves no promise of an early finish.
Our hands find things to touch. Wrenches, boxes, wood scraps. Replacing, restoring and setting items back in their places.
We revolve around each other, lost in our own thoughts. I can't help but be relieved by the rain. I've spent the day watching you twist and bend. Watching from behind as you lean over the engine or straddling you with the light as you lie flat under the car; waist and long legs visible but nothing else.
I've imagined raking my hands across your back, your chest, filling them up with your body all day. My small, seemingly accidental touches not registering with you but sending volts of need through my body. Brushing a few blades of grass from your hair has enough energy to ignite paper. The challenge to make contact with your skin when handing over tools is a frustrating one-person game and I gain only a few points.
With everything returned to its place, I lean against the door frame again and feel your presence behind me. Your hand on my arm causes me to jump and I watch your other hand take my own and examine the smudges and dirt.
There's a bathroom in back and I turn and follow you back to scrub away proof of the afternoon, resigned to the rain, to the end of day filled with my own longing and shared innuendo, to another round of frustrating thoughts and fantasies with no culmination.
I stop at the doorway and wait for you to allow me to pass through first. As I move through, in to the room, I turn to the sink, refusing to look in the mirror. I can feel the sadness; I don't need to see it. I reach for the soap and turn on the water as the door closes behind me.
An unexpected movement jerks my eyes to the mirror and am caught in your gaze, trapped as certainly as a fly in a web. Holding your gaze, I ask the question with my eyes and brows but I can't read the answer though it seems my blood already knows.
The answer is singing through my body, in and out, my heart beating a rhythm of understanding as I step aside to allow you to share the stream of water and place the slippery bar of soap in your hand.
The soap falls and your large hands envelop mine removing excess bubbles, massaging them into both sets of dirty hands. As we hold them under the stream, my eyes focus on the gray water and suds swirling in the sink and the flash of your fingers twining through mine, cleaning and stroking.
