The Spirit Wood Read Free

oldest sport of all anymore,” she said, with a little self-conscious shrug. Then regretting that she'd said it,afraid that she might have made Byron feel uncomfortable, she quickly went on. “But maybe when the term's over, and he can get back to concentrating on his dissertation, things will pick up. I think he'll feel a lot less pressured then.”
    “I'm sure he will,” Byron said. “He's got a lot on his mind right now.”
    Diogenes barked from across the street, where he'd finished with the garbage cans. “I think you're being paged,” Meg said. “Congratulations again on the job.”
    Byron leaned down and pecked her on the top of the head. “Buck up,” he said, tucking one finger under her chin. “He'll come around.” Her eyes, he thought, were the blue of Dresden china. Turning quickly, he walked away, each of his steps punctuated by the soft, rhythmic thwap of a loose sole on one of his shoes. Diogenes disappeared around the corner.
    The moment the door was closed again, Meg could hear the sound of the shower running. Peter had always been a fan of the hot shower, but lately it seemed as if he couldn't get clean enough no matter how long he was in there. And he locked the bathroom door, which he'd never used to do. By the time she heard the water turned off, she'd undressed, put on her nightgown, and slipped into bed with an Agatha Christie mystery. Peter came out wearing a faded pair of blue pyjamas. That was another manifestation of his new-found modesty. The most he used to wear to bed had been a pair of loose boxer shorts; now he always had on pyjamas, and a robe, too, if he got up for a midnight snack. Anything, it seemed to Meg, to discourage intimacy.
    “I left all the dishes to soak,” he said, and dropping his sling on the night table, got into bed. “You really pulled out all the stops tonight. I don't think Byron's had a feast like that in years.”
    “Neither have we.”

    Peter pulled the sheet up onto his chest and gently laid his left arm across it.
    “How's it feeling today?” she asked.
    “Better. The hot water seems to help.” Then he turned his head on the pillow to look directly at her. “How're you doing?”
    She closed the book and turned on her side. “I'm fit as a fiddle, I think. Tomorrow I'm going to call the pottery shop and see if they've got a wheel free for me. I'm dying to get some work done again.”
    “The knee's okay, then?”
    “Um-hum,” she said, raising her leg beneath the sheet, so that it lay across his own. She nestled herself closer to him, and when he didn't seem to tense up, she raised one hand to his face. She gently stroked his cheek, and then wound her finger in one of the soft black curls of his hair. His eyes closed. She slipped the earpieces of his glasses free and laid the glasses on the night stand; she flicked the lamp off, so the room was filled with just the faint, silvery light from the street.
    Please, she thought, please.
    As if in response, his right hand gently descended the outside of the sheet, and came to rest on her knee. His fingers lightly enclosed it, as if it were something very precious and fragile.
    Her hand slipped beneath the sheet; she delicately unfastened the buttons of his pyjama top, and spread it open. The hair on his chest was as black and curly as the hair on his head; it spread across him, just beneath his collar bone, in what had always appeared to her as two neat and symmetrically extended wings. Her hand roamed across him, before gliding down to follow the trail of fine black hair that ran the length of his abdomen. When she unsnapped the lower clasp of his pyjamas, she felt a sudden, slight tremor pass through him.
    Please . . . please.

    Gently, in ever increasing circles, she stroked his body. His hand moved from her knee to caress her thigh through the sheet. She felt his breathing quicken, but his eyes remained shut. Squeezed shut, it seemed, as if he were trying to concentrate, to think of only one