Vivian woke up late the next morning, and her head ached.  The room was intolerably bright.  The sun was nearly overhead, and its light streamed in unobstructed.  The first thing she noticed was that she was naked.  The second thing she noticed was that every part of her body hurt.  It was a painful kind of exhaustion, like a muscle clenched too long had finally started to let go.  The third thing she noticed was Lucia, her hair mussed and her body bared as well, asleep on her shoulder.

 

Much of the previous night was a blur.  Her thinking brain had shut off at some point.  She dug the flat of her palm into her eye, hoping to distract herself from the pain with other pain, to no effect.  She didn’t want to disturb Lucia, but it couldn’t be helped.  Once she started trying to extricate herself, Lucia rolled over and grabbed a pillow.  Vivian was left staring at her friend’s back side, and the smooth curves of her waist and hips.  Dense, tattooed sleeves covered most of her arms, and angel wings connected them across her upper back.  Bare feet tucked just below her cheeks.

 

Vivian went to the bathroom, to take care of her needs.  Her mind remained blank, focused on her efforts and actions, though she was aware of what she was avoiding.  She couldn’t help being aware of avoiding it.  Lucia was still sleeping when she padded, barefoot, into the kitchen.

 

She needed a cup of coffee, and she needed water.  As she drank, it occurred to her that Lucia might need those things too.  She had to brew a fresh pot, and that took a solid ten minutes.

 

Lucia was sitting up in bed, elbow on her knee and forehead in her palm, when Vivian returned.  She took the water first, drinking greedily while Vivian put the coffee on the makeshift nightstand.  And then Vivian sat down on the bed.

 

The body has many needs.  They come in many forms.  Some are tangible, and some are not.  Some are greater than others, and take precedence, but in the end they are all needed.  The body dies without them.  One moment, Vivian was sitting next to Lucia, tenderly brushing hair back from her beautiful face, and in the next she was underneath her.  The sheets got tangled up between, and they kicked at them furiously.  Thrashing.

 

Vivian needed this, and from the frantic, fearful look in Lucia’s eye she didn’t think she was alone in that.  That look said a lot to her.  Volumes.

 

Their legs entwined tightly, like roots curling and squeezing.  The feeling of Lucia’s thigh buried against her core was only eclipsed by the heat of Lucia’s against her own thigh.  Their bodies pushed and pulled, finding resistance and compliance in equal parts, and always that look in Lucia’s eye urging her onward.  Sweat poured off both of them in a torrent.

 

At a pained gasp, Lucia wrapped her arms tightly around Vivian and rolled, and Vivian kissed her thanks in a line from lip to lips as she turned around.  There had been a quiet bliss being trapped in Lucia’s strong embrace, but her body had limitations that Lucia’s did not and she found that being on top was much less tiring.  As she settled down on top of her, head buried between Lucia’s thighs and with a tongue worrying earnestly between her own folds, Vivian sank into a glorious haze.

 

Exhaustion came and went.  Always, the wind returned to fill her sails and drove her onward.  When her tongue tired she shifted to her side, resting her head on Lucia’s thigh as she slid fingers inside her.  Probing.  Squeezing.  Stroking.  When her fingers tired, her tongue had recovered.  Hours passed without either one of them opening their eyes for more than a glance at the other.  Her lips and pearl were swollen and sore, and even through all of that Lucia still managed to make her climax again and again and again until the pain and pleasure were completely indistinguishable.

 

They could see the shadow of their own building cast onto others, in the late afternoon, when Lucia’s stomach grumbled loudly.  Vivian insisted, despite clever and devious pleading on Lucia’s part, on going into the kitchen to make them some food, but her efforts were interrupted at every turn by a finger placed here, or kisses placed there.  She almost regretted not putting on clothes.  Lucia draped over her, mauling her non-stop, and Vivian nearly burned the rice when she gave in, turned around, and followed her back to the table.  There, between Lucia’s legs, was the peace she had been seeking.  Whether she was standing, with those legs wrapped around her waist while they kissed, or kneeling with her tongue buried deep, Vivian knew that her purpose was laid out before her.

 

When the food was finally ready, they ate quietly, sharing furtive glances.  The body has many needs.  Vivian kept looking at Lucia’s plate, trying to pace her eating so that she wouldn’t fall too far behind.  She didn’t want to be the one that wasn’t ready.  In the back of her mind, the whole thing still felt so delicate and frail.  If she wasn’t there, ready to meet Lucia touch for touch, then the moment would pass her by and everything would fall apart.  She had to be bulletproof.  She had to be perfect.

 

But then she saw Lucia looking at her own plate, and looking at her own mouth as she chewed, and Vivian thought she saw the same fears.  That if she wasn’t ready when Vivian was, she would lose her.  The same fragility, like even a few wasted moments were too much of a risk.

 

Vivian didn’t bother finishing her plate before getting up, crawling across the table, and settling into Lucia’s lap.

 

***

 

The bed shifted in the dark, waking Vivian.  Next to her, Lucia lurched out from under the covers and into the bathroom.

 

“Luc,” Vivian called.  “You okay?”

 

Lucia merely groaned.

 

“Are you hungry?”

 

Lucia groaned again.

 

Vivian had read a lot in the last couple days about detoxing from cocaine.  The reality had been both exactly what she had been expecting and much worse, for all the feelings tangled up in it.  She turned on a night light, slipped on a long t-shirt with three-quarter sleeves, and hustled into the kitchen as quickly as she could.  She felt like a zombie when she hurried, because it looked so ungainly, but every day was a little bit better; a little bit stronger.  Now she just had to do that for someone else.

 

She made a turkey sandwich, with lettuce and avocado slices, and poured a big glass of milk.  She cut the sandwich diagonally, and nodded once.  She met Lucia just as the other woman was coming out of the bathroom, and Lucia inhaled it.  Barely stopping to chew.  Chugged the whole glass.

 

“Huh,” Vivian said, as Lucia crawled back between the sheets.  “How are you feeling?”

 

“Tired,” Lucia grumbled.  “My brain feels like…”

 

“Mud?  Slush?”

The Latina groaned, and Vivian set the plate and cup on the bureau.

 

“Stuffed with cotton balls?”

 

Lucia snapped her finger and pointed vaguely over her shoulder.  When Vivian got back into the bed, Lucia rolled over, and her eyes were wide open.  Vivian brushed her hair gently aside.

 

“I’m scared of myself,” Lucia whispered.

 

A lot of things occurred to Vivian to say in response, but none of them were the right thing to say, so she simply continued to run her nails over Lucia’s scalp.

 

“Did I ever tell you about the first time I got high?” Lucia slurred, tiredly.

 

She shook her head.

 

“I was fourteen.  I’d just come back from mi Abuelas.  Guitar lesson.”  Her eyes unfocused, and her breathing slowed.  “My sister, Myrna, was there with her boyfriend.”

“Is Myrna the one that joined the Highway Patrol?”

“Border Patrol,” Lucia growled.

 

Vivian nodded and tried to commit that to memory.  Lucia’s family was big, and it was hard to keep them all straight.

 

“Anyway, they were drunk.  I forget where everyone else was, but it was gonna be a while until they got back.  Myrna passed out, and it was just me and him.  I liked him.  He was cute.  We were playing Smash Brothers, I think, when he kissed me.”

 

Vivian’s brow furrowed.  “Myrna is.... the second oldest?  What, seven years older than you are?  Something like that?”

 

Lucia nodded.  “I just felt really special.  Like, I’d had a crush on him.  I think he knew.  He was a little older than Myrna.  Anyway, he went out to his car after that and came back with a couple of Oxy pills.”

 

Vivian waited patiently while Lucia’s eyelids drooped a little.

 

“He finished before Myrna woke up, but we weren’t, like, put back together.  He was still half-naked, and I was completely naked.  She threw him out, and then… there I was.  Still there. And barely coherent. Myrna was always Dad’s favorite, but after that… I was the scapegoat for, like, everything.  I was the only one that didn’t want to be a cop.  I wanted to speak Spanish all the time.  They wanted to completely forget that we’re Mexican.  I got picked up a couple times for dealing.  My uncle was usually the one to bail me out, but I embarrassed them all.

 

“I moved in with Abuelita for a while.”  The corners of her lips curled into a smile.  “Those were… the best years.  I was in trouble a lot, but she was a troublemaker too.  Everyone told me I was just like her.  They meant it as an insult, but she was…”

 

Her eyes went distant again.  “I used to think that they drove me to it, treating me like they did.  I was a victim of circumstances, right?”  She shook her head.  “Truth is that, sometimes, I don’t feel like I’m in control of myself.  It’s scary.  An-and then there’s all these consequences to deal with, and I just...”  She slapped her hands together, stretching one arm out and making a pshhhewww sound.

 

“Is that why you don’t call home?” Vivian asked.

 

Lucia went very still.

 

“I bet they’d want to hear from you.  How long has it been?”

 

“There’s nothing left for me there,” Lucia said, her voice hoarse.

 

“What about your grandmother?”

 

“I left when she passed.  Right after the funeral.”

 

“And you’ve been up here ever since? On your own?”

 

Again, Lucia was very still.

 

Vivian got up after a moment, slipped into their rehearsal space, and picked up the good acoustic guitar.  Her playing had improved somewhat, but mostly she didn’t want to spend a few minutes tuning just then.  Lucia stayed on her side, with her eyes heavy and low, as Vivian sat down on the edge of the bed and started playing.  Her timing wasn’t as good as it had been, yet, so the playing was a little jerky in spots, but that didn’t seem to matter.

 

Vivian played her new song.  It was the first song she’d ever written that was overtly sad, or meant to be played at any less than eleven on the volume dial.  In her head the song was called Broken Angel, but she hadn’t written that down anywhere nor did the phrase appear in the song.

 

Judging by her reaction, Lucia seemed to know it was about her.  The more Vivian played the more Lucia curled in on herself, until she was just a weeping ball under the heavy blanket.  She didn’t say anything when Vivian stopped but she rolled over to be the little spoon when Vivian crawled back into bed.