The Unfallen 2 Greg Swann “No, Silly
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a novel by Greg Swann to Ken Overture who got me to the river and to Laurie They had brought a backpack half full of supplies and Devin threw it over his who pushed me in shoulder. He helped Gwen to her feet and they walked across the white sand of the dunes. They were almost to the other shore when he stopped in a deep depression in the sand. He said, “Where’s the wind?” She pointed to South of East and he walked toward a dune in that direc- tion. He dropped the backpack and dug into it, pulling out a big wool blanket. He spread the blanket out flat and invited her to sit down. After a moment or two, she said, “It’s warm. It’s very warm...” “A trick my grandpa taught me. It’s always warm in the sun if you can get out of the wind. The dune blocks the wind. The air is still cold, but the sun on your skin makes you feel very warm. You could sunbathe here and not get cold.” She smiled wickedly. “Is that a challenge?” He smiled in return. “Maybe it is.” He sat down next to her and took her face in his hands and kissed her with the longing he’d felt all day, all week. He stretched out on the blanket and she laid down next to him, nestled into his side. They watched the gulls skirling overhead and heard the wind whistling around the sides of the dune. He stroked at her hair and she hugged him very tightly across the middle. He said, “Hunter sleeps with me like this sometimes. He’ll wake up in the night to go pee and then he’ll come to my bed instead of his. He’ll tuck himself into my arm and go to sleep that way, both of us very serene. He’s slept on me since he was an infant, and I’ll be very sorry when he finally stops forever. I’ve thought about sleeping with the two of you that way, Hunter on one side of me, you on the other. I think that would be just heavenly...” She snuggled in a little closer. “You’re seducing me, aren’t you?” “Not yet I’m not.” “Not that way. You’re seducing me with your family. With this great orb of warmth that surrounds you.” “Not by intention, if I am. I hope you don’t think... I hope you don’t think Copyright © 1997 by Greg Swann I’m trying to manipulate you.” The Unfallen 2 Greg Swann “No, silly. It’s just the way you are. People are either all the way in with you, He kicked off his boots and shucked his jeans and then he was as naked or they’re all the way out. You have the magical gift of putting people in the as she was, two half-dressed people in big, bulky Irish wool cable-knit sweaters. center of your orb and saying—quite silently—this is the way things should be. He crossed his legs and she put her hands on his shoulders and descended. She And poof! They are that way, and everyone involved agrees to their toes that said, “Help me down. Don’t let me fall.” He held her body as she slipped down this is the way things should be. I had no idea what it meant to be intimate until the front of him and locked her legs behind his back. She ended up with her I met you...” behind in the cup formed by his crossed legs, her own arms and legs embrac- “Please, stop. This is too much.” ing him tightly. “Oh, this is divine. We don’t have to do anything else, this is “No, I mean it. I thought intimacy was sexual intimacy, and if not that then plenty. I’ve never been so hugged before.” the kind of snickering gossip one hears in the powder room. I am always snubbed He dug his fingers into her hair and pulled her face to his, kissing her hard. from that, by the way. I guess I knew that it was the kind of connection I have She towered over him and he was seemingly completely at her mercy. She set with Spencer, that kind of closeness that needs no repeated demonstrations. But her arms on his shoulders and lifted herself enough to put him where he could with you it’s just there, all the time. The people who are close to you are that close do some good. Then she pressed herself against him and kissed him lightly on to you, no separation at all. You grant them full access and full sight of you and the lips and cheeks and neck. full visibility in your sight. Am I making the least kind of sense to you?” She said, “No one’s ever done this before.” “...Maybe the least kind.” He chuckled. “Seduced you on the beach? I didn’t do nothin’, your honor. It was all her fault.” “Devin Dwyer, you know exactly what I mean. You’re an astrophysicist of “No one’s ever treated me like a person before. And not just a woman. Do all things. At M.I.T. of all places. Who, on hearing those facts, would not presume you know what I mean? No one has ever brought me on an outing with his fam- that you were cold and aloof and remote and insectile? As unapproachable as ily. And no one has ever, ever taken Spencer along for anything. Dinner, the the stars themselves. And yet you’re just the opposite. You’re lit by the flames of theater, the symphony, the ballet, awful little supposedly romantic nightclubs. the poet’s passion and you shed your warmth everywhere, all the time.” Taxis and limousines and gowns and glass slippers, Cinderella always coming “...It doesn’t have to be one or the other, Gwen. The truth is, it can’t be. out, doomed to a life of endless cotillions...” Heathcliff was half a man because he wouldn’t learn to use his mind. Your insec- His face was buried in her neck and his hands were buried under her shirt, tile scientist is half a man if he doesn’t learn to understand his passions. We treasuring her back. She lifted herself a little and took him inside her. She sank name all these dichotomies and we say we’re describing opposites that can to him slowly, nibbling at his lips and watching his eyes. never be united. But a person can’t be whole—can’t be sovereign, can’t be “Yes...,” she said. “This could be very good. This could take years...” She unfallen—until they are united. Do I love you with my body? Yes. Do I love you moved her body against his slowly, like the waves dragging against the sand. with my mind, with my soul? Yes. Is there a distinction? Yes. Is there a mean- They kissed, their lips touching, their tongues touching, nibbling, biting, dart- ingful difference? Never. We are both, we are reasoning animals. The insectile ing, teasing, probing hungrily then breaking away to dart and tease again. scientists and the nerds strive to deny their bodies. Heathcliff and the raging He said, “Do you know the word integrity? Do you know what it means? fembots try to deny their minds. It can’t be. It won’t work. Nothing can come of We have all sort of ideas about what that word means, but the word literally it but disaster, and nothing ever does.” means ‘wholeness’. There’s more, though. To be integrated means to be com- “You’re back to fathertongue and mothertongue again... Aren’t you?” posed entirely of one thing. No impurities. No corruption... A monolith has He chuckled. “I’m always back to fathertongue and mothertongue. If I’m integrity. It’s a mountain composed entirely of one rock. A man, a woman, can any good at intimacy, it’s because I learned to speak mothertongue—from my have integrity, too. Not just honesty—everything. No impurities. No corruption. grandfather, more than anyone else.” One idea, expressed in infinite variations...” She sat up and unlaced and took off her boots. He said, “What are you “What... What are you doing?” doing?” Her eyes were closed but she felt him smile against her lips. “I’m making “You know what I’m doing.” She stood up and unbuttoned her jeans and love with you. Do you hear the word integer in there? An integer is a number pushed them down her legs, her panties with them. “I want you to speak to me with no fractional part, but integer literally means ‘untouched’. Isn’t that a beau- in mothertongue, baby.” He sat up and leaned back against his hands and she tiful idea, to be untouched? So pure, so Apollonian. White sheets flapping on a stood over him, her better secrets almost in a better place. She still had her socks clothesline on a summer day, kissed only by the sun and the breeze...” on, and her sweater and her shirt. She said, “This would make a beautiful pho- Her arms were still planted on his shoulders and her fingers were dug into tograph, don’t you think?” She laughed and tossed her hair behind her and a his hair. His head was thrown back and she was kissing up and down his neck gust of wind caught it and carried it back and she looked so free, so lost to the as he spoke to her.