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Back Devotion Save as PDF
Chapters (47)
  1. Cover
  2. Prologue
  3. 1
  4. 2
  5. 3
  6. 4
  7. 5
  8. 6
  9. 7
  10. 8
  11. 9
  12. 10
  13. 11
  14. 12
  15. 13
  16. 14
  17. 15
  18. 16
  19. 17
  20. 18
  21. 19
  22. 20
  23. 21
  24. 22
  25. 23
  26. 24
  27. 25
  28. 26
  29. 27
  30. 28
  31. 29
  32. 30
  33. 31
  34. 32
  35. 33
  36. 34
  37. 35
  38. 36
  39. 37
  40. 38
  41. 39
  42. 40
  43. 41
  44. 42
  45. Acknowledgments
  46. About the Author
  47. About the Publisher

It seemed to me the bed I was on with Lonnie and James was huge, a monstrous piece of furniture. Just softness, softness, so much softness it made me sick. I put the sheet inside my mouth, saturated the cotton threads with saliva, but it was softer still, slick with wetness. There was nothing around here to grasp—nothing hard. And somewhere outside the bed there was still rain. The rain, the rain, the unholdable rain.

39

THE NEXT MORNING MY LIMBS AND EYELIDS WERE SO HEAVY. I tried to swim back to reality when I heard Lonnie and James rise and felt a hot strip of sunlight across my legs, but I was tangled in blankets and couldn’t compete with their weight. I’d never felt so strange before. When I drank I woke at dawn, fully conscious with pounding headaches, no matter how much I longed for sleep. That morning, I felt as if I were being twisted in the blankets like a dishcloth. I was wrung out. Void of emotion, memories, even my most basic sensations, like smell and taste, had disappeared. Sounds came and went but I grasped only partial meanings. Lonnie and James would board the boat. Little blips of phrases pulled at me. “Do you have everything?” “I feel like shit.” I could sense Lonnie’s body moving next to the bed, slow and stiff. They did not shake me awake to join them, they just left me. I did not yet wonder if they meant to let me sleep as a kindness or if they were discarding me, if they were done. I didn’t wonder anything. I only lay there, sweating, naked, the world around me static and dry.

How they were able to leave at all eluded me. Eventually, I crawled to a bathroom somewhere distant in the house, like an animal wanting to die in private. I lay on the cool tile, my legs drawn up to my chest. The room was so small; it must have been servants’ quarters. And for hours, as the sun burned through a tiny window onto my skin, sweating, death was all I could think of. At some point—I have no memory of the time—a maid, one of those mysterious house fairies that appeared only when everyone was out, found me. I don’t remember either of us saying anything. She knocked, and when I didn’t answer, opened the door gently, until it pressed into the back of my naked thigh. I felt a rush of cool air, a relief. She disappeared for a moment and then returned with ginger ale, the kind that burns hot on the way down, assuming I was hungover and stomach-sick.