Three Fates

breathless.
    “I have to dry my hair. In a minute. You catch a chill going to bed with wet hair.” But she yawned and snuggled against him.
    Not only sated, not only satisfied, she realized. But saturated.
    “You’ve a wonderful build, Jack. Next time, I’d like to feel it on top of me. But you get some sleep first.”
    He tangled his fingers in her wet hair. “Why now?”
    She lifted her head. “You’re tired. And even such a fierce lover needs a bit of rest.”
    “Why now?” he repeated so she couldn’t pretend to misunderstand.
    “All right then.” She got up, fetched a towel from the bathroom and, sitting beside him, began to dry her hair.
    “In the shower you looked like a mermaid. You still do.”
    “You don’t look like a man who’d think or say such poetic and romantic things.” She reached out, traced a fingertip over the scar, over the tough lines of his face. “But you do. I never thought I had a weakness for the poetic and romantic. But I do.”
    She eased back, continued to dry her hair. “I had a dream,” she said. “I was in a boat. Not a grand ship like the Lusitania, nor one of our tour boats. But a white boat, sleek and simple. It slid without a sound over blue water. It was lovely. Peaceful and warm. And inside my head I knew I could pilot that boat anywhere I wanted.”
    She shook back her damp hair and used the towel to blot water drops from his chest and shoulders.
    “I had the freedom for that, and the skill. I could see little storms here and there, blurred on the horizon. There were eddies and currents in the water. But they didn’t worry me. If a sail’s nothing but smooth, I thought in my dream, it gets tedious. And in my dream, there were three women who appeared in the bow of my boat. This, I decided, is interesting.”
    She got up again, went to his dresser, opened the top drawer and took out a white T-shirt. “You don’t mind, do you?”
    “Help yourself.”
    “I know where you keep your things,” she said as she pulled the shirt over her head. “As I’ve had no respect for your privacy. Now, where was I?”
    “You were in your boat, with the Fates.”
    “Ah yes.” She grinned, pleased he’d understood. “The first, who held a spindle, spoke. ‘I spin the thread, but you make it what you will.’ The second held a silver tape for measuring, and said, ‘I mark the length, but you use the time.’ And the third, with her silver scissors, told me this. ‘I cut the thread, for nothing should last forever. Don’t waste what you’re given.’ ”
    She sat again, curled up her legs. “And in the way of dream creatures, they faded away and left me alone in that pretty white boat. So I said to myself, well now, Rebecca Sullivan, here’s your life spread all around you like blue water with its storms and its peaceful times, its eddies and its currents. And where do you want to go with it, what do you want in the time you’ll have? Do you know what the answer was?”
    “What?”
    She laughed, leaned over, kissed him lightly. “Jack. That was the answer, and I don’t mind saying I wasn’t entirely pleased with it. Do you know when I had that dream?”
    “When?”
    “The night I met you.” She took the hand he’d lifted for hers and rubbed his knuckles over her cheek. “Hardly surprising it gave me a bad moment or two. I’m a cautious woman, Jack. I don’t grab for something just because it looks appealing. I’ve been with three men in my life. The first time, it was hot blood and a raging need to find out what it was all about. The second was a boy I had deep affection for, one I hoped I might spend my life with. But as it happened, he was just one of those eddies in the sea. You’re the third. I don’t give myself lightly.”
    He sat up, cupped her face in his hands. “Rebecca—”
    “Don’t tell me you love me.” Her voice shook a bit. “Not yet. My heart went for you so fast, I swear it left me breathless. I needed to let my head catch up. Lie down, won’t you. Let me snuggle up.”
    He drew her down with him, settled her head on his shoulder.
    “I won’t mind traveling,” she said, and the hand he’d lifted to stroke her hair froze.
    “Good.”
    She smiled, pleased that he’d tensed. Some things, some right things, might come easy, but they should never come without impact. “I’ve always wanted to. And I’ll expect to know a great deal more about this business of yours. I’m not a sit-at-home-and-iron-your-shirts