Read Online A Ship Made of Paper by Scott Spencer - Free Book Online
Authors: Scott Spencer
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glow out there, rising up from the headlights of a car.
“Iris?” says Hampton.
She turns quickly. “You’re awake,” she says.
The light in the window is caught in the back of her hair. He can’t make out her features, but he senses from her voice and posture that he has interrupted her, or startled her. “Who’s out there?” he asks her.
“No one.” She turns, looks out again, as if to check her own story.
“No one.”
“I just had a nightmare,” he says, reaching his hand out to her, beckoning her to bed. He knows that he should not be so commanding—Iris has even told him as much—but the gestures of the favorite son, the always-sought-after man, come from the deepest part of him. To change these things would be like changing his voice, it would take constant vigilance. She finds him arrogant, but he doesn’t feel arrogant. It just seems to him that his being found attractive is a part of the natural order of things, and when Iris resists him, or is slow to respond, it irritates him, not because he is a potentate and she is his lowly subject, but simply because a mistake is being made.
The sight of those long, outstretched fingers illuminates Iris’s nervous system with a rage that ignites like flash powder. She wonders if she a s h i p m a d e o f pa p e r
ought to hold her ground or go to him. Sometimes she has the energy to resist him, but each time she does she enters into the conflict with the knowledge that it will extend through the night.
Hampton switches on his reading light. His cranberry-colored pajamas are streaked with night sweats. He sits up straighter, arranges his pillows, and then reextends his reach for her.
“Are you okay?” she asks.
He pats the sheet on her side of the bed, indicating where he wants her to be. Sometimes she thinks about the men who have wanted to go to bed with her and whom she refused, the good men, handsome, clever, large-hearted men, and how strange it is that life would deliver her to this point: treated like a little dog who is being beckoned to hop up onto the sofa.
Okay, if that’s how he wants it. She bounds across the room, leaps onto the bed, falls forward onto her hands and knees, facing him. Then, completing her private joke, she lets her tongue hang out and she pants.
He counters with excruciatingly contrived tenderness. He strokes the side of her face. “We have to sleep,” he whispers.
This is night language, code; somewhere in the blind, improvised journey of marriage, sleep has come to mean sex. It has come to mean let me lose myself within you, let me begin the fall into the silent heart of the night between your legs. “Are you tired?” has become an invitation to make love; a loud yawn and a voluptuous stretch of the arms are supposed to function the way once upon a time his coming behind her and pressing his lips against the nape of her neck did.
She continues to pant like a dog, until his frightened, confused expression is replaced by a frown. She takes her place beside him. She lies flat, she feels her blood racing around and around, as if looking for a way to leave her body. Each time it makes its orbit around her, she feels warmer and warmer.
“I can hardly wait for you to finish your thesis and for us all to move back to New York,” Hampton says. This is meant to be a kind of sweet talk, signifying that he misses her, that he cannot carry much further the
[ 43 ]
burden of their weekly separations. But Iris knows what he is really saying: I hated those people tonight.
“I’m sorry it’s taking so long,” she says. She’s tempted to go back to pretending to be a dog, but she thinks better of it. She feels his long, hard fingers closing around her hand. He lifts her right hand and very carefully, emphatically, ceremoniously places it on his penis, and then he presses down on the back of his hand and lifts his hips up, as if responding to her, though he is only responding to himself.
She pulls her hand away from
“Iris?” says Hampton.
She turns quickly. “You’re awake,” she says.
The light in the window is caught in the back of her hair. He can’t make out her features, but he senses from her voice and posture that he has interrupted her, or startled her. “Who’s out there?” he asks her.
“No one.” She turns, looks out again, as if to check her own story.
“No one.”
“I just had a nightmare,” he says, reaching his hand out to her, beckoning her to bed. He knows that he should not be so commanding—Iris has even told him as much—but the gestures of the favorite son, the always-sought-after man, come from the deepest part of him. To change these things would be like changing his voice, it would take constant vigilance. She finds him arrogant, but he doesn’t feel arrogant. It just seems to him that his being found attractive is a part of the natural order of things, and when Iris resists him, or is slow to respond, it irritates him, not because he is a potentate and she is his lowly subject, but simply because a mistake is being made.
The sight of those long, outstretched fingers illuminates Iris’s nervous system with a rage that ignites like flash powder. She wonders if she a s h i p m a d e o f pa p e r
ought to hold her ground or go to him. Sometimes she has the energy to resist him, but each time she does she enters into the conflict with the knowledge that it will extend through the night.
Hampton switches on his reading light. His cranberry-colored pajamas are streaked with night sweats. He sits up straighter, arranges his pillows, and then reextends his reach for her.
“Are you okay?” she asks.
He pats the sheet on her side of the bed, indicating where he wants her to be. Sometimes she thinks about the men who have wanted to go to bed with her and whom she refused, the good men, handsome, clever, large-hearted men, and how strange it is that life would deliver her to this point: treated like a little dog who is being beckoned to hop up onto the sofa.
Okay, if that’s how he wants it. She bounds across the room, leaps onto the bed, falls forward onto her hands and knees, facing him. Then, completing her private joke, she lets her tongue hang out and she pants.
He counters with excruciatingly contrived tenderness. He strokes the side of her face. “We have to sleep,” he whispers.
This is night language, code; somewhere in the blind, improvised journey of marriage, sleep has come to mean sex. It has come to mean let me lose myself within you, let me begin the fall into the silent heart of the night between your legs. “Are you tired?” has become an invitation to make love; a loud yawn and a voluptuous stretch of the arms are supposed to function the way once upon a time his coming behind her and pressing his lips against the nape of her neck did.
She continues to pant like a dog, until his frightened, confused expression is replaced by a frown. She takes her place beside him. She lies flat, she feels her blood racing around and around, as if looking for a way to leave her body. Each time it makes its orbit around her, she feels warmer and warmer.
“I can hardly wait for you to finish your thesis and for us all to move back to New York,” Hampton says. This is meant to be a kind of sweet talk, signifying that he misses her, that he cannot carry much further the
[ 43 ]
burden of their weekly separations. But Iris knows what he is really saying: I hated those people tonight.
“I’m sorry it’s taking so long,” she says. She’s tempted to go back to pretending to be a dog, but she thinks better of it. She feels his long, hard fingers closing around her hand. He lifts her right hand and very carefully, emphatically, ceremoniously places it on his penis, and then he presses down on the back of his hand and lifts his hips up, as if responding to her, though he is only responding to himself.
She pulls her hand away from
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