The man on the lower bunk jolted awake with an apparent self-reproach for sleeping too long. He glanced across the room to make sure nothing had changed from last he remembered it. But difference pried at his eyes until epiphany lit them. He blinked twice, probably to be sure what he saw was indeed what was there before him, and set his jaws firmly together to keep from shouting. There, in the center of the room, the child slept alone, curled in the sand. Above her, hanging from a steel beam by a rope around its hind legs and swinging ever so slightly side-to-side, was the blue deer whose dark, wide eyes gazed lifelessly beyond the walls of the dugout.
On the far side of the deer stood the woman in leather. She pressed herself up against the dead beast in such a sensuous manner that the man had to look away for a moment, to find the nothing of the sand floor, and use that as a canvas on which he would paint his thoughts. When he looked back, she rubbed her cheek against the blue fur, which didn't quite have the same shimmer he remembered as it had dashed into the room. She caressed the skin and, when she noticed him watching her, brought a thin, glimmering knife up before her eyes and began to skin the beast.
The man acted, but by the time he had roused himself from the bed and made it to her side, she had separated a fair portion of the hide from the left flank. She let him take her hand with the knife, but leaned into the creature—and with a devious glance at him, turned her head, opened her mouth, and licked the raw muscle of the dead deer. He managed to pull the knife from her hand and flung it to a far corner and wrestled her from the hanging creature. She resisted, somewhat, but only as much as a drunk only half protesting being taken to a bed to sleep off the inebriation.
When he had sat her back down on the couch, he stood back up, over her, whispering, “No!” fiercely serveral times. When she retreated from him a bit and had curled up back near the wall, he returned his attention to the the fortunately still-sleeping child. How she hadn't awakened while the deer had been slaughtered and hung, he didn't know; but then again, he himself had slept through it. His eyes only spoke volumes about his future vigilance. Nothing like this would happen in the future; he would not allow it. But motion above her caught his eye; the steady argument of gravity had been coaxing a small drip of blood from the animal's flank down its belly, past its shoulder, and onto the neck of the animal hanging over the girl. It raced down the jawbone, over the chin, and came to a point on the tip of the nose. The man's muscles froze as he watched as the drop gathered its weight and then released to the final persuasion. It fell singularly, alone from nose to forehead—a final communion between beast and child. Her eyelids twitched for a moment, her hand reached idly to her face and smeared the drop into a streak, but didn't wake. The man was freed from his spell and he rushed to her side.
He picked up the girl softly and carried her back to the lower bunk. After he had set her down and again placed the blanket over her, he tried to wipe the blood from her forehead. But the smudge wouldn't disappear. But she was sleeping, still, and he rejoiced in this fact.
Looking back to his left, he found the young woman, huddled in the corner of the bed in the corner of the room, where she sat with her head between her knees, arms wrapped around her legs. A sigh of compassion fell from his lips and he scooted himself back to join her. With gentle hands he pulled her shoulder to him, lifted her chin until he found those shifting blue eyes with his own. A moment escaped between their glances, and then he leaned in to kiss her. But she turned her head; she found the texture of the wall suddenly more fascinating.
Without hesitation, the man stretched his arm around her shoulders and held her close. She shivered in his embrace and her breaths came with short and shallow intakes. He began to sway with her, ever so gently, whispering small encouragements and soothing statements. When tears finally broke from the comfort of her eyelids and streamed down her cheeks, he wiped them with a careful finger and held her just a little more tightly than before. Then her breaths gained volume and turned into stuttered moans, filled with agony and pure defeat. “There, there,” his lips said, “You're okay; you're okay. I've got you.” Still she seemed to resist his embrace; she kept her cheek turned as far away from his as she could; but as her energy dwindled, his persistence began to win out. Her elbow no longer pushed against his chest as hard as it had; she didn't hug her knees as strictly as she had when he had first approached her. And evermore her sobs gained volume. Each had a marked effect on the man: his eyebrows betrayed him most, dropping in empathy with every ache-marked sigh. But he held her; he held her with every muscle he had and willed life and love into the deepest parts of her heart.
As he brushed a strand of hair from her face, at last she turned her eyes to his. They were filled with despair, bleak and deep. He gazed in them, much further than anyone had ever tried to penetrate. And like an unfathomed cavern devouring a light on a rope, she began to consume every ounce of life he had to offer. Just as he emptied the last of himself to her, just as a flashing, wicked smile came to her lips, he struck the bottom.
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