Free In All of Infinity by H. R. Holt Page A

up the stairs. She began following him,
“Remember last Christmas? A little kiss here? A little kiss there?
Well, I want more of that, and a little bit of something else.”
     
    “What?!” he asked and turned. Virginia was
two steps behind him, almost as small as a child, but he knew she
wasn’t guiltless. He couldn’t believe she attended church! If she
embraced who she really was, he would at least accept her as a
human being! “What do you want from me?”
     
    “I want you,” she answered. “I’ve always
wanted you. If only you would believe that…”
     
    “Don’t you understand?!
I’m twenty years
older than you are! Is there no one else in this world you can
devote yourself to? Someone younger? Someone who isn’t an old man?”
he asked and reached the second floor. He realized he wasn’t going
to be rid of her, knew he wouldn’t be able to go in the attic. He
turned and looked at her resignedly. “Why can’t you “love” someone
else? Do you even know the meaning of the word?”
     
    “Do you?”
     
    Emmanuel looked at her blankly for a second,
“I guess I don’t.” He turned and began walking away. “Not
anymore.”
     
    “Will you ever get over her?” Virginia
sobbed. “Will you ever know that I exist? I do exist. I can show
you what it’s like to live and continue to love, to feel alive
without ever sacrificing emotions. Even if love doesn’t exist for
you, it exists for me. Why won’t you let me exist for you?”
     
    Virginia realized he wasn’t listening to
her. Since she was a woman who often got her way, no matter how
high the odds were stacked against her, she wouldn’t let him walk
away. She had planned on catching him ever since she’d returned to
town, after burying another husband who had made her too distant
when it came to lovemaking. Larry, her fourth, made love to her to
make himself feel alive, but never for love. Not even once. She
needed to feel loved, and knew Emmanuel Reagan was just the man to
do it. She didn’t care if he returned the emotion.
     
    She went towards him and wrapped her arms
around him, began undoing the buckle on his belt. She whispered
passionately, “Make love to me.”
     
    Emmanuel turned and looked down at her, not
knowing how else he could reject her. She considered three kisses
to be love, when he knew for a fact they’d both been intoxicated
when each one happened. He disentangled her arms from around his
waist and shoved her away. She began sobbing, but he would have
nothing to do with her. He walked into his room and slammed the
door behind him, hearing the volume of her crying increase.
     
    He sat on the bedside, ran his hands through
his hair, and then pulled out a cigarette. Once he lit it, he
stared at it, watching the smoke rise from the abomination he went
to for relief. It wouldn’t help him get over Esme. It never would.
He’d tried for years to push her to the back of his mind, but she
emerged each time he tried. He remembered the way she bit her lip
when she was nervous, the aroma of her perfume, the brilliance of
her eyes, and the way light would dance across her hair. What
troubled him most was that, when he thought of her, he couldn’t
imagine her smiling. He always saw her in tears. Tears he couldn’t
and would never be able to wipe away.
     
    After sitting in silence for a while, he
realized it was almost time to go back to work. He stepped out of
his room but paused when he realized Virginia was no longer
standing in the hall. Instead, he saw a white man-child sitting in
the middle of the floor, eyes closed and hands pressed flat against
the sides of his head. Emmanuel realized there were parts of the
man-child that was splotched with brown.
     
    “Who are you?”
     
    The man-child opened his eyes and Emmanuel
realized how unusual they looked, almost like a snake’s. The owner
of these eyes quickly moved so that he was standing ramrod
straight, his hands still pressed to his head.
     
    “What is the date,