Free Cycles by Deborah Boyer Page A

out what he's thinking. But now—his eyes are so expressive they scream what he's feeling, I know exactly what's on his mind, and I'm hardly ever wrong. We know each other inside out, so why talk? We can have a whole conversation from opposite sides of a room—and there's something wonderful about that. We're comfortable, I guess. And I don't know what to do about it. But something has to give, or I'm going to strip naked and run screaming through snowdrifts just to numb this aching longing for something that's gone—and might not come back. Not like this. Not like the sex we were having when these beaming grins were snapped.
     
          I touch our shiny faces, the colors faded and blurred. If this is what married sex is doomed to, no wonder old people don't seem to touch—they can't bear the reminder.
     
          All right, enough of this, because now I'm completely depressed. Maybe coming up here wasn't such a good idea after all. My tomato body is begging for a pressure release and this isn't helping. One little orgasm and I'd feel a whole lot better. I could take off my pants, sit in that rocker and be playing with myself when Cole gets home for lunch. Not new, but maybe surprising.
     
          My laughter is muffled by the boxes.
     
          "Darla? Are you up there?"
     
          I jump. Damn! Too late. It's lunchtime already.
     
          "Yeah, hang on, I'm coming." I dump our smiles back into the box and clamber down the ladder, happy to see him—but he doesn't notice. He's sorting through the mail, tense shoulders saying he has a full afternoon of farm rounds to survive before he can relax—the animal world must be as cranky as I am today. Ah well, best laid plans. I touch his arm. "Soup, or just a sandwich?"
     
          "A sandwich is fine."
     
          I watch him while I slap together meat and bread. A slight frown over the electric bill, a smile at the silly postcard from Cindy. Comfortable, yes. And maybe it's not such a bad thing. He didn't used to care if he was late because we were screwing. I should start something right now, because looking at him standing there, still every inch the handsome man I married for better or worse, fills me with—
     
          "You have to make the boys turn out the lights," a terse command. "The electric bill's twice as high as last year."
     
          Well, I could've started something but he had to go and open his mouth. Impulse and desire evaporate and I'm defensive. "You're here, too, Cole—you tell them. I've told them until I'm blue in the face." Okay, so maybe I don't have to be so bitchy about it but in my current state, I'm not inclined to be the cheery little wife.
     
          I feel him looking at my back. He's examining me like a patient, his deductive brain trying to work out what my pain is.
     
          "Are you trying to start a fight?" he asks mildly.
     
          He does know me as well as I know him. "I'm sorry," I say with a sigh, "I guess I am."
     
          One of his many frustratingly endearing traits is his acceptance that there are times I can't control my moods. That he goes out of his way to avoid conflict once a month is really quite sweet—and horribly unsatisfying to Mother Nature's design.
     
          He munches and reads the paper, effectively ignoring me. Enjoying its hour of hatless freedom, his hair stands up in clumps. I cross the room and smooth it down. I love the feel of it, thick and unruly. Why doesn’t running my hands through it make me want him anymore? Just playing with the chestnut stuff used to make me wet.
     
          He smiles and kisses my hand.
     
     
     
    ~:~:~:~:~
     
     
     
Saturday
     
     
          "Ooo, look—there he is." Lindsey turns to watch the new guy's progress across the taproom. He's a buff engineer-in-diapers, twenty-five if he's a day. The council hired him to help plan the new Town Hall.
     
          "He is so damn fine—and so damn