Chapter 19

When Tess eventually came back from her forced march in the woods, she was dry-eyed and more-or-less normal looking. We all three lazed around for the rest of the afternoon and evening. I wasn't feeling communicative so I broke out a novel I'd been neglecting and used it as an excuse not to engage in conversation.

There was a pall over the proceedings, and I'm sure Kim noticed that something was amiss. But she didn't say anything.

After dinner I needed a shower. I first considered using the front compartment -- the telephone booth shower that was nominally Kim's, but that none of us actually had been using regularly. Finally I thought to myself, 'fuck it, ' and went on back to Tess' bedroom to undress.

I was bare from the waist down with my pants around my ankles when Tess followed me into the room and closed the door. "Are you going to sleep with me tonight?" she said.

"Doesn't seem like such a great idea," I told her.

"Please," she said. "I don't want Kim to think that we are, y'know, busted up."

"Christ, what difference does it make what Kim thinks? Why don't you tell her I'm leaving you alone for a few days so your boyfriend won't find any strange spermatozoa leaking out of your cooze."

"Is this the way it's going to be?" she said.

"You mean, 'Can't we all just be sophisticated and civilized about this?'"

"I understand that you're angry, Will."

"Listen, when you said we shouldn't make sleeping together a big deal, I agreed to it. Hell, I'd have agreed to anything -- a tattoo on my schlong, if you'd asked for it!"

Once again, I was finding that I couldn't discuss the issue with Tess without blowing up. "I just didn't fully understand the terms and conditions."

"Will, I..."

"I thought you meant that, after our little time together, here, on the tour, it was possible we'd just go our separate ways, y'know? I didn't realize you meant you'd be fucking other guys who just ducked in and out for the weekend."

"I told you already, Will, I didn't plan any of this. I didn't know I was going to... to... become your..."

I finished it for her. "You didn't know you were going to decide to get off with your caddie before Prince Hal was due back to see you. It seemed like a good idea at the time, but now, you realize it's all terribly awkward."

"I didn't know you could be so -- so hurtful!" she said. She was getting ready to cry again. I was just feeling stupid, arguing with her with my crumpled trousers down around my ankles.

"Sleep in here tonight," she said, finally. "Please. We don't have to do anything."

"Why do you give a shit what Kim thinks?" I asked again.

"Not Kim. But. Just sleep in here tonight, so I can sleep. Please?"

"What am I? Your security blanket? Is that what we've been doing, here?"

"Please. I don't want to fight, Will. Please! Think about it." She left the bedroom, with nothing settled, and I got my shower.

Later, Kim, after a couple of "good-nights," went off to bed, and a few minutes after that, Tess, saying nothing, went into the back bedroom. I was still plowing through my novel. In spite of all the Sturm and Drang in the RV, it was a pretty good novel, and it had helped to take my mind off my troubles.

Alone, I had the choice of sacking out on one of the several long-cushioned couches in the RV. They were comfortable enough: designed to accommodate odd-men-out, like me, when the RV's two bedrooms were filled. Or I could do as Tess had asked, and join her in the big bedroom.

I certainly didn't feel like having any kind of sex with her. I wasn't even going to be poking Junior up into her friendly little cleft for safekeeping. Hell, I was going to leave my Jockeys on, even.

But, eventually, I did go back there and climb into her bed. We slept back to back. That was unsatisfactory for several reasons -- one of them being that I was accustomed to lying on my left side, with my arm full of warm girl. Tonight, it was my right (wrong) side, with one arm hanging uncomfortably off the side of the bed.

During the night, Tess' broad, warm back-and-bottom snuggled up close. I felt it. It woke me up, momentarily. She was damn near shoving me clear out of the bed!

But I didn't turn around, and I didn't push back. I just took my place on the far-left edge of that big bed and tried to get some sleep.