He’s washed his socks and underwear in the sink and is drying them in the oven. As I write this, he’s padding barefoot in an old robe of mine, his hair unbraided, rippling down his back.
[click here for the first episode and here for the previous one.]
He has a set of Chinese iron balls going counter-clockwise in each large thin hand and is pacing the apartment’s three rooms, rotating the balls so they chime rhythmically high and low without clicking together. My focus shifts from his fluidly moving fingers and exposed wrists to his tawny feet and surprisingly sturdy ankles.
The robe covers his calf muscles and yet I’m so aware of them I have to shut my eyes and swallow hard, which only makes my breath louder and faster. For there is no reflex for blotting out his intense but roving concentration, his flowing hair, and the contrast between the delicate, synchronized chimes in here and the wind outside, which can only hint at the contrast between the callous sunless Carlos I’ve always known and the magnetism of the hot-blooded prophet circling my floor.
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