Chapter 39
Daniel
She woke just before dawn. She was hot, unbelievably warm, and the red ethereal light was glowing through the window making her feel like she had awoken on Mars. In reality she was just squashed in bed with three huge men. John and Colt flanked her sides and Seb lay between her legs, the back of his head on her belly. All of them were asleep, their breathing even, their skin toasty warm.
A new day had dawned and they were still all together. The realization was too beautiful to keep to herself. “Is everyone awake?” she asked.
There was some assertive mumbling.
“Does anyone want to talk about the apocalypse?”
Nobody said anything.
“Cool.”
Colt rolled over and kissed her temple. “How do you feel?”
“Pretty good,” she whispered. “Do you want to smoke the joint I have my coat?”
Colt was on his feet before she’d finished her sentence. “It’s in the kitchen, yeah?”
He returned a few minutes later with the joint, Iris’ lighter and a bottle of water. John and Seb had woken up in his absence and were both kissing various parts of her skin, making goosebumps erupt all over her.
This isn’t fair, Daniel thought. It really isn’t fair. But she didn’t tell them to stop.
“Do the honors?” Colt said, handing her the joint.
“I’d be honored,” Daniel said, accepting it.
“How often do you smoke weed?” Seb asked, his eyes following her as she stuck the joint between her teeth and ignited. “On average? Between one and fourteen times a day.” She laughed at his outraged expression. “Just kidding.”
“Are you though?” John asked skeptically.
“Oh come on, it’s fine,” she said, blowing a thin stream of smoke at him. John gave her a disapproving look but opened his mouth and inhaled, his pale green eyes gleaming.
“Huh,” he muttered. “That is good.”
“I’ll pass the compliment along to Iris. She’s been working on this strain for years. Everyone around here smokes it.”
Colt snorted as he took the joint away from her. “So this place is just the most stereotypical commune on earth, huh?”
“Love it or leave it, Tarzan.”
Colt took a drag and spluttered. “Fuck that’s strong.”
“It sure is,” Daniel said, grinning.
“Why aren’t you…?” He waved an annoyed hand at her. “Coughing too?”
“Because I’m a pro and you’re a newb,” Daniel said laughing at his irritation. “You need to slow down before you hurt yourself.”
“No I don’t.” Colt attempted to take another drag and sent a shower of purple gray smoked floating all over them
“Fucking hell, Stone,” John waved his hands in front of his face. “We’re not all trying to get baked here.”
“You breathed in when she did it.”
“It was sexy when she did it!”
“Okay, okay. Enough.” Daniel plucked the joint from Colt’s fingers. “No more for you, noob.”
She took another drag delighting in the floaty head-spinny feeling and held the joint above Seb. “Care to give it a crack, Reefer Madness?”
Seb looked mightily tempted but shook his head. “Not right now.”
“Oh come on,” Colt said, still coughing a little. “Just do it.”
“Yeah peer-pressure,” Daniel said, as she made the joint dance in front of him. “Besides, you’re just gonna get hotboxed if you stay here so you might as well embrace it.”
Seb glanced up at John.
“The end of the world is coming,” he pointed out.
“Plus you’re unemployed,” Colt added. “I’d say this is a pretty good time to experiment with weed.”
So, holding it like it was a stick of dynamite, Seb brought the joint to his split lips. He sucked lightly, the way he did when he was between her legs and managed to hold the smoke down pretty well.
“You’re good at it for a newbie,” Daniel said encouragingly. “Better than Colt anyway.”
Seb grinned as he blew out the smoke. “Same as sex then?”
She and John laughed as Colt and Seb had a brief but furious wrestling match. They were both naked but it didn’t seem to bother them. It was like watching children play in truth, completely at ease with nudity.
“So do you guys want to talk about the apocalypse?” Daniel asked when they all settled against her once more.
Everyone groaned.
“Hey, don’t be like that!” Daniel said defensively. “I’m just concerned that you’re keeping unresolved tension bottled up inside.”
“It’s not bottled,” Seb said, turning his head so his hair tickled her belly. “It’s just resting.”
“Okay,” Daniel said in a high and mighty teacher’s voice. “But if you kill yourselves I’m going to be pissed off.”
“We’re not going to kill ourselves,” John said exasperatedly.
“I don’t know that. You’re all veterans and you have access to guns.”
“What does that have to do with anything?” Colt asked.
“People who have guns commit suicide at way higher rates.”
“Yeah, yeah hippie.” John snuck the joint from her and took a quick drag. “People have guns everywhere.”
“Not in New Zealand,” Daniel said proudly. “In New Zealand even the cops don’t carry guns.”
“Is that because they’re hobbits?” Colt asked.
Daniel kicked him.
They lay in silence for a while, thinking their own thoughts together. In spite of all the unanswered questions Daniel couldn’t remember ever feeling so relaxed. The world was a beautiful purplish haze, her muscles loose, her mind a tranquil lake.
“You know it reminds me of deployment,” John said finally. “The end of the world. We’ll be heading out into the unknown. Shit-scary but kinda exciting.”
“You’re right.” Colt’s voice was a low rumble. “Dying doesn’t scare me as much as rotting away in some home for sad old fucks. Besides, now we know what’s happening we can enjoy the time we’ve got left.”
“Yeah,” Daniel said, snuggling deeper down into the bed, into them.
“I’ve never seen pyramids.” Seb said, pinching out the joint and placing it on the bedside table. “I think I’d like to go there.”
“There’s five more years,” Daniel said. “Plenty of time for you to go.”
“For us to go,” Colt corrected, making her all warm inside. “I can’t believe I was worried about turning fifty. I’m gonna stay hot right up to the end.”
“I hope you do,” John yawned. “The grayer you get the vainer you get. Best we can hope for is for you to go to the ground with a full head of hair.”
Daniel smiled. “Maybe it’s a good thing you used to be soldiers. You have a very well refined sense of gallows humor.”
“Among other things,” Colt said, kissing her cheek.
“You guys,” Seb said. “I don’t think it’s sunk in properly for me, but I don’t feel nervous at all. Like at all.”
John reached down and tousled his hair. “Think that’s the weed, kid.”
“Oh.” Seb’s smile was dreamy. “I like weed.”
He pressed his cheek against Daniel’s stomach and nuzzled at her like a puppy. The mood was too contemplative and friendly to invoke more sex but Daniel made a mental note to get him super high and sixty-nine the hell out of him later. Speaking of which…“Do you think you guys would ever…you know…do stuff to each other? While I watch?”
“No,” they said without hesitation, the lazy sensual air instantly dissolving.
“Don’t be a bunch of prudes!” Daniel snapped. “It’s not a big deal.”
Colt pinched her side. “Yes it is.”
“But—”
“Put it this way, Schwartz,” John said, cutting her off. “If nothing happened after a fourteen-week deployment, we’re talking months with no pussy in sight, it’s sure as hell not gonna happen now.”
“Even if I buy you…a Nespresso machine?”
“Not even for four hundred Nespresso machines,” John said, amused.
“I don’t know…” Colt exhaled loudly. “I wouldn’t let the kid blow me for a Nespresso machine but I’d definitely let him blow me for a Chevy Impala.”
Seb screwed up his face in disgust. “Well I ain’t doing that.”
“What about John?” Daniel asked, curious.
“He’s got the wrong hair. Couldn’t pretend he was a woman.”
“What if you pretend he’s a woman with a shaved head, like Sinead O’Connor?” Daniel asked.
Colt shuddered. “No thanks.”
“What about Natalie Portman in V for Vendetta?”
Colt tucked her deeper into his side. “I think when it comes to sexy Jewish girls I’m happy with what I’ve got.”
“Agreed,” Seb said, pressing his cheek back against her belly.
Daniel looked at John and he gave her a very small wink.
They’re like you, a voice inside her said. They won’t take their own lives because they’re afraid. They’re fighters. They’re strong. They’ll stay with you.
Daniel felt something inside her release, not a valve, more like a huge throbbing blister that had been punctured. The pus and pain that had been accumulating felt like it was pouring from her, evaporating into the air along with the pot smoke. Maybe they all sensed it happening because each of them moved closer, holding her more tightly, covering her skin with theirs. They lay there for the longest time together, Colt snoring, Seb breathing evenly, herself drifting in and out of consciousness. Finally she remembered something, something she’d been meaning to tell them.
“John?” she mumbled. “Are you awake?”
“Yeah.”
She yawned. “You know in some parts of India women used to marry multiple men all the time? Brothers, you know?”
“That right?”
“Yeah, like four brothers at once. And they were…” Daniel yawned even wider. “Really happy and normal.”
“That’s good, Schwartz.” She could hear him smiling.
“I’m not saying we should get married, but you know…Stuff.”
“Yeah, stuff.” He pressed a cool kiss onto her cheek. “Sleep now. We’ll work everything else out later.”
The End
Daniel, John, Colt and Seb will (hopefully) return in Mock.