Candy Cigarettes (working title)

[reaganob]

Author's note: This is my first short story that I've even attempted writing. It came out of an inspiration from song lyrics and sort of a dream I had one night. I appreciate any and all feedback on this-- it's a draft, but I have gone through and edited some here and there-- especially since I am going to do NaNoWriMo this year and I'd like to start off with the best foot forward.
The song that inspired this is called April Fools in February by Beck Pete.
Thanks for reading!

Sounds of the street below the small but comfortable apartment were only slightly dampened by the frosted glass window of the bathroom. The afternoon sunlight was uncharacteristic for winter there, but the way the rays cast into the tight bathroom space gave it a slightly magical appeal. A woman stepped out of the shower and onto the bath mat, taking a towel off of the hook on the open door. Her dark hair, darkened even further by the water soaked into it, was stringy, locks of hair stuck together from the water and collecting in small tresses around her face. With the back of her fingers, she brushed the back of her neck and guided her hair up and over her head, flipping it over so that it hung towards the floor. With the towel in her other hand, she pinched the towel in two corners and placed the hem at the back of her neck before wrapping the towel around her hair and twisting. In one fluid motion, she then flipped her now toweled head back, letting the twisted towel collect the water from her hair. Water droplets still ran and dripped down her body, for which the woman reached for a second towel from the same rack on the door and began toweling herself off; first, drying the back of her neck and what she could reach of her back, then her shoulders and arms, left and then right, then down to her legs, starting from her thighs down to her ankles, left and then right. Finally, she pinched the towel at its corners as she had before and placed the hem right at the top of her armpits and wrapped each side around herself, rolling the top hem under itself towards her skin so it was tight and would stay up without her having to hold it.

If anyone had been watching her, they may have found it exciting the way she moved and handled herself, especially in such a state after bathing. Yet perhaps the way she moved was because she simply knew there would be no one there to watch her, although someone had been expected after all.

There was something so enticing about the entire scene, and maybe it was just because she’d just stepped out of the shower that she felt this way, but while she would have normally lounged about in her towel in the sitting room, perhaps with a book, perhaps just with her thoughts as she waited for her someone, she chose to stay right where she was. She sat herself down on the toilet, the lid closed, and rested her arm on the top of the tank. Her elbow brushed past small bottles of skincare; moisturizers, clarifying gels, cleansers, and such other items.

After a few moments of stillness she moved again, taking the towel down from her hair and getting up from her position briefly to hang the now wet towel back up on the peg where she found it. Running a hand through her heavy hair, she returned to her previous position and let out a low sigh, turning her back to the doorway and facing the mirror, catching a glance of herself in the mirror above the sink as she reached for her hairbrush.

That diffused sunlight coming through the window to her left, now, warmed the skin of her shoulder and neck as she ran the brush through her hair slowly, the motions pulling her hair over her right shoulder. The wet layers of her hair, now drying, had stopped being so unimpeachably straight and were returning to their wavy state, in particular the layers in front that framed her face. She remained this way for a long time, absentmindedly brushing through her hair as the brush continued to collect the stray hairs that shed from her scalp. The sounds from the street below were not so much background noise, but instead the soundtrack for this meditative state she found herself in.

This meditative state was eventually broken by the sound of distant footsteps and the door to the apartment opening. Heeled loafers against the hardwood floors made the slow, almost cautious footsteps stepping closer and closer to the bedroom and subsequently the bathroom where the woman sat. It was impossible to tell how long she’d been there, but her new movements felt like a nice stretch just after waking up from a deep sleep. She was now leaning over to the windowsill and replacing the brush to its rightful place. Then just as one would return to settle in the sheets, she returned to simply sitting in that position of hers, with her left leg crossed over her right, her elbow resting on the top of the tank between those bottles of skincare and a roll of paper, eyes cast out in front of her towards nothing in particular.

The footsteps finally found themselves in the bedroom, where the man who belonged to the footsteps now stood. Although his back was turned to the bathroom door that stood open, the two were intimately aware of each others’ presence.
The man placed his wallet and keys on the desk that was just opposite the bathroom door, catching sight of two Nintendo Switch cartridges, before his eyes cast upon the bar in the corner, a drink already prepared with a napkin under it. With a small smile, he reached out for the glass and took a whiff of its contents.

His smile faded as he tried to recall the last time he’d seen the desk so perfectly arranged for his arrival home to their apartment. He’d grown accustomed to ignoring the disarray of the place when he returned home, her clothes strewn over the place haphazardly and a pair of wine glasses sitting out, one stained with lipstick, both their contents drained. And yet now, he returned to his home just the way he used to find it years ago. There was an uncomfortable feeling that had set into his chest.

“Video games and mezcal on ice,” the woman spoke finally, her gaze turning down towards the floor. She still hadn’t turned around to regard him. Her tone was resigned, almost as if she wasn’t fully there. “The only recipe I know by heart that you like.”

The man placed his lips to the crystal glass, its ridges pronounced and almost sharp at times on the pads of his fingers. After a moment of hesitation, he took a sip of the spirits and let the alcohol warm his mouth and throat as it went down, the ice clinking against the glass as he did so. He placed the glass down next to the Switch cartridges and turned 90 degrees to his right, now facing the window to the street. She was in his peripheral vision, yet instead of basking in the image of his wife as any better man would have, he kept his gaze towards the wall. “I’m sorry,” he replied, even though it had nothing to do with what she’d said. His voice was level and calm, somewhat resigned as well to match her own. He figured she would understand what he meant.

“I’m surprised the ice hasn’t melted by now,” she continued, practically ignoring his apology and keeping still. “Then you’d just have an even shittier drink. But at least you’d be drinking it the proper way, even if watered down.”

At this he chuckled almost imperceptibly, his smile growing again as he shook his head and took another sip of the spirits. His eyes now caught the wedding band next to the Switch cartridges as he placed the glass down, and his smile slowly faded again. He picked up the band and studied it, looking on the inside of the gold ring for the engraving.

“Is this mine, or yours?” His voice finally came, his gaze now shifting over to his counterpart. He saw the way the sunlight lit up her skin and the towel, the way her hair cascaded down her shoulder. Warmth filled his stomach, but maybe it was just the alcohol.

“Well, are you wearing yours?” Her voice came, answering his question with a question. It was a signature of hers to answer this way, and yet it still revealed the truth of both of their earlier activities and obligations that day.

There was silence between the two now. He stood turned towards the bathroom, not moving, only able to see himself from the chest down and a fraction of the front of her right side in the reflection. He studied the small pattern on his dress shirt, his black belt, and his navy trousers in the mirror before his heeled footsteps came again, moving towards her figure leaning on the tank. He stopped at the doorway, just close enough, leaning against the doorframe with his left shoulder. He placed a hand on his hip for a moment before slipping his hand into his pocket, rubbing the wedding band in his left hand and looking down at it.

“You brushed your hair,” he commented softly, looking down at her drying tresses draped over her shoulder. “I thought you liked me to do that.”

“I’m sorry,” her voice echoed his from earlier, but he wasn’t sure that it was referring to the state of her hair. It didn’t seem to have any apologetic quality to it.

There they were, baked in silence again. His eyes moved from the back of her neck to the window and how the sunlight came in, then down to the skincare and makeup on the windowsill, then to her brush.

“Well of course, I’d never want to redo the work done by the experts,” his voice returned, now with a slight passive aggressive edge that would have normally been used by her. It surprised her, given that she was usually the one that dealt more than she took.

“Oh, a month ago I would’ve said that I liked to fight. But now, I’ve got bruises for knees and white flags in my eyes, Henry,” she replied quickly and with new intent and fire in her voice than she’d displayed so far in their exchange, uttering his name for the first time in what felt like ages. A sigh passed through her lips and Henry looked down again to the wedding band in between his fingers.

Henry passed the ring between his fingers a few times as he thought about what to say. “Jo,” he sighed, her name on his breath mixed with alcohol. “You know I never want to fight with you. But we have to get ready, it’s nearly time for the car to pick us up.”

A scoff came from her quickly, but he could tell there was a smile on her lips even though he couldn’t see her face. A smile came to his own features as he turned away from her and walked back towards the desk, a hand grasping the crystal glass on it as he moved towards his own dresser. “As much as I think you’re absolutely divine as you are, we must attempt to adhere to the dress code this time.”

There was shifting behind him as Josephine turned around to face him, assuming the same pose as she had before, only now she could see through the doorway of the bathroom. She could see his back standing at the dresser, fumbling with things. Henry was sifting his fingers through a crystal bowl of odds and ends– some of Jo’s earrings, a few necklaces, a beaded wire rosary, and a few keys– looking for something.

“Jo, my cuff–”

“In the jewelry box. Middle drawer,” she replied, watching him.

Henry shifted over slightly to stand in front of her jewelry box, placing his fingers delicately on the small iron handle of the box’s middle drawer and pulling it open. Just as she’d told him, there sat his favorite pair of cufflinks, small rectangle pins inlaid with obsidian and oyster shell, displayed neatly in line with other cufflinks of his and a few other pairs of earrings that Josephine wore on more special occasions.

Henry took the small cufflinks into his hands and unfolded the cuffs of his sleeves from the crook of his elbow, working on the left one first. He fumbled with the odd motion of his hands, doing his best to smooth out the now slightly wrinkled forearm and wrist of his shirt before looping the pin through the first hole, shifting the shirt around by pinning it between his arm and his side, trying to get it to match–

“Come,” commanded Josephine, who had been looking on. With a slight smile, Henry turned around and walked over to his wife in her towel and stood in front of her. Josephine’s hands took his in hers and lowered them to her eye level, pulling them towards her. Only his toes now passed the threshold as he looked on with a shadow of a smile on his face.

The two sat in silence once again, his arms and shirt now with rays of sunshine cast upon them just as her skin had. He let his eyes drift over her collarbones, her neck, the hem of the towel where it was rolled up so perfectly at her breasts, her chin, and her hair that was in that perfect damp stage that he loved so much as she worked on him.

“I swear, Henry, absolutely hopeless,” she breathed as she shook her head, finishing with the left cufflink and moving on to the right. He handed her the other cufflink, her fingers brushing his as she took it and unpinned the backing. Her fingers brushed over the wedding band on his hand as she moved his arm in a way that she could properly access the buttonhole she needed.
“Every time,” she continued, “every time. You’d think you would learn to do it yourself after so many times of getting dressed in a hurry. You’ve had practice, after all.”

They both knew the events of the past she was referring to, and she knew that the past was as recent as just before he’d arrived home. These events both had nothing and everything to do with the outings not unlike the one they would attend tonight– outings they had attended together as a couple even before they were married.

“I said I would love you ‘til the day I died,” Henry responded after a moment, his voice low and quiet and caring, more gentle than her words had been towards him. “We both know I’m lots of things, but I’m not a liar.”

Both of their eyes were cast towards his hands, and Josephine’s fingers slowed as she worked with his cuff. The tension between them seemed to thicken in the diffused sunlight of the bathroom. Yet, the tension in the apartment always seemed to be about to reach a fever pitch, at least when the two were in proximity to each other.

Josephine stayed quiet at this notion, taking her time to finish with his cufflinks. Having noticed the wrinkles from the way his sleeves had been rolled up only just a few moments before, she took the time to smooth them out with her fingers, one hand holding his wrist in the palm of her hand and smoothing each wrinkle with two fingers from the other. Henry watched her do so, slowly inching his hand back towards himself, slipping his hand into hers. While she could have easily let his hand go, Josephine took his hand in hers, her fingers twisting and moving the ring on his finger slowly in thought.

“I’ve never said sorry so much,” she started softly. “And neither have you. It’s fucked up,” a chuckle came from her after she continued a moment later. Henry listened to her quietly, his eyes watching the band and the movements she made with her fingers.

“If I wouldn’t have stayed in a hotel that night,” he began, her fingers now moving to touch his knuckles, tracing the veins on the back of his palm. “With the.. Free HBO,” he chuckled, “and the room to decide…” His soft voice trailed off as he took a breath in.

Josephine’s fingers now traveled back down to his fingers, tracing his cuticles on each finger as she inspected them, gently brushing away any dead skin from calluses that she could get at with her nails. She let his voice trail off in the silence, the street noise from outside having died down a little, becoming background noise to their dialogue.

“Maybe we’d have figured out a way to get by,” she breathed softly, wistfully. After a moment she chuckled. “Maybe we still can. Cheat codes always would’ve been figured out… on your side.”

The alcohol in his stomach no longer warmed him. Instead, cold vines of grief crept up and down his body from his chest. He swallowed the lump that had formed in his throat. Clearing his throat as quietly and delicately as he could, with the hand that wasn’t in hers, he reached out and placed a finger under her chin, lifting it up to meet his eyes.

There were indeed white flags in her eyes; Henry could see this. Their usual fire that she used to keep most everyone at arm’s length, even himself, had been extinguished. Tracing the line of her jaw, he took it in his hand, his thumb and forefinger pressed against either side of it. His thumb slowly moved up and down, slipping below her chin and above to the start of the side of her cheek. He, for once, was not silent because he chose to be. He didn’t know what to say.

Silence had seemed to be their love language, their warzone, their playing field. Their gossip-filled and chatter-fueled public life had become their entire relationship, so much so that it had become the way they communicated. There was no reason for them to speak, because the life of one had always gotten back to the other that they simply knew. There was nothing to speak about, nothing to argue over, because they had simply already argued with each other in their minds and gotten revenge before the other had even stepped into their home.

Henry held Josephine’s gaze and Josephine held Henry’s for the long moment that followed, but Henry’s thumb had never stopped moving against her skin. Finally Henry broke the eye contact, slipping his hand out of hers and reaching over to where her makeup sat on the windowsill, immediately finding her favorite shade of red lipstick and returning his eyes to hers with the tube in his hand. His eyes flicked from hers down to her lips, then back to her eyes. With a small nod of consent from Josephine, he took his hand from her jaw and uncapped the lipstick. He leaned down, brushing his lips gently against hers for a moment before he pulled away, moving closer to her as he took her chin into his hand again. He looked down to the lipstick wand and inspected it for the proper amount of product before placing a thumb just underneath her bottom lip, parting her lips just slightly.

He then, with almost expert skill, swiped the wand over her lips, taking care to perfect the edges, corners, and her cupid’s bow, until her lipstick had been applied just the way he knew she liked it. He studied her lips carefully during these moments, her eyes still locked on his. When he’d finished, he capped the lipstick carefully and twisted the cap back on before returning his eyes to hers, his thumb running over the skin of her chin before he looked back into her eyes. He presented his other thumb for her as he’d done hundreds of times before, and she placed her lips around it, pulling away and pressing her lips together as his thumb left her mouth. He was left with lipstick wrapped around his thumb, the excess from the inside of her mouth now on his thumb instead of on the inside of her lips, threatening to stain the front of her teeth. Then just as he’d done before, he leaned down to meet her lips, and this time she kissed him back, embracing him for a few long moments before he pulled away from her again.

“Time to get dressed, darling,” he spoke softly as he straightened up again, letting his hand on her chin gently fall, fingers tracing the side of her neck before they returned to his sides. His wedding band caught the sunlight as it passed through the ray that was currently lighting up her collarbone and carving down to the towel she wore. It had begun to slip down, now resting just above where her nipples would be.

Josephine stood, and Henry took a small step back that put him just outside the threshold of the door again. She turned towards the mirror and placed her hands on the sink, the back of her fingers brushing against her shoulder and flicking her now almost-dry hair off from her front around her shoulder to her back in the same motion. She inspected the state of her skin in the mirror as Henry moved off and went to the closet, taking the midnight blue evening gown that hung on the back of the door, ready for Josephine to slip into after her shower, holding the hanger. He came to lean against the bathroom doorway again, the hanging gown now draped over his shoulder. When he caught sight of her again, she had let the towel drop down to the floor, now standing nude in front of the mirror. She had her brush in her hand, and she held it up to her side over her shoulder. Henry knew this gesture, and after a moment of making her wait, he placed the hanger on one of the pegs on the bathroom door to their right where her towels had previously been, and stepped forward across the threshold yet again, one hand sneaking its way between her left arm and side, sliding down slowly to rest on her hip as his right reached out to take the brush from her hand. He got to work on his task, every so often placing kisses along her shoulder and neck. Slowly, they fell back into their old, familiar routine.

“Dress me,” she requested, making eye contact with him through the mirror. Henry’s lips curled into a slight smile and he finished the stroke he’d started with the brush, placing it on the windowsill where it belonged.

“Of course, my lady,” he replied softly, placing one last kiss on the crook of her neck before he turned and retrieved a pair of underwear for her and a bra, returning and resuming his previous position behind her. He then dressed her, hooking the eyelets of her bra together in the back and sliding her underwear up her legs and around her waist, letting his hands rest there at her hips for a moment and looking at their reflection in the mirror before turning towards the door. He took the dress off of the hanger, unzipping the zipper. Josephine stepped away from the sink slightly and he held the dress out in front of her, his two arms on either side of her as he stood behind. Her hand held onto his forearm as she stepped into the dress, the fabric sliding up her waist and her sides as Henry pulled it up along her body. She let go briefly to slip her arms through the off-the-shoulder sleeves. Her hands came up to her chest to hold it in place as Henry’s hands slid away to pinch the bottom of the zipper, his other hand pinching the zipper itself and zipping her into the dress. Once it was zipped, Josephine turned around, keeping her body close to Henry’s as she leaned up and into him, their eyes closing simultaneously as their lips met. Henry’s hands resumed their position on her sides and her hips as Josephine’s arms moved to wrap around his neck. They enjoyed this embrace for a long moment until they were interrupted by two sharp honks outside. Their driver for the evening had arrived.

Josephine was the first to pull away, Henry leaning in to kiss her for as long as he could before they were forced to separate. “No villain this time,” Josephine smirked, speaking softly to him. “So, who do I scream at, at night?”

“You can scream at me,” Henry suggested, matching her smirk with his own smile, his own voice just loud enough for her to hear. “I’m a lot of things, but I’m not a liar.”

Josephine’s hands slid down Henry’s shoulders, adjusting his collar before they continued to slide down his chest. They rested just below his pecs, over his ribs.

“You are my head,” he began, “down to my toes. I could never get used to a world without you.”

“You’re my own personal hell,” she replied, a finger coming up to trace his lips. Henry kissed her fingertip tracing over them.

“Can’t be hell without you, dear.”

Another two honks sounded from outside as the pair kissed again, this time with more need and passion. Henry pulled away this time and took his wife’s hand, leading her out of the bathroom and letting her hand slip from his as he retrieved her heels that went with her dress. While he did so, Josephine retrieved a tie for him, his suit jacket, and his overcoat. The two met in the center of the bedroom, turning towards each other as Henry placed her heels at her feet. She stepped into them as Henry guided her feet. He then turned towards the mirror, Josephine tying his tie for him and helping him into his suit jacket and overcoat. They looked at themselves in the mirror for a few moments, taking in the sight of them together. And just like the old days, with Henry looking over to his wife and raising his arm, Josephine took it, and they left to meet their driver for the night.