Even well into the evening we just cling together like families you hear about drawn closer through trauma.Eventually, we fall asleep on the couch, sleeping securely through the night.In the morning I tell Chris I don’t want to leave. I feel so close to her, so compatible, so needed. She seems an empty orphan. Open, vulnerable, abandoned, and I simply have this unexplainable desire to protect and care for her.So I move in for a few days.Dogs, vitamins, toothbrush, shirts and half a dozen cans of Alpo chopped beef.And it doesn’t take more than a day or two for the swelling in Chris’ lip to subside, the discolored bruise around her eye to fade and for the bloom in her cheek, the laughter in her smile and the madness in her logic to return to their normal, bizarre ways.Since she’s appearing Off-Broadway, the show’ll be dark the next couple of days, and she won’t have another until Wednesday. So at least her rape scene was well timed.We stay at home until then, finding it easier to deal with ourselves than the cold, cruel world of reality lying outside our door, waiting to pounce on us again dare we stray.We play games.
