Emotions & Claims

Illustration Copyright © 2017 by Lamair Nash    

Fiction File Entry #87 (Sexy bits and naughty thoughts that may yet become full-blown comics…or something.)

“God.  I hope I didn’t sound obvious when I asked you over to see my books.”

“I thought it was intentional.”

“What?  No!  I mean, I wouldn’t....”

“Why not?”

“What?  Because...weren’t you...?  I mean...you’re….”

Sanjit just kept staring at her, smiling, slowly drinking.  The air around her and between them grew sticky and warm. 

Badra took the glass out of his hand.  “Come.  Come with me.”  She pulled him into her room lined with books, with titles and names and emotions and claims.  She stared at him at first, as if silently asking him, “See?  You understand, now?”  Head up, scanning the shelves from top to bottom, the piles upon piles below, he was swaying, his hands reaching out to steady himself in the candlelit purple darkness.

She seized his hands, lacing his long, thin fingers with hers before he could fall.

She looked him in the eyes.  She had to step on a leather-bound volume of five illustrated classics to kiss him, hesitated when she got there, when he leaned in.

Forehead to forehead, now unable to look him in the eyes, she said: “If you want to…I have...in my drawer….”

“That’s good to know.”

“I want you to know.  I’ve never done anything like this, with—”

“I believe you.”

“OK,” she said.  She exhaled.

“OK,” he said, nuzzling her nose.

· Robert is the critically acclaimed author of the NBM Amerotica titles Great Moves, Attractive Forces and Stray Moonbeams.  His other books include the novel And Sometimes They Fly; the story collections Fairfield: The Last Sad Stories of G. Brandon Sisnett, Intimacy 101: Rooms & Suites, The Tree of Youth and Winter, Spring, Summer, Fall; and the memoir Sand for Snow: A Caribbean-Canadian Chronicle.

All of his graphic novels are now available as e-books from NBM.