She went back to fiddling with my aura, all business, or at least pretending that she was. Long, thin fingers moved over my arms, again not touching but coming close enough that I could feel the heat of her body on my skin. She moved closer, and again I saw something a little hungry come into her eyes, a look that housed a thousand legends. Something thick bubbled in my stomach the closer she came and when she glanced at me, reaching forward as though she would touch my face, I realized I hadn’t answered her question. “Maybe.”
She smelled so good and the heat between us grew, ran into something that felt like a memory, familiarity that made no damn sense to me. Something old and primal seemed to move her and she came closer, leaning on an elbow to bring herself near enough for me to catch a whiff of her breath—spearmint from her toothpaste, gum maybe, enough of a distraction that I didn’t think of those lips for half a second. We moved together like magnets, the force unbreakable, undeniable and out of our control. But at the last moment the scent of her breath and proximity of her body jarred me from whatever small spell we’d been under, enough that blinking to clear my head did the job, brought me out of whatever fog I’d stepped in the second I sat on the sofa.
It was as if the air had cleared, and a kind of understanding came to me. After all, pretty women weren’t all that uncommon in New York. There were models and actresses, folk coming in from all parts of the world, adding to the melting pot. Pretty women were everywhere and I sat right in front of one of them, but she wasn’t what I wanted, not right then, not with everything else bearing down on me. Yes, she was beautiful. She was sweet, weird and bossy as fuck, but she wasn’t for me.
Maybe it was me moving back, maybe it was just the spell breaking for her, too, but she went still and stiff, as though realizing where she was and what she was doing. Then suddenly she jerked her hands back, staring at them as if they belonged to someone else.
“I don’t…” Her gaze didn’t leave her hands, as though she half expected lightning to shoot from her fingertips. There was a hard line between her eyebrows and when she closed her eyes, scooting back to put distance between us, I thought maybe I’d done something wrong, had said something that put her back up.
“You all right?”
“What?” she said, distracted, waving her hand, looking like she wanted to shake something that ached her from her limbs.
She moved her gaze over my face like she’d only just realized there was someone else her apartment. Her confusion was plain, though the low dip of her mouth did nothing to take away the sweetness of her features. Still, she seemed unsettled, continuing to stretch her hand and extend her fingers as though her joints ached. When the seconds lengthened and she went on without speaking, without doing a damn thing but look worried and confused, I figured it was time to make an exit.
“You want me to go?” Before she could answer I left the sofa, moving slow, cautious, only a little worried that she was a dramatic chick that would act a fool if things didn’t go her way.
A few more blinks as she watched me move toward the door and she finally got to her feet, holding her arms over her stomach like she needed to keep herself together.
“I’m sorry… it’s… your aura is so…” She sighed, head shaking. “There’s something about you and I can’t figure it out.”
“Maybe it’s my bitchin’ about that.” Again I nodded toward the record. The turntable went on spinning and as I pointed it out, the woman moved toward it, flipping down the power button so that spinning stopped.
“It’s not that. And I’m sorry.” She faced me, curling her arms together again. Her body was stiff and I got the feeling that holding herself like that was something she did to keep her hands off me. Wasn’t really sure why that bothered me, but it did. She took a step closer, body still ridged but her eyes held that hungry, eager look again and I wondered what she thought of me and why the look on her face seemed so familiar.
“I’m a little thrown off, to be honest,” she said.
“By me?” I tilted my head, not getting what I’d done to throw her off.
She watched as I took a step, that hungry, confused expression not moving from her face. There wasn’t any fear or worry in that look, but her stance didn’t change. She kept on holding herself together, knuckles white as she balled her hands into fists like she was worried what she’d do if I got too close.
Took all I had to not smirk like an asshole at that thought.
“By your aura… your… presence.” She waved a hand, again motioning at something around me, not at me exactly. “There’s something I can’t put my finger on.”
I didn’t buy any of this aura mess. I knew I had a body, a good one for how hard I worked it. I knew somewhere inside there might be a spirit or soul, wasn’t real sure of the difference, but I suspected there was more than zeroes and ones to this world. I still believed I was part of it. But auras and cleansings and all the hippie crap she seemed to believe in? Nah. That was a pill she offered that I didn’t have the stomach for.
But that didn’t mean I couldn’t shake the feeling of there being more to her. More to the feelings I caught in the half-hour I’d been around this crazy white chick.
My mentor, Roan, had always taught me to listen to my gut, and right then my gut told me not to jet. Not just yet.
“You… you wanna finish?” I grabbed at anything that would keep me in that apartment. The juju shit was weird, but seemed to be strangely… good. “You know, finish with the…” quick wave around my body, at the invisible whatever-it-was that I guessed was supposed to be my aura, “the ju… ah… the aura cleansing?”
The whites of her knuckles returned to their original pink color and I relaxed a little, moving slowly back to the sofa, arms spread wide against the cushions; an invitation to work me over again. Her frown disappeared and she dropped her arms to her side, relaxing as she moved toward me.
She knelt in front of me, still cautious, movements slow as she dragged her fingers to the back of her head to braid her long, chestnut hair. She worked quickly, efficiently, flicking long strands behind, in between, around another as she worked, not watching me as she spoke. “Not sure how good it’ll be, now.”
“Not sayin’ I believe all this,” I waved a hand, grinning when she rolled her eyes, “but I’d hate for you to blast that chanting nonsense all night because you couldn’t finish the job.” She smiled when I shrugged, and I guessed she didn’t buy my nonchalant act. “You seem like a chick that likes to finish a job.”
She purposefully ignored my crappy attempt at flirting and moved her hands to her lap, sitting straight. “I like solving problems.” She was dead serious.
“You think I got a problem?”
“Hello, you can’t sleep. Even without my ‘chanting nonsense’ music playing.” Her laugh was quick, a little loud and I liked the way it sounded, even if it was poking fun just a bit. Reminded me of the noises blue jays made when I went to the park on my lunch break. The woman recovered from her humor, head shaking.
“You got a point?”
She moved slowly, but all those colors and sounds came with her as she crawled closer, a few loose strands of hair falling out of the braid as she sat next to me on the sofa. “You offered. And yeah, maybe I do need to finish the job.”