Did he know how much trust I was giving him? How terrifying it was for me to give him this kind of power? I held my breath waiting for his reaction, and my eyes went a little watery when he stood from his chair, walked to my side of the table, and pulled me into his arms.
“I can see where you’re going with this, and I can do it with your hair, but we’ll have to talk about whether I can handle the next step.” He kissed the top of my head, and squeezed me a half second before going back to a loose hold again. “Together, we’ll figure it out, though. I promise.”
Right, because he immediately understood that eventually he’d have to make love to me in the missionary position, knowing it might make me go all zombie, or alternately, make me fight as if my life depended on it. God, what must that do to him? Instead of asking, though, I told him something else that’d been bothering me. “Someday, you’re going to hug me without having to worry about making me feel trapped.”
“Until that day comes, I’ll gladly do whatever’s necessary to make you feel safe in my arms.” I looked down a few seconds, unwilling to let him see my watery eyes. I knew he could smell my emotions, but it was hard for me to let anyone see my weaknesses. Part of me was glad he could smell them, though, so I didn’t have to feel so guilty about looking down. He deserved to know how his words affected me.
I’d been starving when we came back from our run, so we hadn’t showered yet. When we finished the dishes, I took him by the hand, walked him to the bathroom, and started filling the tub.
“My hair gets washed twice, then it gets the conditioner. It might be better to get through the shampoos at a normal speed, and then just keep working the conditioner through my hair until I can handle it.”
“We’re doing this now?”
I nodded. “Yeah, before I chicken out and change my mind.”
Chapter Thirty-Six
Brain
I could smell her terror as we stepped into the tub, and my wolf balked. He did not want to do this. He only knew she was terrified of what we were about to do, and there was no way to explain the logic behind it to him. I don’t often have to push him down until I can’t hear him at all, but I had to now, because I was having a hard time with it, too.
“I know you said you need to face me, but I need to get you to relax for me. I want you to sit with your back to me while the tub fills, so I can massage your shoulders. Put your hair up — I won’t touch it while you aren’t facing me, okay?”
She nodded, grabbed a clip, piled her hair on top of her head, twisted it, and clipped it so it stayed.
I massaged her shoulders and neck for a good twenty minutes, and she was totally relaxed, when she turned around and said, “Enough, Brain. We have to do this.”
I nodded, changed places with her so she was leaning against the back of the tub and could be more comfortable, and I used the handheld unit to wet her hair before I started with the shampoo.
She whimpered once, caught herself, and stopped breathing, though I could tell she was still with me.
“Breathe, Harmony. I’m good with whatever sounds you need to make.”
“I think I might need to cry, and I haven’t cried in front of anyone in… I can’t remember the last time. Maybe my mom, in middle school?”
“Cry, scream, cuss, fight… whatever. Just as long as you’re breathing.”
She didn’t cry, but stopped holding her breath. Instead, she must’ve been counting to fifteen with each breath, forcing herself to inhale deeply and then let it all out slowly.
I rinsed the shampoo, put more in, worked it up to a nice sudsy froth, and felt when she left me. Her eyes were unfocused, and she didn’t hear me when I spoke to her. I rinsed the shampoo, super careful not to hurt her, talking to her the whole time, telling her she was fine, talking about our run that morning, and the beautiful sunrise, and how it was supposed to rain tomorrow morning, and a run in the rain might be fun.
I conditioned her hair, massaged her scalp, massaged her shoulders, kissed her forehead, and when she came back, I didn’t act as if anything were wrong, just kept up with what I was doing.
When I rinsed, I told her, “Help me make sure I have all the conditioner out, please?”
She ran her hands through it as I worked the handheld shower unit, and when I finally turned the water off, I stroked her head, over the top of her hair, and leaned in for a gentle kiss.
Neither of us said anything about the experience, we went along with the rest of our day as if it hadn’t happened. I followed her to a gym we’d joined, and I went through the motions of working out as a human would, as she pushed her muscles to the point of exhaustion.