With her legs she clung, compressing him, herself, so nearly joined that they could not tell her heat from his.

"It’ll be all right tonight, won’t it, Elly?"

"Yes… yes."

"Will it hurt you?"

"Shh…" She muffled his question with her kiss.

He pulled back. "I don’t want to hurt you."

"Then come back to me alive."

Neither of them had voiced it before. Desperation now became part of their embrace while urgency moved their hands to fondle, explore, stroke. They drew deep breaths, holding momentarily still, the better to absorb the moment, the memory.

"… ohhh…" she breathed, and her head dropped back until her braid touched the water.

He uttered a throaty approval, licked the underside of her chin and kissed what he could reach of her breasts. She was limp with acquiescence and he bade his time, pleasuring her, being pleasured, watching her eyelids flicker open, then close, her lips grow lax, her tongue tip appear as she drifted in a mindless torpor. In time she began moving, stirring the water until it lapped against his chest. Her caresses kept rhythm and he set his teeth, then arched like a strung bow.

The water became quicksilver. Tomorrow became an illusion. Here and now became the imperative.

"Oh, Elly, I wanted to do this so long ago."

"Why didn’t you?"

"I was waiting for you to say it was all right."

"It would’ve been all right two weeks ago."

"Why didn’t you say something?"

"I don’t know… I was scared. Shy."

"Maybe I was, too. Let’s not be shy."

"I never did things like this with Glendon."

"I can show you more."

She hid her face against his neck.

"Can I wash you?" he asked.

"You want to?"

"I want to be in you. That’s what I want."

"That’s what I want, too, so hurry."

They shared the soap. They shared each other. They got to their knees and forsook washcloths in favor of hands. They lathered and kissed, sleek as seals, and twined together and murmured sweet sentiments and adored with hands and tongues. And when the compulsion was magnified to a welcome ache, he grasped her wet arms and pushed her back, freeing his lips. "Let’s go to bed."

They stood in the steamy bathroom, impatiently wielding towels, caring little about dry or wet, watching each other, grabbing a quick kiss, laughing excitedly-tense, aroused, ready. He plucked his jeans from the floor and found in a pocket a prophylactic.

"What’s that?"

He closed it in his palm and looked at her. "I don’t want to get you pregnant again. You got all you’ll be able to handle with no man around the place."

"You won’t need that."

"I don’t want to leave you with another one, Elly."

She stepped across his wet towel, took the packet from his hand and laid it on the high shelf.

"Women don’t get pregnant when they’re nursing, didn’t you know that, Will?"

By an arm she tried to lead him from the room, but he balked. "Are you sure?"

"I’m sure. Come."

He took the lantern and they tiptoed into their own bedroom. In it she turned, placed a finger over her lips and mouthed, "Shh." Each one taking an end of the basket, they moved Lizzy out into the front room for the night.

When their door was closed they turned to each other. Their pulses seemed to do a stutter step, but neither of them moved. Alone… suddenly hesitant. Until she took the first step and they came together swiftly, kissing and clinging, reminded again of the hourglass shifting its sand. So little time… so much love…

Impatiently he hooked her beneath her knees and carried her to the bed, whispering, "Pull down the covers." Riding in his arms, she dragged the spread and blanket over the foot of the bed. On knee and elbows he took her down, dropping across her with their mouths already joined in a frenzied kiss, tongues reaching deep, arms and legs taking possession. It was untamed, that prelude, all lust and anticipation drawn to its maximum. Twist and roll, thrust and rut. Sexual greed such as neither had experienced until now.

When it stopped, it stopped abruptly, he above, she below, their breaths gusty, labored.

"Do you need anything… to make it easier?" The baby’s Vaseline was on the bureau. He’d studied it dozens of times while imagining this moment.

"I need you, Will… nothing else."

Her kiss silenced him as she hooked his neck with an arm and brought him down.

"I want to make it good for you, Green Eyes."

He knew how. He’d been taught by the best in a place called La Grange, Texas. He touched her-deep, shallow-with hands and tongue until she bent like a willow in the wind.

As he eased into her body she closed her eyes and saw him as he’d looked that first night, standing on the edge of the clearing, lean and hungry, wary and secretive, hiding beneath his hat-hiding his feelings, his loneliness, his needs.

She closed her eyes and opened her body, offering solace and love to equal his own. It hurt after all, but she hid it well, grasping his head and pulling it down for a deep kiss within which she disguised a soft moan. But soon the moan was dictated by pleasure instead of pain. He took her to the tallest tip of a tree, where she poised-a graceful bird at last, trembled upon the brink of flight, then soared for the first time. Becoming one with the sky, she called his name, twisting, lifting, reborn.

And when her cataclysm had passed, she opened her eyes and watched him follow the way she’d come, watched his gold-beaten hair tapping his forehead, the muscles in his arms standing out like formations in stone, beads of sweat dotting his brow.

He quivered, groaned and pressed deep, arching. He uttered her name, but the sound was trapped by his clenched jaw. When he shuddered in release, she found it glorious to witness, a blessing to receive. She held his shoulders and felt his deep tremors and thought it more beautiful than the flight of an eagle.

When it was over he fell to his side, draping a limp arm on her ribs, waiting for his breathing to slow. Eyes closed, he laughed once, satisfied, replete, then rolled her close, held her in a powerless caress with their damp skins touching.

He rolled his head tiredly and let his eyes caress her. "You all right, Elly?"

She smiled and touched his chin. "Shh… I’m holdin’ it in."

"What?"

"Everything. All the feelin’s you give me."

"Aw, Elly…"

He kissed her forehead and she spoke against his chin. "I had three babies, Will-three of ’em-but I never had this. I didn’t know nothin’about this." She clutched him close. "Now I find out about it on our last night. Oh, Will, why did we waste two weeks?"

He had no answer, could only hold her and stroke her hair.

"Will, I felt like I always wished I could feel-like I was flying at last. How come that never happened with Glendon?" She braced up on an elbow to look him in the face.

She was such an unspoiled thing, innocent like no woman he’d ever known. "Maybe ’cause you were married to a good man who never visited a whorehouse."

"You’re a good man, Will, don’t you say different. And if that’s what you learned there, I’m glad you went." She drew up the covers while he smiled at her unexpectedness: shy one minute, earthy the next. He gathered his wife close and found reason to be glad. It had been a circuitous route that had led him to her. Without La Grange, without Josh, without prison, he’d never have ended up in Georgia. He’d never have married Elly. But he didn’t want to dwell on it tonight.

"Elly-honey, you mind if we don’t talk about that for a while? I wanna talk about… about the flowers you’re gonna plant for next summer, and how you’re gonna pick the quince and how the boys’re gonna help you shell pecans and-"

"You’re gonna be back before that, Will. I just know you will."

"Maybe."

Through the hourglass the sand spilled faster. She rested her cheek and hand on his chest, against his strong, sure heartbeat, praying it would never be stopped by a bullet.

"I’ll write to you." More sand… more heartbeats… and two throats tightening.

"And I’ll write to you."

"I’ll remember this night forever, and how wonderful it was."

"I’ll remember…" He tipped her head back to look into her glistening eyes. "I’ll remember a lot of things." Beneath the covers he found her breast and tenderly took it in hand. "I’ll remember that day you threw the egg at me. That was the day I realized I was falling in love with you. I’ll remember you slicing bacon in the morning, and leaning on the door of the Whippet while the boys pretended they were driving up to Atlanta. And that first morning, you tying your hair up in a tail with a yellow ribbon. And whippin’ up a cake, holding the bowl against your belly. And the way you looked sitting in the boys’bed when I come home from work, telling ’em a bedtime story. And you-all waiting beneath the sourwood tree when I come driving back from town. Ah, that one’s gonna be the best. Did I ever tell you how much I liked sittin’ under that sourwood tree with you?" He kissed her forehead and made her eyes sting.

"Oh, Will…" She clasped him and blinked hard. "You got to come back so we can do it again. All those things. This summer… promise?"

He rolled against her and looked into her eyes. "If I make a promise, you got to make one, too."

"Wh-what?" She sniffled.

"That you’ll go to town, take the boys out. You got to go, Elly, don’t you see? Donald Wade, he’ll be seven next year and he’ll be starting school. But if you-"

"I can teach him what he-"

"You listen to me, now. They got to get out. Take ’em to the library and get books for ’em so when they’re old enough for school they’ll know what to expect. You want ’em to grow up less ignorant than me and you, don’t you? Look how little we went to school and how hard we have to fight for everything. Give ’em a chance to be smarter and better than us. Take ’em in and get ’em used to town, and people-and-and surviving.’Cause that’s what life’s all about, Elly, surviving. And you-you go in and keep selling the eggs and milk to Purdy. You buy Dreft instead of making that homemade soap. It’s too hard on you, Elly, to do all that. The Marines’ll be sending my checks to you, so you’ll have the money. But you put half in War Bonds and spend the other half, you hear? Buy good shoes for the boys and whatever Lizzy needs. And you hire somebody to do whatever needs doin’ around the place. And if I’m not back by the time the honey runs, you hire somebody to open the hives and sell the honey. It’ll bring good money with sugar being scarce."

"But, Will-"

"You listen now, Elly, ’cause I haven’t got a whole lot of time to convince you. Miss Beasley, she’ll be your friend. You’re gonna need a friend, and she’s fair and honest and smart. If you need help you go to her and she’ll help you or find somebody else who will. Promise, Elly?"

He held her lightly by the throat. Beneath his palm he felt her swallow.

"I promise," she whispered.

He forced a grin, made it teasing, the way he knew she needed right now. "You got your fingers crossed under them covers, missus?"

"N-no," she choked, releasing a laugh that was half sob.

"All right. Now listen." He wiped her cheek dry and said what needed saying. "I got to tell you this before I go. It might not’ve been fair of me to ask Miss Beasley, but I did, and she told me about how your mama she never was married, and how your family locked you up in that house when you were a little girl, and all the rest of it. Elly, how come you never told me?"

Her gaze dropped to his chest.

He lifted her chin with a finger. "You’re as good as any of them down there-better. And don’t you forget it, Mrs. Parker. You’re bright, and you got a pair of real bright boys, too, you hear me? You got to go down into that town and show ’em."

He could see she was on the verge of big tears. "Aw, Elly, honey…" He wrapped her close and rocked her. "This war is gonna change things. Women’re gonna have to do for themselves a lot more. And for you, facing town might be part of it. Just remember what I said. You’re good as any of them down there. Now I got to ask you something, all right?" Once more he pressed her away and studied her eyes. "Do you own that house?"

"The one in town?"

"Yes. Where you used to live."

"Yes. But I ain’t goin’ in it."

"You don’t have to. Just remember, though, if an emergency comes up and you need big money for anything, you can sell that place. Miss Beasley’ll be able to help you. Will you do that if something goes wrong and I don’t come home?"

"You’re comin’ home, Will, you are!"

"I’m gonna try, darlin’. A man with this much waitin’ for him’s got plenty to fight for, don’t you think?"