I DON’T KNOW HOW IT HAPPENED, BUT ONE MORNING Dante
came over and decided he’d be the one to give me a sponge bath. “Is it okay?” he said.
“Well, it’s kind of my mom’s job,” I said. “She said it was okay,” he said.
“You asked her?” “Yeah.”
“Oh,” I said. “Still, it’s really her job.” “Your dad? He’s never bathed you?”
“No.”
“Shaved you?”
“No. I don’t want him to.” “Why not?”
“I just don’t.”
He was quiet. “I won’t hurt you.”
You’ve already hurt me. That’s what I wanted to say. Those were the words that entered my head. Those were the words I wanted to slap him with. The words were mean. I was mean.
“Let me,” he said.
Instead of telling him to go screw himself, I said okay.
I’d learned to make myself perfectly passive when my mother bathed and shaved me. I would shut my eyes and think about the characters in the book I was reading. Somehow that got me through.
I closed my eyes.
I felt Dante’s hands on my shoulders, the warm water, the soap, the washcloth.
Dante’s hands were bigger than my mother’s. And softer. He was slow, methodical, careful. He made me feel as fragile as porcelain.
I never once opened my eyes. We didn’t say a word.
I felt his hands on my bare chest. On my back. I let him shave me.
When he was done, I opened my eyes. Tears were falling down his face. I should have expected that. I wanted to yell at him. I wanted to tell him that it was me who should be crying.
Dante had this look on his face. He looked like an angel. And all I wanted to do was put my fist through his jaw. I couldn’t stand my own cruelty.
