3 - Citrus and her lips

"Sir."

  Hermosa was unaware of Brent's presence for a short while. She covered Elisa in a nice bath towel and stood with her back to the shadows as if she were expecting that the small amount of darkness might conceal anything for her.

  “Sir just…Excuse me, please." Hermosa said cautiously after a moment's silence, seeing that Brent had no intention of giving in.

  Brent then realized that his wheelchair was solidly in Hermosa's way. He backed away a little and heard Hermosa say in a low voice,

  "Thank you."

  "Hm."

  Brent responded, noticing that Elisa was staring at him with those big, unblinking eyes that looked so much like her mother's, innocent and clueless, and like she had seen his mind deeply.

  Brent looked away.

  "Elisa, don't look at Brent uncle like that, it's not polite honey," Hermosa whispered to the child with a slight sense of reproach. Looking somewhat apologetically at Brent, "I'm taking Elisa back to the room, good night, sir."

  She finished with a cautious glance at Brent as if she couldn't decide if that was the right thing to say. Brent ignored her, however, he entered the basement in a wheelchair.

  When he returned to the bedroom the "good night" echoed in his ears, and something came back to him long ago and uncontrollably.

  "Good night, my baby."

  As a child, his mother always gave him a kiss on the cheek before leaving his bedroom. Later, when he was older, she would remark at his bedroom door, "Good night, you'll always be my pride and delight.”

  She was nearly the best woman in the world, and she had nearly the best husband and three amazing sons. She was strong and kind, and when one day everything flipped upside down, she did not complain but instead quietly sobbed. Brent was the one who couldn't stand the way she cried, the way his father always whispered behind her back, "He's upset enough, do you want to make him feel worse?" And he thought he didn't hear.

  The world began to twist in his eyes, and the anatomical experiments that used to be almost like daily homework for him took on a brutal thrill of dominating the lives of other beings. Neither cigarettes nor alcohol nor the company of friends could match this pleasure, and he realised that he could not live at home any longer, no matter what. Five months after moving out alone, he hadn't thought about the images that had left him breathless for a long time, if not for Hermosa.

  It was all Hermosa's fault.

  "Clank!"

  Brent suddenly grabbed the short knife on the bedside table, military stuff, small, but sharp and functional. He threw the knife forward with a jerk and the tip plunged straight into the target hanging on the wall. Ten rings, right on the bull's eye. The wind from it disturbed the closed curtains for a moment, revealing a dark night outside the window.

  Brent suddenly felt a strange sensation.

  The window of the house next door seemed to have a pair of eyes, reflecting an eerie light in the darkness.

  But wasn't that an empty house?

  Brent pulled back the curtains and saw only the empty windows next door and the tattered curtains flapping in the wind in the night.

  It was a sign of increased paranoia.

  Without showing any expression on his face, he took out an aripiprazole-dissolving tablet and put it in his mouth. His mouth didn't enjoy the slightly sweet, crumbly taste.

  He lay back in bed and stayed awake all night to the sound of Hermosa's whispered coaxing of the baby.

  In his trance, he even thought he heard Elisa's voice clamouring for sucking milk and Hermosa's unbearable: "Haah... Uugh.., gently ......"

  Hermosa's presence in this house was significantly more intense than Brent had anticipated, to the point where Brent thought it was torture to keep her.

   He spent long hours locked himself in the basement, constantly trying to calm himself down with the blood gushing from the poor white rabbit's throat. It was only when he sat down at the table the next evening that he barely recovered his as-usual demeanour.

  "Do you have a job?"Brent asked.

  He noticed Hermosa's dress had changed after her chores. The bottom half was still in the same denim hot trousers that tightly outlined her hips, and the top half in a loose black jacket, loose and unreadable in style, zipped all the way up to the highest point.

  What could possibly be underneath that jacket, a halter top that did not conceal anything or a shirt so thin that it tore?

  He swallowed the rest of his pineapple and tightened his grasp on the spoon.

  "Oh, I work the night shift,” Hermosa replied.

  The scent of shower gel spilled from her as she cleared her plate, a clean, fresh scent mixed with another softer, sweeter aroma, like someone peeling open a round coconut in front of him and scooping out the white, greasy flesh.

  "Nice perfume.” Brent said.

  Hermosa paused, her ears reddening a little. For a moment, a little overwhelmed, knelt down to tuck the blanket around Brent's legs:

  “Thanks."

  "You work the night shift and take her with you?" Brent was referring to Elisa.

  "No," Hermosa denied with a quick shake of her head, "I'll be leaving Elisa in the care of a friend. Her house is crowded and small, but it's fine for Elisa to stay for a few hours."

"Today too?"

"Yeah, I'll take her out on my way out later and my friend will bring her back when it's about time."

"I think I need to remind you of one thing." Brent's eyes sunk suddenly, "I don't like other people coming to my house."

"I'm sorry."

  Hermosa apologized out of habit and said with a little embarrassment, "Sir ......"

  Brent pretended not to be aware of his embarrassment and peeled an orange from the coffee table fruit tray. The ripe fruit was full of juice and the tender flesh was wrapped in a thin layer of skin: "When do you go to work?"

  "In an hour."

  "Tell her to stay home, no need to leave her to someone else." Brent broke off a clove of orange, his fingers filled with the fresh, slightly tart scent of the fruit.It took Hermosa a moment to realize this, and she flushed: "That's... that's too much trouble for you-"

  Before she could finish her sentence, Brent gagged her slightly open lips with an orange petal and shoved the orange into her mouth. The fragile peel of the orange was bitten through and the sweet and sour juice moistened Hermosa's lips, making them look even more luscious.

  As if to wipe away the juices, Brent's hand rubbed twice over those lips, which were as moist and soft as one would expect, just like Hermosa herself…