Each morning Ben hands me his soapy washcloth and asks very sweetly if I will wash his back as he turns away in our glass shower. It's separate from the tub I can swim in, in a little room all of its own. It's amply big for one person but not so big for Ben. Add me and it's a bit tricky to keep his elbows out of my eyes and when he rinses his hair I get rinsed in an extra layer of shampoo.
His back is a wall, a billboard of black and grey work. I always wash the angels' faces first and then the demons on his skin. I have names for all of them. I make him laugh when I greet them and then when their little faces and hands are clean and the whole place is scrubbed and swept he turns back around and finds more space in a perfect way, lifting me up into his arms, my legs around his hips, holding on for dear life, burning as soap reaches places I'm not so sure it should go.
Each night Lochlan and I spend close to an hour under the same hot spray,
our skin red not from sunburn but from the water temperature. My
fingers and toes are webbed, wrinkled and steamed. One single kiss on my
forehead and we're reluctantly finished and the towels go back onto
their heated racks and the expensive shampoo (one for curls, the other
for blondes) goes back on the shelf for the next night. Sometimes he turns me away and slides his hands around my hips but mostly we just stand and let it rain.
It's a far cry from years and years ago where he would lock the door, press the stainless steel button on the wall that gave us exactly six minutes of lukewarm water with which to wash away salt, sunburns and bug bites, our bad runs and good marks clouding and sweetening our moods alternately until we would emerge fresh and clean and ready for sleep, heading back to the camper in the growing darkness. We would go inside for the night, putting away the little plastic basket of shampoo, conditioner, soap, comb and razor under the bed until the next night, leaving the towels hanging outside to dry.
Now showers are an event each time instead of a chore, and we don't run out of hot water anymore.
