We did it three more times that afternoon. I had to admit to a slight feeling of fatigue by the end, but Yoni was still going strong. I suppose twenty-seven years of celibacy builds up a head of steam.
“It echoes back and forth, doesn’t it?” she said after number three.
“Yes,” I said emphatically.
In a smaller voice she said, “Is it good?”
I smiled at her. “Yes. Intense, but good. How about you?”
She smiled back. “I like being close to you.”
“But?”
“Only a little but.” She rocked her head on the pillow. “I’m beginning to know things I didn’t know I knew. It’s like I fill up with connectedness. Knowledge about you, about the world around us, even about people in the next building or down the street. It’s there no matter how I try to pull in the edges. I don’t like that flood of knowledge. It interferes with my peace of mind—unless I’m with you.” She flashed me a smile. “Before you, I was becoming alienated from the world, even though I’m more connected with it, because I know that no one else knows all this. I didn’t know all this.”
I passed over the difference being-with-me made. “Do you want to return to ignorance?”
“I can’t tell. I just want to be human!”
I patted her on the boob. “Can’t argue with you, babe.”
“Sorry for whimpering,” she said gruffly. “Is it like this for you?”
I knew she wanted me to say it was, but I couldn’t. “Maybe because I’m a man, or a soldier turned sex demon. Or because Aphrodite didn’t choose me for Her avatar. I can tell you that immortality, like fame, sucks.”
“Oh, good. Tell me more.” Her tone said don’t, but I couldn’t stop myself.
I counted the bullshit out on my fingers. “Your friends stop seeing you as a person. Your followers stop letting you make mistakes. The public tries to tear you down. You smile at someone and they have an epiphany—or you scowl at someone because you’re tired and they jump out of a window. Everything you touch turns to gold, which gets old fast. The world the way you remember it is not remembered that way by history. Did I forget one? Oh. And everybody you know dies.”
The afternoon sun had slid away from the bed and now hit the beveled edge of the mirror across the room, where it bounced away, making rainbows.
She rocked onto her elbow and made a face at me. “Buster, we need to turn that frown upside down. You gotta wow the public in a couple of hours.”
Reluctantly, we dressed and took the limo to the Cubby Bear, because I didn’t have it in me to do the magic to hide us from the paparazzi. The car dropped her off at the club first and then drove me on to the Lair, where I picked up my old bass. I plugged it in before I took it down to the limo. Yup, still twongs. I was good to go.
Girl had stamina. I felt used up. Maybe I could grab forty winks in the dressing room.