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"Doctor Synder and I talked about all this," I said. "She tried to assure me someone could still love me. but I wrote it off as just something cheery a therapist has to say, especially since she was also a paraplegic. She wanted to believe it as much or even more than I did.

"I was suspicious about you. too," I said. "about all the nice things you've been saying to me."

"You mean you're not anymore?"

"I don't know. Still, it's pretty crazy for you to come sneaking back in here."

"And risk my career," he added nodding.

"You sure you want to?" I asked, lifting my head from his chest.

"There's only one way to answer:' he replied and kissed me, this time harder. Then he lowered my head to the pillow and sat up so he could take off his clothes.

It was like watching it all in a dream, aloof, apart, above my own bed. floating. Perhaps I had died in the lake and all this was wishful thinking in the afterlife. My heart wasn't just pounding. It was hammering and throbbing against my breastbone, rushing blood to my head, making me dizzy. I was afraid, not of making love, but of not being able to, of not being capable of returning his love and affection.

There were so many more reasons why we shouldn't be doing this than there were why we should. Why was it that more often than not the men in my life were forbidden for one reason or another?

When he was naked, he lifted my nightgown, bringing it up. Then he waited for me to raise my arms.

"Don't be afraid," he said.

Of course he would understand my fears. I thought. Who better?

I raised my arms slowly and he took my nightgown off. Then he brought his body to mine and kissed me and held me. He took such special care with each caress, each kiss. I felt we were making love in slow motion. Seconds and minutes were glued together. The hands of the clock struggled and strained to move an iota forward. All the tingling and all the warmth that blossomed under his fingers and beneath every place that his body touched mine returned to me like memories long lost and forgotten, now traveling back over vast chasms of darkness to reach my aroused brain charged with expectations and promise.

Can I do this? Can I be a woman again? Can I feel him grow hot with anticipation and pleasure? Would we turn our separate selves into some magical conjoined living, breathing creatures of ecstasy? Or would I fumble and moan, be clumsy and awkward and as unsatisfactory to him and myself as would a promise undelivered, my kisses turning to smoke, my embrace nothing more than wishful thinking?

My name was on his lips. When he cupped my breasts and then brought his mouth to them, my head fell back on the pillow. I closed my eyes so I could feel myself drift deeper and deeper into the warmth built around me by my own hot blood and tingling skin.

"You're so beautiful," he said

.

His words were like some kind of perfume sweetening the darkness. I moaned with pleasure I had believed was gone forever, and just like some old friend shaking her head at my skepticism and disillusionment, my body chastised me for my doubt. teasing me with each rush of warmth that flowed down to my thighs.

He was there almost as quickly to greet them. I flinched and he paused.

"Do you want me to stop now?" he asked.

Should I have said yes, stop, don't make me believe I can be a complete woman again, don't fill me with false hope and promise, don't help me up and then leave me to fall again? Should I have turned away from him?

And turned to what. though? Everlasting disappointment, acceptance of defeat and tragedy? Like a swimmer who had gone too far out. I could not refuse any extended helpful hand, but surely Austin's hand wasn't just any. The way we had first looked at each other, the warm feelings we both had when we were together, the comfort and ease with which we moved in and out our most intimate thoughts and memories certainly all meant that this was something special, that together we were some thing special.

"Don't stop," I said and lifted my head to kiss him.

I was surprised and rapturous when I felt him inside me, filling me with so much exhilaration. I couldn't breath. I clung to him as if I was dangling in the air and if I let go, I would fall forever and ever. The rush that followed our climaxes flowed up my stomach, around my heart and then into my brain. Maybe I passed out for a moment. maybe I just reached some point beyond mere consciousness. but I found myself surprised I was still clinging to him and he was still there, holding me, catching his breath, pressing his lips to my neck and then, with one quick peck on my own lips, lifting himself away and falling back beside me.

Neither of us spoke for a long moment. "Are you all right?" he asked.

"I don't know. I have the feeling I could get up and walk away." I said and he laughed.

"If that's all it took. I'd be the most successful therapist in the business."

We were both silent again. Then he leaned on his elbow and turned to me.

"When I saw you go into the lake. Rain, my heart did flip-flops and not just because I was watching someone drown. It was more than that. I panicked. I was going into that lake, too. I was going to drown with you. I was going to lose you."

"Really?"