MELINDA A. SMITH
literary and science fiction

muse in the rain
And now, with only camisole between the fog and the delicate parts of my skin, only now did I begin to wake. My skin chilled in a wave of frisson that wound its way from the nape of my neck and around my shoulder. It slunk across the front of my chest, which rose to meet its touch. I felt it almost as a hand, fingers tracing a circle around my navel and grasping at the thin fabric that plastered itself to my torso. The hand ripped it away and only then did I see it was a hand, indeed, a hand that beckoned me to let her play. The rain, the smell of quenched earth and plump clover intoxicated me and I could not refuse. Fingers tiptoeing over my hips, tugging at anything that stood between my skin and the cool drops of trickling water, fingers that wandered, looked for places I had kept in the dark for so long, found purchase on my lower back.
So much attention I had paid to these hands that I hardly considered the wrists, arms, and body to whom they must belong. When I lifted my eyes, there stood a goddess. And I say this without the slightest hint of hyperbole. If you gathered equally the parts it took to make a human body, its bones and epidermal cells, nerve endings, and bits of ear to nibble, if you mixed these with photons in wave and particle, it would be her. The glow infected my eyes in a most alarming way and I stood, arrested, absorbing the parts of her I could.