Chapter 3

This time, she changed positions.

She lay on her side beside him and let him hold her from behind. Her back pressed against his chest, and she could feel his heartbeat, thudding away, much slower than when he had first come in.

"Does this feel a lot more relaxing?" She glanced back at him. "Your heart rate was over a hundred at first, and now it’s down into the eighties. That’s pretty good."

He didn’t say anything, but he did seem more relaxed.

Her body was warm and soft in his arms, carrying a faint smell of sweat mixed with disinfectant.

His hands around her waist could feel the tiny bumps on the skin at her sides, gooseflesh, and she was reacting too.

She took his hand and guided it upward.

"Touch me here," she said, placing his hand over her chest. "See? My heartbeat’s faster too. I’m reacting as well. That’s normal, so don’t overthink it."

He touched the skin over her chest, and beneath it his own thudding could be felt, indeed faster than his.

The spot under his palm was soft and warm, with a distinct shape to it.

He instinctively wanted to pull his hand back, but she held it there and wouldn’t let him.

"Don’t hide from it," she said. "This is part of the treatment. You need more tactile stimulation to reach that point."

Her voice was soft, close, right by his ear. The scent from her hair drifted over in waves, mixed with her body heat.

With her other hand, she reached behind herself and guided him in.

"Can you feel it?" she whispered. "It’s different inside now."

He could feel it.

Compared with before, her body was deeper, hotter, tighter.

He could feel every contraction, every squeeze.

She could feel his heartbeat speeding up again, and this time it wasn’t from nerves.

"You can move now," she said. "But follow my lead. If I say go faster, you go faster. If I say slow down, you slow down."

He started moving.

In his arms, she swayed gently with his rhythm.

Her hand covered his and pressed it against her chest.

Her breathing grew heavier and heavier. With every breath, her chest rose and fell, brushing against his palm.

"Right... just like that..." Her voice broke off in little pieces. "Can you feel it... inside me... it’s changing..."

He could. Deep inside her body, there was a rhythmic tightening, each contraction stronger than the last. Those pulses clamped down on him, squeezing him, as if trying to force something out of his body.

"It’s close..." she gasped. "I’m close... and you’re close too... we’ll get there together..."

Her body began to tremble, violently.

Her legs stiffened, her toes curled, and her back pressed hard against his chest.

She grabbed his hand, gripping so tightly her nails nearly dug into his flesh.

He could feel the spasms deep inside her, rolling in one after another like waves.

"Harder..." she shouted. "Now... harder..."

He obeyed and gave it everything he had.

A fierce sensation surged up from deep inside his body, building and building, and then—

Nothing.

That feeling reached a certain point and simply scattered, vanished. Like a tide rushing to shore but never breaking, only receding again.

He stopped, panting, drenched in sweat.

She was panting too. It took a long while before she slowly sat up out of his arms.

"Still not working," she said, looking at him with a trace of regret, though more than that was a professional sort of thoughtfulness. "This isn’t just a simple distal blockage. It may be a problem with deep neural conduction. The fluid can reach that point, but it just won’t come out."

She picked up the suction device and took another sample from him. This time, after tasting it, her expression grew even more serious.

"Compared with the last sample, the concentration is higher, which means the fluid really did reach the outlet position, but it still didn’t get expelled." She set the suction device down and looked at him. "You’ll need a course of treatment. One session won’t fix it."

He lay there, sweat still drying on his skin, his body still carrying the aftershocks of what had just happened. He stared at the ceiling without saying a word.

"Will you come back next week?" she asked.

He turned his head and looked at her. She was sitting on the edge of the bed, still damp with sweat, a few strands of hair stuck to her face. Her eyes were bright as she waited for his answer.

"Yes," he said.

She smiled. It was brief, but it really was a smile.

"Good. Then I’ll book you for the same time next week." She stood up, took a towel from the cabinet, and handed it to him. "Wipe off the sweat and get dressed. Drink more water when you get back, eat less spicy food, and don’t mess around on your own. See you next week."