The Beauty of Color

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As the car stopped, he caressed me immediately; in synch with the stopping of the engine was the start of us. I say us because I feel like that’s what it is to become intimate with someone, you merge, mesh, mix into some form of a united being. I enjoyed him. Intimacy was an act of passion. It didn’t take love to feel passion, and it didn’t take an appropriate union to become a part of another person. We were one as he kissed me, touched me. I felt him and he felt me. One.

“You like that,” he said, panting like some needy animal.

Please be quiet.

“Say it if you like it,” he panted some more.

Shut the hell up.

“Is it good?”

“Quiet!” I yelled without realizing that my thoughts were vocalized. He pulled back and stared at me as if I were some whacko, needless to say the look was returned. A quick awkward expression and a not so melodious cry ended the moment. Now, the only sounds we heard other than the heavy breathing of us both was the zooming of passing vehicles. As I licked over my dry lips I recognized the taste of sweat in my mouth, kissing his neck I guessed. As he got up and scooted to ‘his side’ of the van I scratched my head noting that my hair felt like shit. Relaxed hair need not get sweaty; I felt the naps I tried so hard to conceal creeping back into the roots of my follicles. No ‘good’ hair here. His eyes were closed and I could see the moon reflecting light off of his caramel-complexioned skin.

I got up and moved, naked, to the front of the van to roll down the windows; the dankness of the vehicle was enough to make me gag.

“When are you going to take me home?” I asked. Without opening his eyes he shrugged his shoulders and gestured for me to shut up.

“I would like to get back before my show...

... middle of paper ...

...ooks, Paw-Paw was the only person in the world to ever call me beautiful.

***

“You are not like me.” I said plainly. I opened my eyes to see that he was no longer listening. One thing about us, we connect during intimacy, but other than that we play tag. I want to tell him, though. Shake him and explain that his color makes me squirm. The way others of his ‘paper-bag-brown’ have talked down to me, made me question myself. Tell him that it took years to reverse the hatred that I grew for myself. I was eager, wanting to spill it all to him, make him understand. But I mellowed out. Looking at the moon on his skin I just pulled him towards me into my shadow, my dark shadow. Instead of telling him how I felt I would show him. Show him my hatred, my love, my curse, and my blessing. And in that van, in the dark of my shadow, we were both as black as we wanted to be.

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