Go Fast

Down the River Driving,

Special Thing

Hiding behind a couch with crying little boys, jumping on a trampoline with a pretty black girl, ripping up a carpet to paint on the floor, hearing teeth chatter as my foot kicks a chin, being dragged out from under a bed by my hair, sitting on a bed in the dark listening to Death Song, sitting on the roof alone to watch dawn come up.

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"Soooo, Atlas-"

A familiar voice once again dragged me back from flashbacks with no context. These days I allow myself to get so lost in those vignettes, knowing I can rely on these voices to bring me back.

Snow had plopped herself on the ledge next to me and was eyeing me mischievously, "What was that comment Lahood made the other day... dreaming about partnership singular?"

I turned from the ocean to look toward Lahood and Havnamara, who were lying down together in opposite directions, ear to ear. Lahood peaked one eye open to me and quickly closed it as she fought a smile from her lips. I didn’t realize Snow had been listening so long to that conversation. I kept playful eyes on Lahood and said, "It seems I am being passed some interesting romantic cravings that our Lahood is expecting me to explore."

Lahood came to her seat abruptly, and in a mixture of laughter and sincerity she said, "Okay look to be fair I had no idea that unraveling sexual desires would have us arriving where I'm at today, but what I'm passing on to you are not mere fantasies, Atlas. They must be experienced or we simply will not have lived a satisfied life." She said all of this still seated on the floor with big expressive eyes.

Standing above her, I gave her a bemused look. Havnamara sat up to get a better view at the fervor on Lahood's face and Snow was still sitting on the ledge next to me with an expression that gave her intentions away. Seems she was hoping for this. Looking around at the amusement on each of our faces Lahood said, "I'm so fucking serious Atlas, if I could've made them happen in my era I would've, but I doubt I'm going to find it before its your turn to fully step in so I need you to promise me!"

"There seems to be quite a list of desires you feel this passionate about Lahood, I'm not sure how I'd even find most of them. I don't understand why you don't just act on some of them now," I said to provoke her a bit more. I love entertaining the other two.

Lahood pointed at me, "Baka!" and I laughed. "You're being a bitch, Atlas. I know you're going to do this for us."

Snow was eagerly leaning forward and said, "Well this is incredibly fun but I'd like to request a formal walk-through of some of the details of these requests."

I looked again at Lahood as I said scandalously, "I apparently have an unwavering desire to be in a throuple with two men who are already deeply in relationship with one another." Snow’s expression grew in delight. She looked toward Lahood who was playing bashful, then Snow and Havnamara gave one another approving nods. "Please go on," Havnamara said.

"I also seem to a have rather vivid imagination around what it would be like to fuck a pianist, or a stringed instrumentalist, to rendezvous with men dressed in mini skirts, with nonbinary people, with women, with many. In fact, since Lahood is not taking care of any of these desires, I suspect that by the time I make my true debut into the world there will hardly be anyone I will not want to try."

"Oh that's bullshit, and you know it.” Lahood chuckled, “There's simply nothing I can do about most of these things. Such is the misfortune of a pan who also happens to be a demi."

I laughed as I asked, "Is this what we are classified as now?" Lahood responded trying to fight her embarassment, "I don't know. I don't know that it matters all that much, this is what people have called me after I talk about some of this stuff."

Snow's mouth was agape, and I was confused by her reaction. "Don't you guys already know all of this?" I said to Snow and Havnamara. Havnamara shook her head, "No, once our eras are complete we don't see anything that goes on out there. Most of us are exhausted enough by the end that we are content to obliviously fiddle about the ship, awaiting home. We care, of course, but unless someone comes back needing to ramble about what they're going through out there, we tend to spend our time together doing other things." This was strange to me.

"So you guys normally come in with all your predecessors memories and just wing whatever you think is best during your time, and no one on the ship really knows how things are progressing out there?"

Snow chimed in, "Well no, Atlas, then we'd still be a shit show. What Havnamara just said doesn't really apply to the non-era selves, because they go in all the time. You can think of the non-era selves as like... bts, or housekeeping. But us eras like to finish our cycle and then take a fucking rest." Snow paused for a moment before adding, "But there's also been plenty of times when Lahood has looked more shot to shit than I ever did and she'd tell me a little about what we were facing out there. It's why I've tried to offer to go in for her so many times... however,” She gave Lahood a pointed look, "She has never bothered to mention all of this sexy shit that we are not done talking about yet. Atlas honestly, you should be excited about all of this, you're going to have even more fun than I did, fuck."

My expression turned again to confusion, "I don't really have any flashbacks of you having a ton of fun."

Snow smiled with a sense of pride at whatever she was remembering, "You only get glimpses of whoever you are emotionally connecting to on the ship. Like earlier, whatever flashbacks you were seeing- they were probably little S's, since you and her have been bonding most lately."

Havnamara nodded and added on to this, "You probably also get bigger doses of Lahood's memories with a little more emotional context to them, too, because she's your direct predecessor. You've got to have little bit of something to go on, I guess. That's why you can already feel all these desires she's got." Havnamara stared at my face for a pondering moment. "It also seems to me like you're being subject to some of the fog that Lahood hasn't been able to shake, too."

"I thought that was just from my birth being early." I responded.

"Mm, could be. Probably is a factor, but I think it goes deeper than that. I'm not sure if it'll be cleared by the time your era starts, that depends on Lahood." She said this without any blame in her voice. Again I wondered how such a steady version of self led to such a troubled one. I looked over to Lahood. She was still sitting, though not what I would call comfortably, with her eyes to the floor. I couldn't even really tell if she was listening, either. I want to know more about all of this, but right now doesn't feel like the right time, feels too sudden. I've been so absorbed in asking for stories about the past that this is the first time I'm hearing about what's really going to be expected of me when it comes time.

"Well, I wanna go back to our previous conversation, ladies. I told you we're still not done with that." Snow came through to move the conversation along.

"If you had so much fun, Snow, I want to have those memories back, too. You look so smug, I've gotta know."

Her expression turned from hesistant worry to something completely self-satisfied. "I'm sure you'll start getting more of mine after today."

"Mmm, and what memories should I oh-so-eagerly be expecting?"

"You'll most likely start getting memories that are in a similar unhinged spirit to the cravings you have now, since we’re talking about it. One of the last times of my era will definitely be in those."

"Oh what, were you having threesomes and living up to your whorehood?" I wanted to keep banter building to lighten things up again.

She laughed, "No, no, nothing like that, you have to remember that we are all massive evolutions of one another." At this she turned to me, propped her feet up on the ledge, and leaned back on her hands. She pushed her seat my way as she slowly slid towards me, and when her knee met my arm she curled her left leg around my waist and pulled me in to her. She stayed leaning back on her hands and dangled her right leg off the ledge. She kept her left leg curled around my waist but made the grip languid like a true creature of leisure.

She tilted her head to the side as she said, "But I had my own way of wild."

Havnamara was smiling lightly and shaking her head, and even Lahood had come back to us to enjoy Snow's show. The expression on Snow's face as she said this to me was one distinct to her, and I loved it. She still looked so smug and hungry, and like a champion. Seeing this look on her made me want to find my own version of it. To feel whatever that is.

Snow is someone I am proud to be an evolution of. I can say that about all the women on this ship. But Snow is… like her name. She is the thing you hope for. She doesn't demand that Winter hurry itself to become Spring, she just shows you how Winter can be so beautiful. She doesn't remind me as much of a force of nature as she does a muse for nature. I can't help but wonder what kinds of phenomena she would have become if her era was longer, or if the ship had already found its rhythm back then. I could feel the soft smile on my face as I shamelessly stared at her.

"Mmm, you got her going now, Atlas," Lahood said like an excited child. She stood up from where she had been so sorrowfully sitting and said, "Snow's heart was monogamous but her cravings were still as whirly as mine, she was just too conflicted over that heart to get where I've got you, Atlas!" She bent over dramatically in a bow of jest.

I was quick to look back at Snow, not wanting to miss out on cherishing the expression Snow was still directing at me. I could still feel my smile, and something was emanating from her that I wanted to fan. So I leaned toward her a little and asked, ready to rapidfire.

"What was that last time like, Snow,"

"Primal," she said, remembering.

"Where,"

"On the jetski," remembering.

"Where,"

"Down the river," remembering.

This caught me a little. "What part of what river,"

"A long stretch on the Red River," remembering.

I glanced to Havnamara, who was showing more emotion than I had seen from her yet. She was remembering, too.

"What do you mean a long stretch?"

"I was driving a jetski very fast down the Red River,"

I looked to Lahood, who was remembering as well. They all had that same expression now, and my want for it grew.

"Was it night?"

"Dayyyylight, sunset."

"And you were driving."

"Yes, in front."

I was tripped here. "Were there people? How did you?- "

Snow came out of her remembering to meet my gaze. She pushed off her hands and leaned forward until her nose was touching mine gingerly. She breathed out her nose and I felt her air lightly hitting my lips.

She drew her face back from mine, curled both of her legs around my waist and wrapped her arms very delicately around me, one across my chest and one across my back to caress my head. "You know that pianist you'll have someday? That throuple of men?" she spoke low with a resolve. Her nose nuzzled into my cheek before her mouth found my ear,

"Take ‘em somewhere fast, and you drive."

Before I could even respond she tilted my head, licked up the side my neck, lifted her tongue to tuck the drop of my ear underneath it as she grazed her teeth across and back down, just to end with a kiss on that same wet spot on my throat. My face flushed, but more than that I felt ripple of something sweet travel up my core. Surprise was a moment on my face, until joy broke through my mouth and I clutched my chest as I laughed a bit manically at the ground. Snow kept her legs hugging me but released me from her arms cradle, and before she could lean too far back I reached up to grab her face and place a kiss on her mouth as I loudly sounded, "Mmmwahh!"

Snow began laughing as she leaned back and I hugged her middle as I kept laughing, too. I was in a happy fit; happy to be embarassed, happy to remember what those things feel like, happy to be chosen. Lahood started to spun in twirls toward us saying, “Well I’ll be! Goodness me!” as Havnamara lowered herself back to the ground with a pleased expression. Lahood continued her spun toward the goofy smile still on my face and when she made it close enough for me to reach, still being caught in Snow's legs, I grabbed onto her sides to steady her. We paused for a moment, huffs of giggles coming out of each of us, and when Lahood finally looked up at me I said to her, "Okay. I promise."

She lit up in an inhale, grabbed my face, kissed it all over as she jumped and squealed, and again I felt so happy to be embarrassed, to remember, and to be chosen. Lahood hugged me low, and lazy-leaned her head on my stomach. It felt so natural to drape an arm across her back as my free hand began to brush through her hair. I wanted all these limbs wrapped up around me to stay holding me for a while.

Facing Havnamara now, I felt content to take in the sight of her, too. Lounging on her side across the floor with her head propped up by her hand. She is the only one of us with short hair, so her curls tend to make a bigger halo around her face.

"Havnamara," I asked, "What about you? What memories did you acquire?"

She continued to make lazy traces in the wood as she met my gaze and said, "I never did." She looked just as smug in this response as Snow had.

"What do you mean?"

"I never bothered."

Huffed laughs started to come out of me again, incredible. "How do you go from fucking down a river to being celibate?"

She shrugged casually and swung her arm above her head as she looked up past her hand, "I was bored with everyone I met." She let the motion of her arm continue on its way and dove it behind her head. "There were plenty of men during my era, but I always thought, 'God, I fascinate myself more than any of you ever could.'" She moved her supporting hand from her head and gently laid all the way down, arms up above her. "This is not to say that men are boring, but the ones I was meeting were to me, and I had not yet admitted that I'd like the taste of more than just men." She looked to me and smirked at that, then rolled onto her belly and pushed all the way back onto her knees like child's pose. She continued to share as she slowly slinked to a seat, legs crossed. "They may not have actually been boring, but I was moving through Snow's long-term separation and my mission was to fall in love again, with self."

This conversation had shifted quite a bit from Snow's, but Havnamara still looked proud about her memories and I yet again felt enchanted by one who had come before me.

Her eyes were closed, as they often are. "I actually did report back to Snow quite a bit about the memories I was making because I felt it was important for her to know."

"To know what?" I asked.

She opened her eyes, leaned back onto her hands, and looked up above again.

"That she was the special thing. Her, me, you, Sky, all of us, we are the special thing. Everywhere, all along." She took a deep breath in and sighed. "Even saw that old love a year after the separation- fully expecting to still be in love, as a courtesy to all the selves who had loved him before me- and the only revelation I got from seeing him again was that we-" she looked back to me and used a hand to gesture to herself, us, the ship, "were the special thing. We were what made it all special, we are the thing that makes it all special." She sighed another somber breath and I didn't understand why that notion would make her sound this way. "My era we found more rhythm here on the ship, and because we let go of that love I finally got to have the special-us all to myself. These are good things, but when something that has been in a particularly chaotic state of being finally finds its equilibrium, it sets off the unraveling of other things that’ve been patiently waiting to be uncovered. That's always what happens with us eras, we do all the unraveling we can til we hit a threshold we're not fit to walk through. The next of us is thrust through that door into a whole new unknown."

Havnamara closed her eyes and leaned her head back again, one knee up to support her. Her locks are so different from the rest of us, somehow bouncier and sharper and I wondered why she chopped off our hair for her era.

She stayed quiet for a time and I didn't have anything I wanted to say. Snow and Lahood were still holding me, they were listening. I understood what she was trying to tell me here, but I still didn't have it in me to ask for more just yet. I don't feel quite ready. To hear about it, or to be pushed through the threshold.

Havnamara kept her head tilted back but turned it in my direction to look at me. "The unknown that Snow left for me was so empty. A big void, that I fell in love with, and did not want to clutter. They say all the time that when you clear space, other things, better things, will have room to come in their place. But I found that I wanted the space all to myself, to expand into, and fill up only with me, whatever I was." She looked back up again, "And so that's what I did."

She leaned forward to sit crisscross and she reached her arms above her to stretch and scratch her head. That smugness had returned to her face, and she wanted me to see it. "I found out something about what I am, too, you know,"

My expression lifted and I gave an inquisitive look. "Oh? What are you? What are we, I s'pose?"

"Delicious." She said smirking.

Giggles came from the three of us at the ledge and the mood was shifting itself into something feathery again.

She heard our giggles and kept on, "And anyway, who said anything about being celibate? I'm the one that made us excellent at fucking ourself."

And there I was again, letting laughter have me, as the other two began to move from their holds on me to start playing again.

Havnamara lifted her hands, palms in, out- "When your own hands have learned you that good, the need for others lessens significantly." She said it like the gesture of a shrug.

Lahood chuckled and said to me in jest, "Atlas, you will discover that the thing that turns you on the most is just imagining yourself."

"And you are so welcome for that," Havnamara said with her chin tilted up.

I was still leaning against the ledge watching them banter and laugh at each other. Snow had jumped down from the ledge and walked over to sit next to the two of them. "Alright now, Lahood. We went from monogamous water sports and having the hots for the void to Lady Hedonista loading over there. Fill in the gap for us Miss…?"

"Cactus Tree-Leaden Heart.”