Chapter 282
Nima
"I'm sorry you have to do this," I say, my voice a thin whisper as she gently washes my back with a soft, warm cloth. The water feels good, but the humiliation burns hotter. How embarrassing.
The thing with having an old body is that it betrays you. It forgets how to hold itself, how to stay clean, how to be anything but a fragile vessel slowly emptying.
She doesn't pause her careful, rhythmic motions. "My dear beloved," she says, her voice low and impossibly steady, "this is not the first time I have done this."
"It does not make me feel better if you say that," I murmur, closing my eyes against a prickling of useless tears.
The cloth stills for a moment. Then I feel her lean close, her lips brushing the shell of my ear. "I mean," she clarifies, her breath warm, "growing old with you. This is not the first time."
I try not to cry but fail. The tears are silent, warm tracks through the wrinkles on my cheeks, lost in the bathwater.
