Love is Enough

"Emily fell back onto the settee, and Antoine loomed over her. 'It isn't Victor you grow impatient for,' Antoine said. 'You grow impatient for the experiences of a woman. You grow impatient for the man who will put a bit in your mouth and ride you like his prized mare.'"

TJ was only able to read through another chapter before Gabby stopped him. She laughed out loud and said, "Get to the good part—the part where Antoine ravishes Emily on the settee!"

"I don't think that happens," TJ said and leafed through a few more pages.

Hannah fell back in the easy chair laughing, and Gabby groaned. "Oh God no! What kind of story is this?" She stood and pulled on TJ's arm until he dropped the book, and they both toppled onto the sofa. Gabby wrapped herself around TJ, and with her lips under the line of his jaw she said, "You play the Antoine I want and I'll play the Emily he needs."

TJ didn't stop to think. Gabby's scent and the touch of her body had already hardened his cock. She gasped when he pushed her down on the couch and pulled her camisole off her shoulders. He kissed her throat, and he kissed her shoulder. He sucked her and drew her firm flesh into his mouth.

Gabby laughed and held TJ's mouth to her nipple while he pulled her knickers down and tossed them away. TJ shoved himself between Gabby's knees, and his fingers found the soft curls and the intricate folds beneath them. They were already wet.

TJ worked first one finger, then two fingers into Gabby and ground the heel of his hand down on her trigger, but only for a moment. She didn't seem to need it, and he was too excited to wait. TJ let her nipple go, rose on his knees and started pushing his pants down.

Gabby shoved TJ's hands aside and opened his pants herself. She wrapped his straining cock in both hands and pulled him to her. TJ waited until he couldn't wait any longer, and he shoved himself into Gabby. She tossed her head back onto the arm of the sofa and groaned. He shoved again, and she writhed while he sunk deeper into her. She lifted her legs around his hips, and when he thrust once more, he settled against Gabby's thighs with his cock pulsing deep inside her.

None of the subtle sex moves that TJ ever learned even crossed his mind. He slammed himself into Gabby and she gripped his arms. She clenched her teeth, and her body rocked under him while he fucked her. She gripped his shoulders and her fingernails sunk into his skin. Their bodies came together harder with each repeated thrust.

Gabby got what she wanted. She got to be Emily to TJ's Antoine. His thick cock filled her. His strong arms held her, his gleaming skin slipped under her touch. He was salty between her lips and between her teeth.

TJ got what he wanted. His cock burned inside Gabby, and pressure built in his balls. He tossed his head back when his climax gripped him, and he shoved his cock as deep into Gabby as he could go. First one spasm sent his juice gushing into her then he groaned through another, and another.

And then TJ collapsed. Gabby kneaded his shoulders while he went soft inside her then he sat back and fell off the sofa. He landed unceremoniously on the stage and realized that he'd just fucked a ghost on an open stage in front of an 800-seat theater.

Hannah had watched the whole show, and now she clapped her hands in slow, sardonic applause. She took the plastic cup from the table beside her and watched Gabby while TJ pulled his pants on. Hannah knelt beside him and offered him the water. "I've seen Gabby turn a few tricks," she said, "But I never seen her look that happy when it was over."

TJ took the cup and said, "Sit down." He wanted her close, and she obliged. Hannah crossed her legs and settled beside TJ, so she faced him. "Was I just a trick?" he asked.

Gabby laughed from behind TJ. "If he pays with time and attention then it ain't a trick," she said. She sat up and kissed the top of TJ's head then asked Hannah, "Where'd we leave that bottle? In the dressin' room?"

Hannah nodded her answer and Gabby disappeared in a breath of cold air. "It's the never-ending gin bottle," Hannah said. "All we gotta do is remember where we left it." She unwrapped her legs and tucked them up beside her, leaned close and asked, "Is Emily really going to do the mattress jig with Antoine?"

TJ laughed. "I don't know," he said. "But the way that kind of story usually works, Victor will come back in time to save Emily's virtue."

Hannah lifted her camisole back onto her shoulder while TJ's attention danced from her blue eyes to her red lips. "Why are you wasting your time on us?" she asked. "Don't you have a thing to write?"

"We all need something to write about," TJ said, "and I don't think I can keep writing about lies and irony forever." "Maybe I'm learning from you, or maybe it's the sex." He watched Hannah's expression and asked, "And maybe I just like you. Is that okay?"

Hannah surprised TJ by leaning close and brushing his lips with hers. "And how," she said. "You and Oscar are the only fellas that ever done anything for me." She hardly pulled back from her little kiss. Her warm breath brushed his cheek, and she added, "But I don't like sex the way Gabby does. She liked it before she did it for money, and you make her all giddy. My step-dad hurt me too many times for me to get giddy about it."

TJ put his arm around Hannah, and she laid her head against his shoulder. "Don't let that stop you, though," she said. Her eyes drooped and her lips parted. She offered her mouth and he took it. Hannah's tongue was wet and warm.

He wrapped Hannah in both his arms and held her. Her excitement was there, he thought. It was just under her soft skin. It was in her quickened breath.

"I found it!" Gabby said. Cold air swirled for just a moment before she appeared on the sofa. "It was in the john." Hannah pushed herself out of TJ's arms and wiped her mouth while Gabby opened the bottle and tipped it up. She handed the bottle to Hannah and said, "It looks like I interrupted a little somethin'."

TJ struggled up from the stage and checked the time on his phone. "Shit!" he said. "It's almost two, and it's going to be a long day tomorrow. I have to go." It was easy to kiss Gabby's cheek; it was harder to bend down and reach Hannah. He took his jacket from the back of the sofa and vaulted off the stage.

Gabby waved the bottle at TJ and said, "Kisses! We're gonna get bent now."

4.

If Hannah and Gabby got bent, then TJ couldn't tell. It was ten in the morning when they followed him into the manager's office, and they didn't show any sign of being hung over. That was bad. He wouldn't be able to close the theater until after ten that night. He needed them to be calm, or they'd drain his energy long before then.

They appeared as soon as he closed the door behind him, and he put his finger to his lips to shush them. "I have to make some phone calls this morning," he said. When he could, he paced while he talked, and he sat when he had to take notes.

Hannah found a pencil and a note pad, and settled in the side chair. She couldn't write, but she could draw, so Gabby wrote a big "TJ" in the middle of the page for her. He glanced over Hannah's shoulder now and then while she made the letters fat and bold and gave them a background of daisies. When Hannah was done, Gabby turned the page and sketched a picture of a hard dick that she titled "All for me?" She signed it with a heart and showed it to TJ.

TJ hung up after his last call and sat down. Gabby dropped onto his lap and Hannah leaned on his shoulder while he flipped through the note pad. "Do you always use hearts and flowers?" he asked.

"I always use flowers," Hannah said and her voice tickled his ear. "I'm no good at signing my name, so that's what I use. Gabby always puts a heart with her name." Hannah looked at the door and straightened her back. "Someone's coming," she said, and both girls disappeared into a breath of cold air.

There was a tap at the door, and TJ said, "Just a second." He tore pages from the notepad, folded them into his pocket, and waited a moment longer because Gabby left him as hard as the dick in her drawing.

The theater bustled all afternoon. The paper printed a glowing review of the play, so the box office stayed busy. Half the cast came early to run through a scene, and the tech crew was there to help. The Saturday night show was sold out, and the cast was determined to make it their best show. After that, only the anticlimactic matinée on Sunday stood between them and their next gig.

TJ lost track of Hannah and Gabby and only had a sense of where they were when the actresses complained that their makeup had been rearranged and there was a cold draft in their hot dressing room.

It was a big crowd, and TJ felt good while he patrolled the lobby at intermission. He listened for comments and complaints in the snatches of conversation he overheard then, when the director signaled him, he blinked the lobby lights and waited for the crowd to find their seats again. The lobby was soon empty but for ushers, who moved boxed programs to storage, and a guard who peered out through the lobby doors.

TJ was about to go back to the office when he felt a cold touch on his chest, and Gabby whispered, "I can't find her. I can't find Hannah." He looked around to see if anyone watched and opened the door to the closet under the balcony stairs. Gabby's presence brushed by TJ, and he flicked on the light and closed the door behind them.

Gabby look worried when she appeared beside him. "We were talkin', you know, and I don't know what happened, but something got into her. She told me to go away, but she didn't wait or nothin.' She ran, and I don't know where she went.

"She gets like that when she hurts, and then she's gotta hurt someone else." Gabby touched his chest again, but with a warm hand. "I don't want her to hurt you," she said.

TJ wasn't worried about getting hurt. The best scenario was that Hannah would take it out on him, but he had a cast and crew, and a house full of people that could be Hannah's target.

"I looked where we usually go," Gabby said. "Downstairs and in the box office and up in the balcony. I looked backstage and in the office, too."

"Keep looking," TJ said. "I'll try too, but I probably won't be able to see her." TJ's only chance of finding Hannah was to walk into her, so he weaved his way through the lobby and the mezzanine and tried to find her by touch. He zig-zagged up and down stairs and asked everyone he found if they'd felt any cold drafts. He got nothing but odd looks.

TJ stopped when he heard the ovation from the house and realized the play was over. He ran back to the lobby to watch the people who left during the bows, and saw people trickle from the balcony. TJ caught his breath when he realized that all Hannah had to do to hurt the most people was trip some unsteady old lady on the crowded stairs.

He tugged two volunteer ushers to the stairs on one side of the house. "I want you about three steps from the bottom of the top flight, and you about three steps from the floor on the bottom flight," he said. "Look for anyone who slips or stumbles and help them."

TJ was sweating under his jacket when he climbed the opposite stairs. He had no-one else to help. The crowd was at its thickest when someone at the top of the stairs asked, "Did you feel that?" and someone else said, "Wow, I'm suddenly freezing." A woman just a couple steps above him turned to look behind her, and tripped.

He dove to catch the falling woman, and felt a cold presence pass. He set her on her feet and tried to make sure she was okay, but then felt a grip on his ankle. TJ stumbled down a step and sat down out of balance and out of control. He landed on his back, turned head-down, and slid over two steps, and then three before he could stop himself.

People were all around him. They helped him to his feet, straightened his clothes, and they all asked—as if one wasn't enough—if he was okay. Startled gasps came from the lobby and TJ looked just in time to see a velvet rope topple to the floor, and a picture crash off the wall. People closed their jackets around them, and used programs scattered from their hands. It was over in seconds, and the lobby was filled with questions.

Clearing the house and the lobby took longer than usual that night. Everyone wanted to know what happened, but no-one had answers. They all left with ghost rumors that took on a life of their own.

TJ went back to looking for Hannah after the stage held only the covered sets, and the lobby was quiet. He walked the rows and the aisles. He searched the offices and the back rooms. He found Hannah on an old staircase that, because of some remodel long ago, led to a blank wall. He couldn't see her; he could only hear her sob.

TJ sat on the steps as close to her sounds as he could get. "Hannah, let me see you," he said, and her sobbing quieted.

He felt her pull away. "Don't hurt me," she said.

"I won't. I never would," TJ said. He tried to touch her, but pulled back from her bitter cold. Hannah was visible for just a moment. She huddled against the wall with her hands clutched under her chin, and then she faded again.

Gabby's voice came from behind TJ. She said, "Hannah, oh God Hannah! I didn't mean..." When TJ turned to look at Gabby she turned away with tears welling up in her eyes.

Hannah appeared again; her eyes were red and tears streaked her cheeks. TJ pulled her into his arms and onto his lap, and he held her head against his shoulder. He warmed her and rocked her, kissed her forehead, and whispered in her ear. He said, "It's alright. It's okay," just like his mother told him when he was an injured child.

"She whipped me," Hannah said. "With a lamp cord. My mom whipped me with a lamp cord." She turned her face against TJ and her tears fell on his neck and trickled down under his collar.

"My step-dad thought she was gone," she said, "But she wasn't, or she come back, I don't know. He held me down on my bed, and he hurt me.

"She screamed at him when she found us, but she screamed at me, too. I was just a little girl, and she screamed things I didn't get, but I get now: harlot, slut, cunt. She pulled a table lamp from the hallway, and she whipped me with the cord."

TJ slipped his hand under Hannah's camisole and over her back. He was surprised when he found welts that crossed her back like ropes under her skin. She relaxed under TJ's touch. She took a deep breath and her body trembled when she let it go.

Hannah unwrapped herself and pushed away from TJ enough to see his face. "Did I hurt you? Or that lady? I meant to." There wasn't a note of apology in her voice.

"I caught her," TJ said. "Maybe she'll have a bruise." He watched Hannah's expression for a moment and thought he could tell her something she wanted to hear. "You hurt me. My back is bruised and sore. My neck is stiff." He touched the back of his head. "I have a knot back here from hitting the steps."

Hannah kissed TJ's cheek without saying a word, then leaned her shoulder against his chest. Gabby tugged the pocket square out of TJ's jacket pocket and used it as a handkerchief. She wet it on her tongue and cleaned Hannah's face.

Gabby sat back to look at her handy work, and TJ asked, "What started all that?" Gabby disappeared so fast that the pocket square danced in a swirl of frosty air.

Hannah laid her head on TJ's chest again and said, "Gabby started it. We was talking about you, and she said I'd never get you to love me, 'cause I couldn't get my own mother to love me. It made me remember what I wanted to forget." She fell quiet, and first TJ wondered how that came up, and then he asked himself what it would mean to love a ghost.

"I can be mad at Gabby, but not for very long," Hannah said. "She's all I got."

TJ looked around at the dark and dusty stairs to nowhere and said, "Let's get out of here." He plucked his pocket square off the floor, stuck it back in his pocket, and struggled a little to get to his feet with Hannah cradled in his arms.

Hannah laughed at TJ's effort. "I guess you ain't no stevedore, huh?" she said. If he'd stopped to think, then he might have figured out that she could leave a lot more easily than he could carry her, but he wanted to hold her close. He got his bearings and carried her through a dusty corridor and down another flight of hidden stairs. They emerged behind the wings on stage right.

The stage, with its single bare light overhead, was a comfortable place for both of them. TJ sat down on the sofa with Hannah on his lap. "I need to see," he said and gave Hannah no more warning before he pulled her camisole over her head. She was surprised, and then surprised again when he turned her face-down on the cushion.

TJ knelt astride Hannah's waist and ran his hands over the scars that crisscrossed her back. Some were raised, and some were angry red. "I touched your back last night," he said. "None of this was here. Your skin was smooth and soft."

"Last night was before Gabby reminded me," Hannah said. She propped herself up on her elbows and turned her head to look back at TJ. "The scars on my skin healed, you know? The scars on my heart, they never did."

"And these are the scars on your heart." TJ said, to himself as much as to Hannah. He touched her and tried to imagine a child's pain. TJ stroked his hands over Hannah's back and touched each scar. He leaned over her and kissed a red welt at the base of her neck. To him, the old scar seemed bitter and hot.

"What are you doing?" Hannah asked, but TJ didn't know, so he couldn't answer. He stretched the scars and smoothed them with a gentle touch, and Hannah sighed into the cushion. He traced them across her back with his lips, and he kissed them until their hot and bitter taste was gone.

Hannah moved under TJ hands. Sometimes she flinched away, and other times she pushed back against his touch. The dim light from overhead was all that lit TJ's work, but even by that light he could see the scars fade. He could feel Hannah relax.

TJ wasn't done until Hannah was asleep, and her scars were gone. TJ felt drained as if he'd poured himself into her. He sat down on the edge of the cushion and found Gabby slouched in the easy chair. She had one hand between her legs and the other under her camisole, but she righted herself when TJ struggled to his feet.

"If you're payin' with time and attention," Gabby said, "Then that was heavy sugar." She stood up from the chair and passed TJ to reach Hannah, so TJ dropped into the seat that Gabby abandoned.

Gabby bent over Hannah and kissed her cheek. She whispered into Hannah's ear, and Hannah faded away. Gabby turned back to TJ, and he motioned to invite her onto his lap. "Do you think her scars are really gone or just forgotten?" he asked.

"I don't know how to tell," Gabby said, "They've been forgotten before, but I guess they were never gone." She pushed her knickers down, kicked them up with her heel, and caught them. Gabby climbed over TJ's knees and knelt over his lap.

"I watched everything," Gabby said, and handed TJ her knickers. They were damp and fragrant, and the look on his face made her laugh. "I didn't think I should butt in," she said and leaned forward to kiss his lips. "You know, no fella ever did so much for Hannah when she was still alive."

"So I'm late," TJ said, "But I don't think it was a waste of time." He dropped the knickers, ran his hands up Gabby's thighs, and under the bottom of her camisole. "You lied to me," he said. "In the closet when you told me you couldn't find Hannah. You said you didn't know why she left. You knew." He pushed his hands up Gabby's hips and watched the soft curls between her legs. When he looked up again he said, "I'll give you another chance to lie to me. Did you know what you were doing to her?"