Wrapped inside his sweatshirt on his black sleeper sofa. The two of us hidden from the world watching casablanca by the light of slow melting candle. Ingrid and Bogart in the darkness on the runway, flickering of the candle. His hand working its way through thick black ringlets. “This is the best part,” he whispers, fingers running through curls teasing them straight and letting them recoil. We’ve watched it a dozen times, but its always new, exiciting for him. Every part of me simmers as the credits roll and the flame flickers then dies. He abandons the curls fumbling in darkness for the edge of his fuzzy sweats, trying in vain to find skin beneath the cotton. A shiver escapes me as his fingertips find flesh and catch me slightly off guard. I close my eyes, tingling, waiting for his lips against the back of my neck. A creature inside me cries out, impatient for him to kiss me. A siren shatters the darkness. Forced to open my eyes to a fading memory, glaring reality.