Touched
Karen Myers
June 19, 2009
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Karen Myers
“I can feel the life force leaving me,” Mike says as he massages my legs with his rough, careful hands. He doesn’t use oil or lotion like the other massage therapists. Just his sticky, Marlboro-scented fingers. I lie in my underwear beneath a green sheet. My bony shoulder blades and crooked spine press into the table, having long since lost their cushion of muscle.
“We’re getting older,” Mike says, even though we’ve barely reached forty. “Maybe that’s why we’re so afraid. We don’t have the energy to fight like we used to.”
Mike’s eyes bulge like a bullfrog’s. When I first knew him, I found them a bit frightening. His voice is raspy and deep. He has a fading tattoo on his left
