Senitus VII

Last part of the first Senitus chapter.  No one has voiced opinion about who they want to rad about next, so I guess that I'm going to surprise you.  Also, I couldn't find a picture of a mixed sex bathroom.  The Erramans have a bit more gender equality, a la the Etruscans, and one of the ways that this is represented is by the lack of separation in the bathroom or the baths.  Oh, and yes; I know that my characters are weird.  I'm weird.  Comes with it, I guess.

This important task finally completed, he reached down to his left side to grab the spongia, the sea sponge on a stick, but just as he reached his hand down, a hand swiftly took it away from him. He looked up to see the face of a beautiful young woman who he’d not even noticed in his urgency to get to his seat. She was tan of skin and dark of hair with striking green eyes, and dimples forming as she brought to bear a disarming smile that was nothing short of lovely. He smiled in turn, but while his lips displayed sincerity, his eyes betrayed his lack of compassion.

Without averting her gaze from his eyes, she lifted up her stola with one hand and with the other put the spongia under her dress, attending to her hygienic duties. Senitus panicked and looked in the other direction, finding another spongia in the water to his right foot. He grabbed it up and looked at it. There was a reason he went for the other one; it was much cleaner. It was too late to worry about that now. He turned back to meet her gaze and set his own spongia to work. Luckily his tunic was short enough that he didn’t need to draw it up, for his other hand still occupied his bun. And so they sat for a moment, hands undulating back and forth as they attended to their hygienic duties and stared directly into one another’s eyes.

Her grin broadened even wider until it eventually broke open into a laugh, the corners of her eyes crinkling as she did so. Senitus realized just how absurd this whole exchange was and joined together with her guffaw, adding his own. They laughed for perhaps much longer than they ever should have and as their chuckling drew down in volume, he became distinctly aware of the silence in the room, that everyone had ceased their conversation and brought their eyes to bear on the two of them, sitting and laughing their heads off whilst scrubbing themselves. He had to admit to himself what a sight it must have been, even as it quite embarrassed him.

She replaced the spongia to the trough and rubbed it a little bit against the stone to clean it, letting the water flow over it, before standing up and giving him a wink. “Been fun, killer.” She walked towards the exit, his eyes transfixed as her hips swayed from side to side. She turned her head over her shoulder and looked back to catch another glance of him, which he realized at that moment that she had seen him watching her as she left, but made no notice of offense, instead only saying almost under her breath to him, “I’ll see you around.”