She looks at my outstretched fingers as if I’ve offered her an oozing skull covered in rotten flesh. In fact, she looks at all of me that way—as if she can’t stand the sight of me. “No,” she says, with a slight shudder. That shudder wrecks my fragile composure. At her sign of revulsion, something inside me snaps. I used to be glorious, desirable, irresistible—and this mortal worm shudders at the thought of my touch?
