Rain fell harder. I was a prisoner in my own home, Jewell Stewark my cellmate.

The winds howled and told me that parole was not coming soon.

I stared through my open plantation shutters, the ones on the back of my office leading to my deck, that part of my townhome facing the cluster of trees that separated my unit from the club house and community swimming pool. Anxiety filled me as I regarded the storm and its fury, every cell in my body unnerved by Mother Nature's attitude. Her mood was ruthless, uncontrollable, her every breath volatile.

Jewell Stewark said, "Keep away from the windows."

Not long ago she was contemplating cutting my throat. Now she was saving my life.

I closed the shutters, sat in my office chair, rubbing my temples, let a moment pass.

The skies remained restless, released loud cracks, never-ending rumbles.

The flames from the candles flickered, their flickering sound adding to the pandemonium. Water dripped from the roof of my townhome, fell from trees weighted down by precipitation. Upstairs food was defrosting in my freezer. Ice was thawing in my icemaker. The windows and doors were swelling from the moisture. A million bugs were moving around outside, bugs indigenous to the South. I could hear the liquid sound of humidity, heard the moisture as it was created and formed. Felt each gland in my body as it produced nervous sweat. Heard sweat forming, heard the salty moisture dripping down Jewell Stewark's back, her breathing uneven, still nervous, so very anxious and uncomfortable, trapped here with me, abandoned by her lover and trapped here by Mother Nature.

I looked across the candlelight, our scandal light, regarded Jewell Stewark, her skin damp, her red complexion possessing a post-coital glow of shame, her green pupils surrounded by a deep redness. We didn't break our fatigued gaze. Our worn gazes were more empathetic than antagonistic.

My phone vibrated again. My heart raced, I jumped and cursed.

Jewell jumped, startled.

We both shared embarrassed glances.

After three vibrations the Sex and the City ring tone played.

I caught my breath, pushed the END button, sent the call to voice mail.

The storm raged. The rain slapped down in increased anger. The skies screamed their fury.

In a terrified voice Jewell Stewark said, "Bathtub."

"What was that?"

"We should get in your bathtub."

"What does that do?"

"My grandmother made us get in bathtubs during storms like this. The more walls between you and a storm the better. So we might have to go into a bathroom and hunker down in a bathtub."

"Hunker down."

"Climb in. Huddle up. Hunker down."

"I have a full bath down here."

"We should take this with us, to cover us."

She motioned at the twin-size mattress on the wooden frame, the Japanese futon.

She said, "If a tornado hits, we can pull that over us. It will block the flying debris. If it comes to that. I hope it doesn't. But you never know. The way it sounds out there, tornadoes might be all over."

I nodded, lips pulled in, fingers nervously running through my hair.

Together we pulled the mattress off the futon, dragged it into the bathroom, leaned it against the wall. I hurried and got the candles, put one on the sink, one on the seat of toilet, one on the tank.

She told me to keep away from doors, windows, stoves, sinks, metal pipes, anything that could conduct electricity. She told me to not use the telephone. Then told me I should've disconnected all of my electrical appliances, even the things on the top floor and in the living room, and I should've turned off all the TVs and radios. I took to the stairs, went up top, unplugging as much as I could but not everything, made it back to the basement, breathing hard and sweating. She was sitting in the bathtub, knees to her chest, rocking.

I said, "Now what?"

"We wait. Wait and pray."

Jewell had put her cup of water on the floor and gotten in with her back at the faucets. Did that like she was being polite, saving the most comfortable end for her host. I crawled in the tub.

I said, "Do we need to pull the futon cover over us?"

"Not yet. Keep it leaning against the wall so we can pull it down if we have to."

We sat there, sweating, our bodies touching, the candles flickering. I felt her trembling, her legs shaking. I smelled her sweat. The thunder, the lightning, all of that had her terrified.

She asked, "Which one of them sent you the flowers?"

"They never sent me flowers."

"I saw flowers on your porch."

"You've been watching me?"

"Not you. Him. I drove by looking for him."

"Someone I used to see sent me the flowers. Guy I broke up with, he sent me flowers."

She nodded. "Did you break up with him because of the twins?"

"No. Other issues."

"The flowers weren't from them?"

"Not the twins. Not them. Not from your husband. Not from his brother."

I remembered the plagiarized words from Logan's six-page manifesto. How do I love thee? Let me count the ways. I love thee to the depth and breadth and height my soul can reach...

I felt Jewell Stewark trembling. She shifted, bumped her head against the faucet.

I asked, "You comfortable down there?"

"I'm okay."

"Let's switch ends."

"No, it's okay. No need to have you bumping your head."

"You might as well turn around. Maybe we can both fit this way."

She stood up, stumbled as the lightning flashed, eased back inside my tub, this tub not as large as the one in the master bedroom. It was unsafe up there in a storm of this magnitude. She had her back to my front, her back against my breasts, her butt against my thighs, both of us squeezed together in a small space in a small cell, body heat against body heat.

She was praying.

I waited for her to finish. When she was done, I shifted, tried to get comfortable. It was impossible. Soft skin against hard porcelain. Her body was soft, much softer than mine. I was trapped between the softness of her skin and the hardness of the tub. So many scents filled this claustrophobic space. Her skin smelled of perfume and Karl. The scent of the Southern rain. The scent of damp wood. The scents from the trees and the dampness from the Georgia red dirt. The scent of three therapeutic candles. It was here settling on me all at once.

The skies boomed. She shook, moved closer to me, meshed into me, afraid to be alone.

She reached for her cup, picked it up, sipped the water again. A gentle sip before wiping her eyes on the back of her hands. Jewell Stewark finished her water. She put the empty cup back on the floor and remained sitting up. She swallowed hard, shivered, then took deep breaths, her nose flaring each time, her chest expanding with each inhale, her eyes closing with every exhale.

Candles flickering. Electricity lighting up the Georgia sky.

A kaleidoscope of fear was in her face. The same fear etched in mine.

She asked, "How did you meet them?"

"Stone Mountain. Running."

"Who came to you first?"

"Karl."

"I'm not surprised."

"Tell me about you and the twins."

"No. Never."

Thunder boomed. She reclined in the tub, a little girl hiding from God's wrath.

She remained close to me, no longer able to tell where my body ended and hers began.

I had nowhere to put my arm, nowhere for it to be comfortable, so I let it rest on her waist. She patted my hand, then she held my hand, held it tight, her hand trembling, still terrified. I touched her in a kind way. The woman who had married one twin, but loved the other.

This was The Jewell of the South. Democrat or Republican, she was the woman Georgia loved as if she was their local Oprah. Inside the city formerly known as Marthasville she was a deity. Inside my home she was a woman who lost the plot and cried like a heartbroken child.

This wasn't real. As she cried she held on to me, a child terrified of the storm.

The scent of sex rising from her body. That scent was too strong, too moving.

I repeated, "Tell me about you and the twins."

"No."

"Tell me about you and Karl. About you and Mark. Tell me how it came to this."

Her heartbeat was powerful, felt the rapid beating coming through her back, felt her rhythm. I knew she could feel mine thumping. I needed to talk to ease my fear.

The Jewell of the South shivered, her voice cracking when she whispered, "Okay. I'll tell you."

"You don't have to."

"I have to tell somebody. I've never told anyone. Holding this inside...it's killing me."

FORTY-ONE.

Her words were given to me as if they were the shocking pages from her own diary. The unexpurgated version of a corner of time, a small measurement of what, in the end, will be known as the alpha and omega of her existence.

For her it started in her freshman year at Spelman, when she was a teenager, when sex was new and wonderful and taboo, when love was confused for orgasm. When sex was given, bartered for love.

She told me she had seen Karl first. The boy with roots in the islands fascinated her. He was attending More house, the private all-male liberal arts college.

Those campuses were located in the same area, HBCU central, part of the Atlanta University Center academic consortium of historically black colleges and universities. An area populated with upwardly mobile minds attending Clark Atlanta, Spelman, More house, and Morris Brown.

But still populated by men and women. With raging hormones. Where many love affairs began. Where the first heartbreaks happened. Where people had moments that changed them for life.

Her mother died when she was three, her father when she was thirteen. Her mother was closer to her roots in Jamaica, so when her mother passed, so did her connection with Portland Parish. Her father never took her there. He was a blue-collar worker, trips to exotic islands not in his disposable income. They lived in a paycheck-to-paycheck world. Her father took ill. Died suddenly. Ruptured appendix. She'd been living with an aunt since her father passed, spent four years sleeping in the living room on a pull-out sofa.

All of that prefaced her telling me she was a small-town girl who had made it to a major college. With all the educated black men there, it was a small-town woman's heaven. It was a paradise for men as well, especially since the women outnumbered the men by at least ten to one.

She told me that she had seen Karl around campus, had seen him in Greek shows on the yard. For a girl who had grown up surrounded by the rednecks in Paulding County-her city being Dallas, Georgia, a city where it was reported that a uniformed deputy sheriff stood in a parking lot of the court house and helped a Klan member put on his sheets-Karl was unique. He was love at first sight. But Karl was Karl; women could seduce him, but none could tame him. Karl was Karl. And he was attending college in an area that had thousands of beautiful black women. She never dated Karl, not then, just wanted to.

Seeing him made her feel high and excited and want to do crazy things.

She told me how much she loved Karl before he knew she existed. But she moved on to other people, other lovers, bad relationships, one abusive, before being on double date with a friend in Athens, Georgia. And in walked Karl. Or so she thought. For a moment. It wasn't Karl; it was Mark.

She had no idea Karl was a twin. In her mind it was the same man she craved beyond reason.

She followed her desires, went against all she believed in, and abandoned her lover to be with Mark that night. She broke the heart of a man who adored her in order to have passion with the doppelganger of the man she had desired more than anything in the world. She did what she had to do to find happiness.

She told me about Mark. In the beginning. When everything was perfect.

His kisses were like oysters and champagne, exotic and intoxicating. Kisses were more sensual and arousing than anything. Her arousal so extreme, yet she was shy, had never experienced anything like that, had never been so astounded. With his fingers he stirred her, and with those same fingers he tasted her arousal, savored her arousal, fed her her own arousal. He did things to her no man had ever done. Made her feel so good, tears fell like rain. He taught his naive lover how to touch his arousal, how to relish his arousal, how to stir him, and she swallowed his love. She wasn't a virgin, but her experience had been limited, only sex, never seduction, never given plea sure in that way, not in the way that opened a woman up, not in a way that opened her heart, in a way that made her live to fulfill his desires.

He took her away on holiday with him.

Karl came along. The man she had wanted for so long was right there with them.