“Yes… It is hard to move on…” I agreed with what she’d said earlier.
“You’re doing better, though,” she told me. “Your hair is getting longer.”
“You like it better that way?” I asked, hopefully.
“Yes,” she said firmly. “Much better.”
I spent a lot of May feeling guilty. I dreamt of her, more and more often. There was one dream that was very short, but memorable. I saw her, and she kissed me, and I felt her mouth, all wet. I woke up, touching my lips. It’s transference, I told myself. She’s a nice lady who gets paid to touch you. Easier to get a crush on her than go out in the real world. She’s not there to be your fantasy.
But I don’t like the real world, I whined to myself. I like Marlena.
I apologized to the friends who had fixed me up in February, and asked if they knew anyone else. I even went on a date with a perfectly nice woman who seemed interested in more than just a good-night kiss, but I couldn’t follow through.
As Marlena’s hands touched every part of me, I scolded myself for objectifying her. Her hands. Her breasts. Her sweet voice. As I turned over, my nipples were hard.
“It’s not too cold in here, is it?” she asked. “I can shut the window.”
“No, no, I like the breeze,” I managed. As she circled her thumb in the palm of my hand, it took everything I had not to grasp on to her. I let out a huge sigh.
“That’s it, breathe,” she told me.
I thought of canceling our next session, but knew I didn’t have the willpower.
The days were longer, and I wore my sunglasses out on the street and up the stairs to my appointments. The room was dark, then I took off the glasses, and there she was, and my heart leapt.
It would be over soon anyway. June barreled down on us, and I had two sessions left. I went over my budget to see if I could manage at least one session a month, and told myself just to let it…let her go.
“Summer’s here…you go to the beach? Coney Island?” she asked me. “It’s fun down there.” She wore a light, sleeveless top and was a little sweaty. She hated air-conditioning, and told me she wouldn’t put it on unless the client asked. Client. I reminded myself that’s what I was.
“I always mean to go…but summer gets away from me,” I told her. “Like I always mean to go to baseball games and outdoor concerts; I like the idea of them, but I’ve lived here so many years and haven’t done so many of the things you’re supposed to in New York….”
“You need someone to make you have fun,” she commented.
“Yes, I do,” I agreed.
That night, I dreamed we were riding the Ferris wheel at Coney Island. As we whirled around and around, my stomach rising and falling, the ocean coming into view as we reached the top, she kissed me and reached up my skirt and touched my thigh. The world rocked around us as she pulled me to her with one arm, and I spread my legs to welcome her other hand. We rocked and rolled and I came so hard.
It was full summer on the day of our last appointment. The solstice had come and gone and I knew, even if I couldn’t tell by sight, that the days were getting shorter again. I like autumn better anyway.
“So Consuela’s going to be in tenth grade soon?” I asked.
“She’s so big…so grown up,” Marlena sighed. “Talking about colleges and where she wants to go. I’m not ready for her to leave me.”
“Well, she could end up going someplace around here,” I said. “Lots of good schools in the city.”
“I tell her that. But what if she wants to go to Stanford or someplace? She would hate me if I moved to California to be with her, right?”
“How embarrassing for her,” I said without thinking.
“Yeah, she should be ashamed of me,” Marlena said angrily. “Is that what you think? I shouldn’t love her? I should let go of her?”
“No, no! That’s not it at all!” I said.
Marlena stepped away from the table. Her hand, which was always touching me, suddenly wasn’t there. I sat up, and the sheet fell away from me. I got off the table, and she moved to the other side.
“Hey!” I said. “Hey…” and I followed her, and she kept going and I kept following and it must have been a sight to see naked me chasing her around and around the table. Then I caught up with her and what was I going to say? I couldn’t think of anything, so I just hugged her.
“You have a beautiful daughter and she has a beautiful mother, and…and…”
“And what?” Marlena said, not angry. Challenging.
And then we were kissing. It was much better than I had dreamed it. She didn’t seem surprised. She didn’t push me away. She kissed back.
“It’s not right…” she said, between kisses.
“I’m a client…”
“Ethics…”
“Not real…”
“Sometimes I get…”
“But it’s okay…”
“If we both…”
“Yes…I think we both…”
“Yes…”
We broke for a moment, and she pulled off her top and her bra, and stepped out of her loose cotton pants.
“Get back on the table,” she told me. “I’m not finished.”
I did as she said, and stretched out on my back. She got on as well and straddled me. She poured the lotion in her hands and rubbed it on herself: breasts, arms, belly. Then she loosened the long hair she always kept pulled back. She leaned over me and it fell like a silken veil over my face. Her breasts brushed, then rubbed against mine, and she massaged me with them, letting them slide and roll all over my front. I moaned.
She shifted so that one of her legs was between mine and lay prone on top of me, using her whole body to stroke me, her leg to grind into me, her teeth and tongue to nuzzle my neck, chin, face. As in my dream, she clasped me to her with one arm, and reached down, and I opened my legs.
Her oiled fingers slipped easily into my cunt, and the hand that knew every inch of my outside began to massage me from the inside and I was beyond thought, beyond words, just capable of moans and grunts and sighs. She rubbed me expertly, but with more than simply a professional touch. She wanted me, she wanted to claim me, to be part of me.
“You’re with me now, understand?” she whispered fiercely. “I don’t care how we found each other, because we’re here now, okay?”
“Yes…yes…” I managed.
She slipped out of me, and told me to turn over. She turned round on the table, and bent over my buttocks, squeezing and kneading them hard. She’d never touched me that low before, and along with her hands, I felt her mouth, her breath, blowing, licking, nibbling around my ass. No one had ever done that to me before, and I instantly understood what I’d been missing. I could feel her pouring more oil on me, then rubbing it in, circling my hole with her finger, touching, seeking; quite suddenly, easily, sliding in. Oh yes, oh yes. Her finger rode me and rode me and I grabbed the table and begged for more.
She climbed off the table, and pulled me toward her so my feet were on the floor. She kept working the finger in my ass, and put her other hand back in my pussy. I bucked and rocked and she kept rubbing and stroking, massaging me to greater heights.
“I’m going to come…” I stammered.
“So come, baby,” she said. “Come with both my hands in you.” So I did.
As I lay there, trembling and weeping, I felt Marlena lying on top of me, resting her head on mine. Something dripped down my cheek, and I licked it and realized it was salty. I managed to get up and turn round, and she was weeping, too.
“Today’s not the last time, right?” she asked, and I held her.
“Today’s the first time,” I told her. “We get to go outside. Out of this room.”
She sighed happily.
“But not just yet,” I told her, pushing her back on the table. My hands, all slippery and soft, worked their way up to her breasts.
RUPTURE
Suki Bishop
It begins like this: We ar
e driving down the highway. I feel frisky, mischievous. I want to play a little, set something in motion that takes on its own life so that when it happens, it just happens. I want to throw something out and see how it returns to me.
Mark sits in the backseat. Dara drives. I am in the passenger seat with my legs spread, the AC funneling under my dress. Later, Dara will say I called her to me. It is true. I pictured her hand under my dress until it happened. What does it matter? I think. Why not? I marvel at how easy it is to cross over a line, to cross back.
I look at her, the driver, who must keep her eyes on the road, who does not keep her eyes on the road. I run my hand up her shorts, pull it away and laugh. I close my eyes and will Mark not to speak; his voice will pierce this fantasy. I want to imagine I am in a car heading nowhere, that I have nowhere to head, that it is raining out suddenly, that drops are hitting the windshield and their shadows fall over my skin—hydrating, penetrating drops.
She puts her hand on my leg. I watch it inch under my skirt. I don’t know where to look, how to hold my head. Mark must be watching. Her hand inches up. I focus on my breath, the sound of rain against the windshield.
He rests his hand on my head at first. “I feel like a puppy,” I say as he strokes my head awkwardly, brushes my hair aside. He moves his hand to my neck. I drop my head back. He grabs my throat as Dara’s hand enters me. I feel myself bend and open. I am in it now; I am in this speeding car, this driving rain; I am in her hand fucking me, his hand grabbing my throat, this throat fuck. She is supposed to be driving, but she watches his hand. She knows about hands and me. So she fucks me harder. I’m opening and opening my legs; I slide down the seat. His finger is in my mouth. I suck it. I am in this thing now; this thing I began with mischief, from a distance; this thing I set in motion last night when I said to him, “What do you imagine it will be like to fuck us?”
She is the one who says yes or no. She has said no all along. Ever since the day the three of us met and she and Mark competed for my attention. She and I kissed then, on a staircase in front of a window. We knew he saw her push me onto the stairs and lift my skirt. See how she lets me fuck her? See how she has chosen me? But Dara is afraid of something.
Today she says yes with her fingers inside me. What happens for her while she tries to watch the highway; catches quick glimpses of his hand on my throat, my shoulder, my chest?
He grabs my hair, wraps it around his fingers. The pain calls me to myself, brings me back to my body—her fingers, his pull, calling me back to this thrusting and spreading and opening body. His hand fills my mouth. I bite him so hard I leave teeth marks.
How can I explain that thing at the center, the destination I never reach, this impossibility? Her hand cannot break me open and fill me. His hand cannot break my jaw and drown me. I cannot bite through his flesh and swallow his palm. I cannot spread my legs so far that I become an endless, open hole. Something releases, but where will it go? Aside from my breath, I do not make a sound. I have lost sound’s language, as if all release is useless. I come, but I cannot break myself open into a thousand drops pouring down on glass, the drum of it, the endless patter of it, the flood outside our car.
Later, he enters our room without knocking. A bold move, yet we have not locked our door. I rise to greet him and he pushes me against the door, hard kisses me. Dara sits on the twin beds that have been pushed together as one and pretends not to care, but she can’t hide her disgust. I am careful. I stiffen at his touch. I lead him to the bed and tell him to kiss her, while I watch her face for signs of pleasure or anger.
He leans over her. The kiss is too hard and too sloppy; I know what she likes. But she lets him continue. The way he just pulls down her shirt and sucks her. The way her nipples are hard, her mouth open. The way he arches over her, like he’s going to devour her. I see their bodies arch and push against each other—there is something fierce there, some kind of war. I get angry when he kisses her too long, and yet the anger excites me.
A reaching hand pulls me in. We become a gross mathematical equation, a rotating lock with endless combinations, the search for a winning number to open a vault. What are we after? Not the skin (though Dara’s skin is so soft); not the hand approaching the bull’s-eye (the brain says, Yes! Yes! Go there!); not the gentle lick of a nipple, the release of air and sound from a mouth; not the kiss (Mark’s is a penetrating kiss, Dara’s a delicate probing); not the hand grabbing the hair of the head below him (such violence—her mouth could not hold him).
This feels different than the boy who obeyed us, who asked, “Can I touch her there?” That boy was nervous and new to this kind of thing. This one is tricky. Mark creates a tornado around him. He wants something; he is hunting us, and even as he slips—no, thrusts—his fingers inside me, I retreat somewhere deeper than his fingers can reach. Something familiar is happening, as if someone hums a haunting tune that I have been hearing and losing and hearing again all my life.
It takes me here: to a windowless room with a raised bed like an altar, to a time that now seems a lost precious gift. She is sixteen. She is on the bed, tied up, stripped down, and her boyfriend cuts her, tentative at first, until she writhes under the blade and he can see that she is coming. He is hard and confused at this pleasure he gets from cutting her, but he does not run from it. She begins to cry and says stop and he wants to, he really does, but it seems to him that something has already started; the knife now cuts him as it slices her. She is crying but she is also writhing and her crying sounds like a plea for something—something he cannot give her, he thinks, so at least maybe he can give her this.
I am on my back when Mark fucks me. When Dara watches him fuck me. Perhaps she sees the way my body bends in grief from an invisible source—a hair pull, a petting, an echoing touch calling up a resonant past. It is grief fucking me when Mark does, a phantom grief, a seductive, sweeping grief that enters and opens and steals me.
But Dara hears no haunting tune. With the obedient one, she and I kept each other’s gaze. This time, we do not. I do not retreat, in this moment, to the embrace of my lover, who is caught outside, feeling excluded, reaching tiny tendril hands onto my thigh, little cat paws pulling at me, calling me back.
When we lie together, I am in the middle, my head supported by an unfamiliar chest, pale white skin. She rests against me, a little lone bird on a log out at sea. The twin beds have begun to split: she and I on one side, Mark on the other. “The abyss of gender,” Mark calls it.
I think: if only it were that simple.
FRUIT OF ANOTHER
Annette Beaumont
It was the same every time. She lay back in my bed, the features of her face now faded in my mind. Those details were diminished, but not the intensity of my desire. As I kissed her neck I heard her breathing quicken; her curves, soft and full beneath my hands, a reminder of this forbidden love. My mouth moved slowly down her body, exploring, hoping, coming alive with cravings. Her moans were soft, a whisper, trying to keep our secret. I lingered on her hips, feeling them rise to me, wanting me, wanting more. In my mind, the teasing was relentless, taunting her, torturing myself. I pulled the inside of her thigh to my lips, her leg bent at the knee. She moaned, louder this time. She wanted me, needed me, called for me. So many times I had heard her call my name and longed to answer. Though I would never be with her, the image of this woman dominated my fantasies, invaded my mind and left me helpless to forget. In the painful absence of her touch, I succumbed to my own, feeling the wetness that only thoughts of her could bring. Years passed and time and again I dreamed of this woman with a frenzy of desire, always the same woman, always the same dream, only to watch her float away before I could finally taste her passion.
More than a decade ago her face was still fresh in my mind. Her eyes were big and brown with smile lines that had come from years of happiness on the river. She was beautifully round, even slightly heavy, with womanly curves my tom-boyish shape had never known. Her natural ways enhanced her beauty. She ha
d absolutely nothing to hide. Free from makeup and jewelry and attention to fashion she nevertheless radiated femininity. Her honesty permeated her appearance. She was modest, but not insecure. Her gestures, her laugh, her love of the nature that surrounded us were all quite genuine. She was simply beautiful to me. She had no idea that she held such beauty, and certainly no idea that I, of all people, appreciated it.
It was on the river that she looked most at home, and on the banks in the evenings, the sun casting its last rays on the canyon wall behind her, that I realized I wanted her. She was a bona fide river guide, with calloused hands and a faded life vest, skillfully rowing guests through turbulent class IV rapids, giving them a wet and wild adventure they would never forget. It was my job, on the other hand, to organize the trip, to plan and pack five days of rations and supplies: Bisquick and bacon, cold cuts and steaks, tents, sleeping bags and Dutch ovens. I would meet and greet the twelve anxious guests, help orient them to camp life, and encourage them to pare down their new L.L. Bean wardrobes to stuff into their assigned dry bags. Both in our twenties, we embraced the freedom of life on the river, welcoming the constant sound of rushing water that drowned out the world and its expectations.
By the end of that summer on the Lower Salmon I was in the throes of my first lesbian infatuation, and I had the makings of a fantasy that would sustain me for more than a decade. We had spent months on the river and countless evenings around the campfire in the sand, no one ever suspecting my hidden lust. The end of each trip was marked by our small rafts floating peacefully into the larger flow of the Snake River, leaving behind the isolated, remote and hidden canyons of the Salmon. Just beyond the place where the two rivers meet, vehicles awaited to return our guests to the world they had only briefly escaped.
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