She takes another sip of champagne. “The problem is I still have my Italian accent - it’s hard to shake off one hundred percent.”
“But it hasn’t harmed your career up until now, has it? I mean, people love an accent, it makes you exotic.”
“So far I’ve been lucky, but I want to be in the same league as Charlize.”
Tough, I think. Trying to compete with the best of the best. “Well you can have elocution lessons. There must be so many voice coaches in L.A. Although, I like your accent. I think it would be a shame to lose it completely.”
She puts her hand on my thigh. “You do?”
“Yes, I think European accents are sexy.”
“Well, I suppose you would, Pearl. Tell me about your husband-to-be. Is he really as hot as he looks?”
“I thought you were gay,” I reply with suspicion. Keep away from him, femme-fatale!
“I am. But you know what turns me on? Lying in bed with my girlfriend and watching a man fuck a woman in a porno movie. Seeing a big, hard, thick cock stretch open up a sweet tender pussy and fuck her. Or even two guys together making out.”
I’m feeling the effects of the champagne and I laugh.
“Why is that funny? Didn’t you know that that’s a lesbian fantasy? A lot of us still love to imagine big cocks but we want to be once-removed from them, if you see what I mean.” Alessandra picks up the hotel phone and nonchalantly dials room service. “Hi, can you bring us an ice-cold bottle of Dom Pérignon and some sandwiches? A mixture of snacks, I don’t care, a mixture of vegetarian and whatever. Thanks.”
My eyes widen. So cocky! She didn’t even ask me.
“It’s on me,” she lets me know. “Now, where were we? Yes, big, huge throbbing cocks—”
Cock…the word brings unwelcome images to my brain and I feel my eyes well with tears. The needle-dick memories flash back and a recollection of that third guy who came into the room envelops me like a blanket smothering me to suffocation. He was fat, sweaty, his penis repulsive; I remember him struggling with a condom…I cover my face with my hands in disgust – the twisting agony of what happened wrenching memories out of my body…I start hyperventilating again, my breath short. I try to suck in a lungful of air.
Alessandra steadies my shaking shoulders. “Pearl, what the hell is wrong?”
And it all comes gushing out; the whole story from beginning to end. I reveal everything to her. I’m in tears now, the memories of what happened to me thick with sordid details. The faces of the guys, how they held me down, how their repulsive penises poked and prodded as if I were nothing more than an orifice.
“The one with the fat, flaccid walnut of a penis couldn’t even get it up – it made him angry,” I wail in between sobs.
Alessandra is holding me in her arms. “That’s right, Pearl – let it all out.”
“He felt humiliated in front of his friends. There were more. I can’t remember how many…but there were more. I puked up – that’s when they finally left me alone. They left me there covered in vomit and semen and—”
She holds my trembling body close against her. “Now, now, my beautiful Pearl, they can’t hurt you anymore.”
Room service arrives and I pick at the food, hardly being able to swallow. Telling Alessandra all this was the last thing I wanted to do. So unprofessional, mixing my private life with a work situation. I should never have agreed to allow her into my hotel room, letting her look into my heart and soul. I’ve been an idiot.
I sit up straight and try to compose myself but I feel exhausted, spent, all my energy sucked out of me.
I don’t protest when she takes control and says, “I’m going to run you a bath, Pearl, and you can just lie back and relax. Think of lovely things. Any time you have a nasty image in your mind replace it with this bunch of pink roses.”
The bath is just what I need. I recline my head back, unwinding in the hot bubbly water and do as Alessandra tells me. I picture the pink roses climbing up the stone walls at Alexandre’s house in Provence and the scent of lavender, the intense purple-blue of the fields, the white butterflies fluttering about like confetti. I remember the buttery croissant I ate for breakfast, the taste of homemade cherry preserve – from the cherry trees in his garden.
Alessandra puts on some music – Woman by Neneh Cherry – a powerful song. I close my eyes. It’s healthy that all the bad memories have resurfaced but now they can go back where they came from, six feet under where they belong. It’s done. It’s over – I don’t want the past taking over my perfect world, screwing up my life.
My lids are shut tight when I feel the bath water ripple. I open them and see two smooth, golden legs in the tub. Alessandra is joining me. This is not what I planned!
“Scoot over,” she says, slipping herself behind me before I have a chance to object. She eases her slim body to the back of the tub and maneuvers around me so I have no choice but to lean on her, my back pressed against her breasts, her legs splayed open either side of me. Double déjà-vu! But this time with her, not Alexandre.
“Use me as a cushion. Just relax,” she says soothingly, pulling my shoulders back.
I’m too tired to disagree. I lean against her. She begins to lather my back with a delicious-smelling body-wash as she sings along to the song…about being a woman’s world. Her hands are firm but soft as she massages my shoulders with her fingertips, kneading out the knots – the stress.
“This feels good,” I tell her, realizing it’s past the point of protesting. Anyway, who cares? What’s the worst that can happen? Alexandre said himself he wouldn’t mind. She’s a woman – she can’t hurt me. A little rubdown can’t be a bad thing.
She continues with this wonderful massage for a good ten minutes. I’m like putty in her agile hands. Then her fingers run themselves from my shoulders to my front and tantalizingly across my breasts. She isn’t touching the nipples, just circling around and around – all part of her skillful massage. But my body does things my conscience can’t control: my nipples pucker and to my surprise I’m silently begging for her to tweak them – the massage has got me really turned-on. I don’t want her to know but she senses something as her hands graze across each nipple. I feel a shooting desire connect the pulse with my core and my clit starts to throb. She begins to flutter her fingers on my nipples and I can’t help it – a little moan escapes my lips and I lean back closer against her. Uh oh, that’s done it.
“I thought you’d like that,” she whispers, her lips grazing my ear. I shudder with secret, quiet desire. “Your tits are beautiful, Pearl. People pay thousands to get their breasts to look just like yours.”
“They’re real,” I tell her trying to feign a normal conversation.
She flickers her pinkie seductively on one erect, rosy nipple. “Yes, I know, I can always tell.”
Her hands have moved back to my shoulders and neck as she continues her soft touch. She’s running the very tips of her fingers along the base of my hairline – my hair is pinned up in a messy bun. Shivers tingle through my entire body.
“I’m not gay you know, Alessandra,” I blurt out, trying to convince myself that this has nothing to do with me. I am an innocent bystander in all this!
“No,” she murmurs, “of course not, but who’s going to arrest you, huh? Just relax, I’m just giving you a little massage, that’s all. You’re holding in a lot of tension.”
She begins to brush my neck with her lips with whispery kisses and then her fingers are back on my nipples again. I feel the need build up inside me. Being with Alexandre has awoken my sexual appetite, a yearning for orgasms and now is no exception. She’s getting me worked up. Her hand moves under the water now, searching between my thighs. My breath gasps in anticipation. I don’t want her to stop… yet this is…wrong!
My conscious mind wants to tell her to leave me be but I can’t, I’m simply too turned-on. Her finger taps my clit gently making me flex my hips. I want more and she can sense that. Oh yes, she can sense it alri
ght. She presses her palm flat on my Venus and the pressure of it has me moving up against her hand. She makes circular motions almost imperceptibly but it’s just enough to feel myself throb as if my heartbeat were right down there. With the other hand she tugs at my nipple, kneading it softly between her fingers. She slips her index finger from her right hand inside my slick opening, continuing with the pressure on my clit.
“I’m not gay,” I repeat, sensations unspooling, my hips grinding on her hand in a ripple of carnal desire, “but this does…aah…oh yeah…feel…so…good.”
“Doesn’t it? Your pussy’s so sweet, Pearl, I’d like to flicker my tongue against your clit.” She presses her hand harder on my purring V-8 now and I feel myself come in a thunderous pound. My back arches as I rock my hips forward pushing on her hand - the orgasm pulsates deep inside me, her finger still there exploring my G-spot, making the double-sensation linger and flutter in waves of orgasmic bliss.
“The best way to relieve tension is through climax,” she says quietly. “If you ever have a migraine you know what to do.”
Sensations of shameful bliss are still pulsing through me, my clit tingling with aftershocks, the base of me beautifully released. I am not a lesbian! How has this happened? “Alessandra, this was a one-off. I can’t let this happen again.”
But she just laughs. “Don’t be so serious, Pearl. It’s just a release, that’s all. Your body needed it.”
“I’m not going to reciprocate,” I warn her. I can’t see her expression as she’s behind me but I can imagine it. I have a picture in my mind’s eye of a cool smirk etched across her beautiful face.
And it scares me.
No woman has touched me like this. Ever.
And I’m shocked at how I responded with so much desire.
***
I awake to the sound of the Skype ring on my iPad and hazily turn on my side. I didn’t have any nightmares last night, I had night mares, or should I say, a night of mares. No stallions. I dreamed about females - beautiful breasts, slender long legs. This is crazy! Still, I guess it’s better that visions of women erase the grotesque, panting images of what was there before.
Ugh, I can’t even think about it.
I unlock my tablet. It’s Alexandre.
I quietly recount my adventure yesterday evening – I’m wondering if he’ll be as delighted as he said he’d be. Perhaps he might get jealous.
But no - jealousy doesn’t seem to hold a place with him when a woman is involved. He responds huskily, “If my plane wasn’t about to take off right now, I’d want a full recount of every single, tiny, sexy detail and I’d pleasure myself while you recounted each horny moment. I swear to God you’ve got me all worked up thinking about it.”
I can hear the jet’s engines roaring in the background. “I’m not proud of what I did,” I say tentatively. “It just sort of….unfolded. It won’t happen again, I promise.”
“Pearl, have some fun, don’t take it all so seriously.”
I freeze. Isn’t that exactly what she said? “I have something really important to tell you. Something that’s been responsible for my bad dreams….hello?…Alexandre?”
The line’s gone dead. I call him back on both Skype and his cell number. Nothing.
I roll out of bed and amble to the bathroom. I miss Alexandre – it strikes me that all I really want to do is be with him and Rex, cozy together watching a movie or a walk in the park. Work used to be so important to me but now less so. I mull over the ‘lady of leisure’ fantasy he sold me yesterday, lying by the beach reading novels. Or the pair of us escaping to Thailand and living in a tree-house – leaving the ‘real’ world behind. Usually when you cook up a fantasy it’s unattainable but for us it could be a reality. A sweet thought. But the Devil makes work for idle hands, doesn’t he?
With this in mind I shower quickly, get myself ready and set off for work in my outrageous low and vast, powder blue Cadillac that feels like a ship. I swing by my favorite smoothie stall feeling cruel that I blamed it for my ‘food poisoning.’ In a few hours I’ll be able to speak to Alexandre and we can have a long talk. I want to get these dreams off my chest, I want to lay it all open – I’m sick of harboring this secret.
As I cruise along Pacific Coast Highway, sipping my strawberry smoothie, I wonder if I could adapt to this city – smoothies, the ocean, palm trees swaying in a warm breeze, beautiful people everywhere – what isn’t there to love?
This is my last day with Alessandra – our last day working on the script. I have to admit that it’s been fun but right now the last thing I need is the possibility of more complications. It was a highly pleasurable one-off experience in the bathtub but I mustn’t let her have her seductive way again. Watch out Pearl, be on your guard.
It’s cooler today so we write inside. We settle in the living room which is an extension of her open-plan kitchen. The place is decorated with Navaho hand-woven rugs and an eclectic mix of oil paintings that are copies of Klimt and Frida Kahlo. There’s a wood-burning stove in the corner with a brick surround and bookcases stuffed with self-help books and…dare I say it, Russian novels. Spooky…a woman after my own heart.
“You have the same reading taste as me,” I remark, setting down my bag and sitting on a big arm chair.
“I knew we’d think alike, Pearl. We’re mirrors of each other.”
I want to tell her that she’s the female image of Alexandre, not me, but I say nothing. The less we talk about my fiancé, the better.
She pulls back her long dark hair into a ponytail, settles cross-legged on the sofa and says, “I told you so much about my life, my family in Italy and stuff but you’ve revealed nothing about yourself.”
Only the most personal thing ever. “Oh, my life has been very normal,” I hedge. “You know, school in New York, college, jobs, marriage, divorce, and now I’m engaged.”
“Engaged to one of the richest men in the world.”
“Well, I don’t focus on that aspect. Money doesn’t motivate me.”
“What does motivate you, Pearl?”
“Passion. In work. In love. In ideas. I think you have to really believe in what you do on every level. You know, morally and spiritually speaking.”
“Do you believe in Stone Trooper?”
Her question grabs me by the throat. Do I believe in this Hollywood blockbuster? Is it important on the grand scale of things? Or is what Natalie is doing so much more significant? “Of course I do,” I reply with a half lie. “I mean, I think the fact that your character, Sunny, is gay is important. A movie with a message. So many people are homophobic.”
“Are you homophobic, Pearl?”
“No! Of course not. I believe in gay rights, I believe in same-sex marriage, I believe in—”
“You kept trying to convince me last night that you weren’t gay. Why is it okay with you that others are gay but not yourself?”
“But I—”
“Why label things? Why is it so important for you to limit yourself, to pigeon-hole yourself?”
“I….I…” I stammer, “I guess I’ve never thought of myself as being locked in some pigeon-hole.” For some strange reason I feel hurt by her accusation. I am liberal-minded!
Her voice softens at my injured expression. “You’re so tender, Pearl. So vulnerable. I hope your husband-to-be realizes how lucky he is.”
“He tells me every day.”
She locks her eyes with mine and says quietly, “When you came by my hand yesterday in the bath, I could feel you tremble, feel your beautiful little pussy-pearl quiver – you know, just the thrill of it, the excitement gave me an orgasm too.”
But how? You didn’t even touch yourself.
She goes on in her husky voice, “All I had to do was give myself a tight clench and I felt little ripples of pleasure. Not a bumper-big, mind-blowing orgasm but, you know…a little thrill. Touching your hard nipples and those beautiful boobs of yours – seeing how turned on I got you…well…you get me horny, Pearl.”
She bites her lower lip. “My pussy flutters a little when you look at me with your big blue eyes. But you know that, don’t you? You know you penetrate me with your intense, come-on stare, don’t you?”
“Alessandra! I’m not trying to seduce you!”
She chortles with laughter. “Just kidding. Where’s your sense of humor? Lighten up.”
I sigh with relief but am alarmed when I can sense my panties have got a little moist after what she just said. I shuffle my position on the couch and sit up straight. “We need to finish this script,” I say assertively. “I’m leaving tomorrow morning.”
She pouts her full red lips. “Such a shame. We’ve had so much fun together.”
I spend the next twenty minutes with my legs firmly crossed listening to what Alessandra has to say about Stone Trooper and the ideas she has for the love scenes. Somehow, she has convinced Sam that a full-on sex scene between her and her onscreen girlfriend in the film is a must. “To titillate the audience,” she explains.
I have Lucifer purring away on my knees while I’m also trying to type on my laptop. I look up. “Alessandra, there’s no way our kind of audience will be up for that.”
“Oh, stop being so backward-thinking. People are more open-minded these days. Mid-American housewives are reading about bondage and sex toys for God’s sake – hell, they’re even experimenting with it all.”
“Yes, but gay sex in a mainstream movie? A blockbuster, buddy movie?”
“Why not?”
“Because, because…”
“It hasn’t been done before?”
“No, I don’t think it has. This is not some French or Italian art-house film. This will be screened in shopping malls across the U.S.A.”
“Then give them something to talk about with their popcorn and soda.”
I put my laptop aside and gently unhook Lucifer’s claws from my skirt. I get off the couch and stretch my arms. “I’m going to have to talk to Sam about this, Alessandra. Personally, I don’t think it will work. I mean, I know that gay characters in movies are either marginalized or made the punch-line for degrading jokes a lot of the time and so having your character being gay, and you, yourself, being gay, is already a big leap forward. We can hint at sex, show a kiss or something but a full-on lesbian love scene?”
Shadows of Pearl (The Pearl Trilogy, Part 2) Page 11