One Hundred Strokes of the Brush Before Bed

by Melissa P.

  In the second drawer I keep the lingerie I wear during my encounters with Roberto and his friends. Thigh-highs shredded by their fingernails, lace panties slightly frayed from being stripped off too many times by lustful hands. They attach no importance to these things; to them what matters is that I’m a slut.

  In the beginning I would buy only lingerie in white lace, carefully coordinating each piece.

  “Black would suit you better,” Ernesto once told me. “It goes better with your colouring, the shade of your face, your skin.”

  I followed his advice, and from then on I bought only black lace.

  I watch him take a fancy to the coloured thongs, worthy of a Brazilian dancer: shocking pink, green, electric blue. When he shops in earnest, he chooses red.

  “Your girlfriends must be really weird,” I tell him.

  With a giggle he says, “Not as weird as you,” and my ego is boosted again.

  The bras are almost all padded. He never coordinates them with the panties, preferring to juxtapose colours that seem unlikely together.

  Then the stockings: mine are almost always thigh-highs, crowned with a band of lace, strictly black, so they form a sharp contrast with the wintry pallor of my skin. He buys fishnets, which don’t match my taste.

  When Ernesto is particularly fond of a girl, he dives into the throng at a department store and buys her glittering dresses adorned with multicoloured sequins, cut with dizzying necklines and daring slits.

  “How much does this girl make an hour?” I joke.

  He turns serious and, without responding, goes to pay. Then I feel guilty and stop acting like stupid idiot.

  Today, as we strolled through the shops, past the acid young salesgirls, the rain caught us by surprise, soaking the packages we were toting.

  “Let’s go under the portico!” he shouted as he seized my hand.

  “Ernesto!” I said, midway between irritation and amusement. “There are no porticos on Via Etnea!”

  He looked at me, bug-eyed, shrugged, and exclaimed, “Then let’s go to my place!” I didn’t want to go there: I learned that one of his roommates is Maurizio, a friend of Roberto’s. I didn’t feel like seeing him; much less did I want Ernesto to discover my secret activities.

  From the place where we stood his apartment was only a few hundred yards away. We covered them at a fast clip, hand in hand. It felt great to break into a mad dash with someone who doesn’t make me feel like I have to get into bed with him and let myself go, no holds barred. For once I’d like to be the one who decides: when and where to do it, how long, with how much desire.

  “Is anyone home?” I whispered as I climbed the stairs with a booming echo.

  “No,” he replied, breathless. “They’ve all left for the holidays. Only Gianmaria stayed home, but he’s out right now.” Content, I followed him, hastily sprucing myself up in the mirror on the wall.

  His place was half-empty, but the presence of four men was visible: there was a nasty smell (yes, that oppressive smell of sperm), and the rooms looked like they had been hit by a cyclone.

  We flung the packages to the floor and removed our dripping overcoats.

  “Do you want one of my T-shirts? It’ll take a while for your clothes to dry.”

  “OK,” I said, “grazie.”

  When we reached his bedroom-cum-library, he approached the wardrobe with a peculiar anxiety; and before he would open it completely, he asked me to fetch the packages from the other room.

  When I returned, he quickly shut the wardrobe. Amused and soaked, I blurted, “What do you have in there? Your dead women?”

  He smiled and answered, “More or less.”

  His answer made me curious. But he avoided other questions by tearing the packages from my hands and saying, “Come on, let me see! What did you buy, little one?”

  He opened my wet box with both hands and stuck his head inside, like a child opening a Christmas gift. His eyes sparkled, and with his fingertips he drew out a pair of black panties.

  “Ooh-la-la! And what do you do with these, eh? Do you wear them for someone in particular? I doubt they’re part of your school uniform.”

  “We all have our secrets,” I said ironically, aware that I was arousing his suspicions.

  He marvelled at me, leaned his head slightly to the left, and softly said, “What do you mean? Let’s hear: what’s your secret?”

  I was weary of keeping it inside me, Diary. So I told him. The expression on his face didn’t change; he wore the same look of enchantment as before.

  “Don’t you have anything to say?” I asked, irritated.

  “You’ve made your choices, little one. I can only tell you to go slow.”

  “It’s too late,” I said, feigning resignation. Trying to stifle my embarrassment, I burst out laughing and then said in a cheery voice, “OK, honeybunch, now it’s your turn. Your secret?”

  He blanched, and his eyes darted around the room, uncertain. He stood up from the faded floral sofa bed and took a few giant steps toward the wardrobe. Then he dramatically threw open one door, pointed at the clothes hanging there, and said, “These are mine.”

  I recognized the things; we had bought them together. The price tags had been removed, and they had clearly been worn. They were wrinkled.

  “What do you mean, Ernesto?” I said quietly.

  His movements slowed, his muscles relaxed, his eyes turned toward the floor.

  “I buy these clothes for myself. I wear them and … I work in them.”

  This time I was left speechless; I really couldn’t think of anything to say. Then a moment later my head was crowded with questions: You work in them? What kind of work do you do? Where do you work? Why?

  He began before I could ask them. “I like to dress up as a woman. I started doing it a few years ago. I lock myself in my room, plant a video camera on the table, and dress up. I like it; it feels good. Later I watch myself on the screen and … well, I get excited. Sometimes I’ll let someone else see me on film, if they ask.” He was suddenly swallowed by a deep blush.

  Dead silence. The only sound was the noise of the rain streaming down from the sky, forming thin wires that encaged us.

  “Are you a prostitute?” I asked, not mincing words.

  He nodded, immediately covering his face with both hands.

  “Meli, believe me, I only do oral sex, nothing else. Someone might ask me to … take it up the ass, but I swear, I never do it. It’s to pay for my studies, you know, my parents can’t afford it.” He would’ve continued, fishing for more excuses. Anyway, I know he likes it.

  “I don’t blame you, Ernesto,” I said after a lull. I was carefully examining the window where the droplets sparkled nervously.

  “Look, everybody chooses their own life. You said it yourself a few minutes ago. Sometimes even the wrong roads can turn out to be the right ones, or vice versa. The important thing is to follow your dream, to be true to yourself, because only if we succeed in doing this can we say that we’ve made the best choice for ourselves. At this point, what I really want to know is why you do it.” I was being a hypocrite.

  Then he looked at me with tender, questioning eyes and asked, “Why do you do it?”

  I didn’t answer, but my silence spoke volumes. My conscience was screaming so loudly that to repress it I said spontaneously, without any shame, “Why don’t you dress up for me?”

  “Why are you asking me this?”

  I myself didn’t know. Slightly embarrassed, I spoke in a hushed tone: “Because it’s beautiful to see two identities in the same body: man and woman in the same skin. Here’s another secret: it excites me. A lot. But forgive me … it’s something we both like; nobody is forcing us to do it. A pleasure can never be a mistake, right?”

  I noticed from his trousers that he was aroused. He tried to hide it.

  “I’ll do it,” he said curtly. From the wardrobe he took a dress and then a T-shirt, which he tossed to me.

  “Sorry, I’d forgotten t
o get it for you. You can wear that.”

  “I’ll have to undress,” I said.

  “Are you ashamed?”

  “No, no, of course not,” I replied.

  As I undressed, my nudity increased his excitement. I slipped into the huge pink T-shirt. On the front it featured a winking Marilyn with the caption “Bye Bye Baby”. Together we watched my friend don his vestments, as if it were an ecstatic, sublime ceremony. He dressed with his back turned, so I could scarcely make out his movements, not to mention the G-string that parted his square buttocks. He turned to face me: black miniskirt, fishnet stockings, thigh-high boots, gold lamé top, padded bra. This is how he presented himself to me, a friend I’d always seen in Lacoste and Levi’s! My excitement wasn’t visible, but it was there.

  His dick popped out of the flimsy G-string with no problem. He shifted it and started rubbing.

  As in some performance, I stretched out on the sofa bed and eyed him attentively. I longed to touch myself, even to possess that body. Much to my amazement, I watched him masturbate as if I had assumed a male gaze. His face was rapturous, beaded with little drops of sweat. My pleasure arrived without penetration, without caresses, simply through my mind, through me.

  His, however, came strong and steady, I saw him spurt and heard his gasp, which broke off when he opened his eyes.

  He lay down on the sofa with me. We hugged each other and fell asleep as Marilyn rubbed her eye against Ernesto’s gold lamé top.

  3 January 2002

  2:30 am

  Another visit to the museum-like house with the same people. This time we played a game: I was the earth, and they were worms burrowing into it. Five different worms dug furrows in my body, and the soil, upon my return home, was loose and crumbly. An old yellowed nightgown, my grandmother’s, was hanging in my wardrobe. I slipped into it and smelled the scent of softener and a time long gone as they blended with the absurd present. I undid my hair and let it fall to my shoulders, protected by the comforting past. I undid it, nuzzled it, and went to bed with a smile that quickly turned into weeping. Gentle, tame, and meek.

  9 January 2002

  At Ernesto’s house there aren’t many secrets. I confided to him that my experiences had provoked a desire to see one man inside another. I really want to see two men screw. To see them screw each other just as they’ve screwed me, with the same violence, the same brutality.

  I can’t stop myself, I’m moving as fast as a stick swept along by the current in a river. I’m learning to say no to other people and yes to myself, learning to release the deepest part of me and let it slam against the surrounding world. I’m learning.

  “Melissa, you’re a continual revelation,” he said, his voice still hoarse from sleep. “How can I put it? You’re a mine of fantasies and imagination.”

  “I swear, Ernesto,” I said, still hugging him, “I’d even pay.” After a brief silence, I turned impatient and asked, “So?”

  “So what?”

  “You’re from that camp. Don’t you know anyone who might like to be watched?”

  “Come on! What are you up to? Can’t you be a nice girl and act normal?”

  “Nice isn’t really me,” I said. “And what do you mean by acting normal?”

  “Acting like a sixteen-year-old, Meli. Boy meets girl, they fall in love and have sex, everything balances out, and they live happily ever after.”

  “Please, in my view, that’s the height of perversion!” I shouted hysterically. “Utterly dull: Saturday night in Piazza Teatro Massimo, Sunday morning breakfast at the seashore, sex strictly reserved for weekends, confiding secrets to your parents, and so on. It’d be better to stay single.”

  Another silence.

  “I’m just not like that; I don’t want to change for anybody. And you – you’re one to talk!” In jest, I screamed this last bit in his face.

  He laughed and caressed my head.

  “Little one, I love you. I wouldn’t ever want something unpleasant to happen to you.”

  “It’ll happen to me if I don’t do what I want. And I love you too.”

  He told me about two guys, law students in their final year. I’ll meet them tomorrow: after school, they’ll come to pick me up at Villa Bellini, in front of the fountain where the swans swim. I’ll call my mother and tell her I’ll be out all afternoon, attending a drama class.

  10 January 2002

  3:45 pm

  “You women are idiots! Watch two men screw … mah!” said Germano. He was driving. His eyes were huge and black; his massive, finely sculpted face was crowned by the most beautiful black ringlets, which, if not for his fair complexion, would have made him a young African, potent and proud. He was ensconced in the driver’s seat like the King of the Forest, tall and majestic, his long, tapering fingers on the steering wheel. A steel ring with tribal markings stood out against the whiteness of his skin and its extraordinary softness.

  His partner, a thin-lipped guy who sat behind me, responded in a faint, polite voice: “Leave her alone. Can’t you see she’s young? And she’s so tiny… Look at her lovely little face, so sweet. Are you sure you want to do this, little one?”

  I nodded.

  From what I gathered, these two had agreed to the encounter because they owed Ernesto a favour, though I didn’t have the faintest idea what exactly they were paying back. The fact is that Germano was put out by the situation, and if he’d had his way, he’d have left me by the side of the deserted road. And yet an obscure enthusiasm shone in his eyes; it was a subtle feeling that I sensed coming and going at intervals. During the journey, silence kept us company. We were driving down a country road, heading for Gianmaria’s villa, the only place where no one would disturb us. It was an old farmhouse, built of stone and surrounded by olive and fir trees; in the distance you could see rows of vines, dead in this season. The wind gusted, and when Gianmaria got out to open the enormous iron gate, a mass of leaves dropped into the car, falling on my hair. The cold was piercing, the smell that of wet soil and leaves long left to rot in water. I clutched my handbag and stood up straight in my high-heeled boots, hugging myself against the icy chill. The tip of my nose felt frozen; my cheeks were tight, anaesthetized. We arrived at the main door, wherein the names of various children had been carved during their summer games, a sign of one’s passage through time. Germano’s and Gianmaria’s had also been etched in the wood … I’ve got to run, Diary, my mother has just thrown open my door and told me I have to accompany her to visit my aunt (she broke a hip and is in the hospital).

  11 January 2002

  A dream I had tonight:

  I’m getting off an airplane. The sky over Milano shows me a sullen, hostile face. The clinging, icy wind musses and flattens my hair, just done at the salon. In the grayish light, my face looks washed out, and my eyes seem empty, ringed by narrow phosphorescent circles that make me even weirder.

  My hands are cold and white, corpselike. I arrive inside the airport and spot my reflection in a window: I take note of my face, thin and colourless, my long hair, dishevelled and at this point horrendous, my lips, clenched, hermetically sealed. I am aware of a strange, unmotivated excitement.

  Then I flash on myself again, just as the reflection shows me, but somewhere else. Instead of being in an airport, dressed in my usual designer clothes, I am suddenly in a dark, putrid cell touched by so little light I can’t see what clothes I’m wearing or what kind of condition I’m in. I weep; I am alone. Outside it must be night. At the end of the corridor I glimpse a flickering light, which is nonetheless intense. No noise. The light approaches. It grows closer and closer, frightening me, since I hear no step at all. The man who arrives moves with great caution. He is tall, potent.

  He rests both of his hands on the bars; I stand, drying my eyes, and go to meet him. The light of the torch illumines his face, suffusing it with a diabolical air, while his body remains in shadow. I see his enormous, ravenous eyes of some indefinable colour, and his broad lips, which are parted
, permitting a glimpse of a row of pearly teeth. He lifts a finger to his mouth, signaling me not to speak. I observe his face up close and notice that he is fascinating, mysterious, and extremely handsome. I am jolted when he places his perfect fingers on my lips and traces a circle. He does it gently, my lips are moist, and almost spontaneously I draw closer to the bars, pressing my face against them. His eyes brighten, but he is absolutely, eternally calm. His fingers enter deeply into my mouth, lubricated by my saliva.

  Then he withdraws them, and with the aid of his other hand, he rips open the upper part of my threadbare clothes, leaving my full breasts exposed. The nipples are rigid from the cold entering the narrow embrasure, and at the touch of his soaked fingers, they become even harder. He places his lips on my breasts, nuzzling them at first, then kissing them. I hang back my head in pleasure, but my chest remains still, yielding only to his demands. He stops, gazes at me, smiles. One of his hands searches through his clothes, which, from up close, I realize are those of a clergyman.

  A jingling of keys, followed by the sound of an iron-clad door softly closing. He is inside. With me. He again tears at my clothes, ripping them from my body, exposing my belly and then, farther below, my warmest point. He slowly lays me down on the floor. His head descends, and his tongue thrusts between my legs. While I am no longer cold, I desire to feel myself, to perceive myself through him. I pull him toward me, smelling my humours on his face. Groping beneath his tunic, I feel his member in my hand, lovely and hard, and I rub it more and more frenetically… His penis wants to escape from the tunic, and I help it by lifting the black garment.

  He penetrates me, our fluids run together, and he slides wonderfully, like a knife in warm butter, but he does not stir me. He slips his member out and sits in a corner. I let him wait; only later do I approach him. Again he immerses it in my foaming waves. A few strokes, hard, sharp, sudden, are enough to bring me to infinite pleasure. We are in unison. He regains his composure and abandons me, weeping even more than I was before.