Champagne Kisses

by Amanda Brunker

  Occasionally she’d pound his chest and shout the word ‘Bastard’, which only made him look more determined and fierce.

  Just as the damp had started to numb my bum, my phone, gripped between my hands like a lifeline, beeped ‘1 New Message.’

  Sure it was Maddie telling me it was too cold outside, and that I was to stop being stupid and get back in and join the group, I got a shock to see the words ‘TURN AROUND’ from an unrecognizable +191 number. Thinking what the fu—? I quickly looked behind me to find my New Yorker standing beside a rose bush brandishing a bottle of Laurent Perrier rosé and two glasses.

  ‘Pinky said it was your favourite.’ Michael smiled, making my heart skip a beat.

  ‘For the record his name is Parker,’ I corrected, ‘but what are you doing here?’

  ‘Hey, I met the most beautiful woman I’ve ever seen tonight, and then she ran off on me. What’s with that?’ His eyes smiled as he spoke.

  Not sure if I was daydreaming again, I pinched my leg to make sure. ‘Am I imagining things?’

  ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘Well, I’m nearly sure we left you in Queens. How did you find me?’

  Ignoring my question, he positioned himself beside me on the icy concrete bench, and started to pour the champagne like a pro.

  ‘You know, that Pinky fella really is a good judge of character,’ mused Michael. ‘He invited me when you were in the cloakroom. He said it would be da craic and not to tell you.’

  ‘What did he say to you? Did he pressurize you into coming here? Oh, God I’m so embarrassed. I’m so sorry. He can be a bit forceful sometimes.’ My mind began to run away with itself.

  ‘Whoah! Slow down there, tiger, everything is just rosé in the garden. Don’t you think?’ A broad smile rippled across his face as he placed the champagne flute in my hand and clinked his glass against mine.

  ‘I propose a toast,’ declared Michael, raising his glass to the stars: ‘here’s to new beginnings and great friendships.’

  ‘Shock entrances, more like.’ My confidence had started to return.

  ‘I’ve always prided myself on my entrances. Much better than my exits, I feel,’ he said and then knocked back the champers.

  ‘Well let’s hope you never make one,’ I said, tilting my glass towards him. And in two magical mouthfuls, I too made my champagne disappear.

  Lifting the glass from my hand, he placed the two empty glasses at our feet, and then asked me, ‘Can I kiss you?’

  Unable to speak, I gave him my best sexy eyes and tilted my head towards his.

  Then we kissed, the perfect kiss. It wasn’t like kissing someone for the first time. It was familiar and right. Wow! If he kept kissing me like this I could love this guy for ever.

  Obviously as happy as I was, Michael pushed my hair off my shoulder and nuzzled his face against mine. The heat of his breath hummed in my ear. ‘Have you ever had a champagne kiss before?’ he whispered wickedly.

  ‘Did I not just have one?’ I was unsure what he meant.

  ‘No,’ he said, smiling, ‘but, just like last time I want you to kiss me back.’

  Then in Jim Morrison fashion, he lifted the bottle off the ground, took a full mouthful of champagne, and before I knew what to do he had leaned in once again to kiss me.

  Like an explosion, I could feel the sweet nectar entering into my mouth, gushing across my taste-buds and rushing down the back of my throat. All the while, Michael choreographed his tongue expertly inside my lips.

  This was true fizz. Champagne kisses for ever. Then, as if he had read my mind he gave me an intense, deep look and said, ‘Do you believe in love at first sight?’

  Doing my best coy act, I replied, ‘Maybe …’

  ‘Well, I do,’ he said, coming over serious, all the while making me feel warm and fuzzy on the inside. Nervous with the intensity of the moment, I let out a little laugh and stuttered, ‘Oh, oh, do you now?’

  ‘Yes, I do,’ he shot back. ‘I’m a big believer in what’s meant to be.’

  Uncharacteristically stuck for words, I gave a nervous cough, trying to gain time. The best response I could come up with was, ‘Oh, yeah?’

  Laughing, Michael grabbed my hands, which had started to make an annoying flicking noise with my nails, and pulled them close to his chest. It felt warm and strong, and smelt great.

  ‘What you doin’ Valentine’s?’ he asked, after obviously giving it some thought. ‘And don’t say you’ll have to consult your diary.’

  ‘You tell me,’ I said as I slid my right hand up to the back of his neck and started to roll his hair around my finger, the cold of the night just melting away.

  ‘I think we should go to Las Vegas.’

  ‘Sounds like a plan to me.’

  ‘Cool. How does this sound? Fancy getting married?’

  3

  ‘HEY BEAUTIFUL, ARE you awake yet?’ The sound of my New York superhero’s voice was now familiar to me. ‘I’ve got fresh bagels and some pastries for you and sweet coffee for my sweet … Now are you gonna get up? Or do I have to drag your ass outta bed?’ His voice resonated from the kitchen, before he popped his adorable head through the crack in the door.

  It was the Monday morning after the weekend before, and I was still happily in London after skipping my cramped return flight on Florence with the gang. It wasn’t like I had any work to rush back to after all.

  ‘Morning,’ Michael smiled, as I yawned and stretched across the bed cheekily exposing my naked nipples over the top of the crunchy white duvet, accidentally on purpose. We hadn’t had sex yet, and I was practically bursting with frustration.

  ‘Morning yourself,’ I replied, as I patted the mattress beside me, signalling for him to come in and join me.

  ‘You don’t want breakfast?’ he challenged, adopting a macho, hands-on-hips pose.

  ‘I think I’m hungry, but, er, I think I fancy some meat to nibble on,’ I sniggered, failing desperately to keep a straight face.

  ‘You want meat?’ he said, as he frantically kicked off his Timberlands and swung his belt across the room, nearly knocking over a bedside lamp. ‘You got meat!’ Before I knew what had hit me, Michael had barged in and swept the duvet from the bed. Tossing it to the floor, he climbed over me on all fours as I screamed and wriggled into the foetal position, trying in vain to hide my modesty.

  ‘You wanna play hard to get?’ he teased, as he tickled my bare body from my feet to my neck, haphazardly wriggling out of his Edun T-shirt at the same time.

  ‘NO – NO,’ I yelped, unable to speak while laughing so hard.

  ‘Well, pumpkin, I fancy a nibble of something tasty myself.’ He smiled, then lunged for my neck and vigorously munched.

  Giving up the fight, my body released itself into his arms. Pulling him close to feel his smooth bare chest against mine, I felt I had died and gone to heaven. His smell had become so familiar now as well; that was all I could register as my eyes rolled back while he savaged at my neck, rendering my body weak.

  Just as I became aware of his right hand sliding down around my waist, he flipped me over like a rag doll, slapped my backside with force and threw me over his shoulder.

  ‘Right, Miss Eva,’ he said, struggling as he tried to rise off the bed, ‘you’re going to have some breakfast, whether you like it or not!’ And he manhandled me into the living room and flung me on to a massive burgundy corduroy couch, sending gold embroidered cushions flying.

  ‘There,’ he panted, standing over me like a gladiator. ‘Now I shall serve you breakfast. Don’t move!’

  Like a rescued damsel, I cosied myself on the sofa, pulling a wool shrug over me to keep warm. As Michael returned to the kitchen to fetch our food, I scanned the room and its fabulous paintings and memorabilia. It was an eclectic mix of modern meets classic.

  Although it wasn’t Michael’s home, just a pad that his mate lent him when he was in London, I could visualize a huge amount of his personality from his belongings.

 
Exuding a relaxed, comfortable style, rips on the sofa arm and burn-holes in the curtains hinted that it had seen the odd party or two; and judging by the mini photo-collage over the black cast iron fireplace, the odd celebrity too.

  On the lengthy walls hung massive black and white photographs of models, alongside interesting pieces of modern art. Impressively, two pieces were by Damien Hirst, and there was even a small Chapman Brothers amended Goya etching above an old Regency dresser, which was covered in piles of photographs and papers, and several empty bottles of Jack Daniel’s.

  ‘Is that really Kate Moss?’ I asked, curious about the beautiful people in the picture frame.

  ‘Yeah, she’s hot, ain’t she?’ enthused Michael on returning with the breakfast goodies. ‘Frankie, the guy who owns this place, seriously works the London scene. He’s currently in Namibia researching his latest book, though. Hunting hidden treasure, I think.’

  ‘Isn’t he just a true life Indiana Jones, eh?’

  ‘He’s a bit of dreamer is my boy, but ya just gotta love him. I’m just surprised that trust fund of his hasn’t run out. It’ll be some wake-up call when it does.’

  Sipping my Java blend, which Michael had switched into a very trendy mug designed by Tracey Emin, I pondered how wonderful life could be, and thought that maybe my mother was on to something with that whole ‘You never know what’s around the corner’ lark.

  She’s going to be so happy for me – that is, when she starts talking to me again.

  Gosh, wait till Lisa hears where I am. This is definitely more her speed. I can’t wait to bore her with all the details of our whirlwind romance. How Michael reckons he can get me a gig writing for a New York publication, and how his family – who own several bars in the city – are going to ‘Eat me up’, I’m so ‘genuinely Oirish’. What a trip she missed!

  Contentment enveloped my being, and I noticed Michael had settled himself with a copy of the Independent in a large wing-back chair beside a sash window. His profile lit up with the strong lunchtime sun. It was unusually tropical for this time of year; I couldn’t see a cloud in the sky as I looked out over the rooftop garden. And I sat there for a time thinking this was a sign. Yes, the future looked bright once again.

  Noticing I was looking in his direction, Michael tilted his paper and asked, ‘You happy?’

  ‘Very,’ I smiled back, to which he returned a wink and then resumed reading.

  Bloody right I was, I thought. I was in the middle of a fantasy romance novel.

  By Tuesday morning, the euphoric feeling hadn’t waned. If anything, it had exploded into a full-on Hollywood love story starring Hugh Grant and Julia Roberts.

  We’d spent Monday in romantic clinches, knitting hands and talking fantasies and aspirations, and our thoughts on children – which conveniently, we both saw in our future. Thankfully the politics banter passed without us destructing, as we both had a combined hate for George Bush and shared similar views on why Clinton should never have been forced to step down.

  My chronicle of how I queued up at a book signing in Eason’s in Dublin, in the freezing cold for three hours to meet hunky Bill, impressed him. The fact that I broke security to plant a kiss on his cheek, only to hear a week later he went into hospital to have heart surgery, sent him into hysterics, and earned me the new nickname ‘Heart-breaker’.

  OK, so he was doing his utmost to laugh at all my jokes: I didn’t care, I was in heaven. In our nirvana in Primrose Hill, he was my Adam, and I was his, well, Eva. Only he was the one offering up an apple, the Big Apple. And I for sure wanted to take a big bite out of that and to hell with the consequences.

  Thankfully, nobody interrupted our passage of discovery of each other. I had switched off my mobile so neither Maddie nor Parker could convince me to come home. They’d just freak me out and get me to check the wardrobes for bondage gear, and have me standing on chairs to see if the fire alarms contained hidden cameras.

  For peace of mind, I had checked the wardrobes, but found nothing but old snorkelling equipment, a water-bong for smoking hash, some Jenna Jameson DVDs and an old well-thumbed copy of Penthouse magazine. Satisfied I wasn’t going to be imprisoned, to be the victim of a snuff movie, I did my best Eva disappearing act, blocked out the world and let the first man ever to propose to me pamper and adore me.

  Monday night he’d excelled himself as the ultimate educated bachelor, by serving me up an authentic ‘Oirish Stew’.

  ‘Let me wow you, beautiful,’ he urged, as he settled me into a steaming bath with candles, bubbles, a glass of Chablis and an old copy of Vanity Fair with Kate Moss on the cover.

  ‘First relax, and when your feast is prepared, I will come for you. Then we shall eat. And then, hopefully, you will come for me.’ He rolled his eyebrows in a giddy manner, as he carefully articulated each sentence before disappearing off to the kitchen.

  He proved a man of his word. I did relax into the slipper bath with a smell of lavender and rose wafting around the bathroom – though I’m sure it was the Chablis that dangerously aided me off to sleep. Drifting into my sweet slumber I dreamt of Kate holding my hand at the back of a tacky Vegas wedding chapel. ‘Go for it, babes,’ she told me, as she pushed me up the aisle carrying a posy of plastic white roses.

  Surrounded by pensioners in wheelchairs carrying buckets of change, Kate stood at the back like an angel, the epitome of cool dressed in her trademark short-shorts, knee-length boots, a leather waistcoat and Jackie O black shades.

  As I walked towards Michael and a Dolly Parton look-alike singing ‘Islands in the stream’ I questioned whether this was what I really wanted. Turning back to Kate for reassurance, I got a fright when I couldn’t see her. The chapel had now become overrun with the pensioners, who were now bickering and flinging dollar coins at one another.

  ‘Kate, where are you?’ I screamed, frantic for a friend, but she was gone. Instead I woke to Michael standing over me, looking inquisitive.

  ‘Wakey Wakey! Who’s Kate, then?’ He looked disappointed I hadn’t been screaming his name.

  ‘I was dreaming of Kate Moss. She seems to be chasing me. Everywhere I look she’s there,’ I blurted, only semi-conscious, trying to sit up.

  ‘Now, there is a dream combo,’ he smiled, kissing me on the forehead and dropping a towel on the floor. ‘You and Kate Moss, eh? I like the sound of that.’

  His mind full of dirty thoughts, he trotted off happily in the direction of the kitchen.

  By the time I fixed myself up, Michael was waiting for me in the living room with two bowls of piping hot lamb stew. It was so good. The kind mother used to make, evidently, his and mine.

  Stew was soon followed by dessert – Belgian chocolate Häagen-Dazs à la Eva. But not before he got the fire going. His stew could only do so much to warm our bones.

  After the third attempt he had finally managed to light the coals, using rolled-up paper, small sticks and several splashes of Frankie’s sambuca. He was no Crocodile Dundee, but then you can’t be good at everything.

  Leading me by the hand, he positioned me on the floor, close enough to feel just a slight burning on my skin, and using the tip of his right-hand little finger began slipping off the white towelling bathrobe I’d found on the back of the bathroom door.

  Starting at my neck, and working his way down to untie the knot around my waist, he took his time to savour each tender moment. His dark brown eyes dilated with passion. His worn faded jeans swelled. Seeing how horny he had become turned me on even more. God, he was gorgeous.

  As he expertly disrobed me, it was as if he was touching more erogenous zones than I knew I had. Panting with wanton desire, my body tingled with excitement.

  Twitching with arousal, he then painted some melting ice-cream over my extremely pert nipples, the strokes of the cold spoon sending jolts of pleasure through my body and the pleasure-pain factor heightening the eroticism.

  He asked, ‘Does that feel good?’ His voice was now breathy and heavy.

 
‘Oh – so good,’ I replied, my spine arching backwards to the couch as my head tilted away from him, leaving my neck and body exposed.

  Releasing all inhibitions my body sighed ‘Ahhh!’ before Michael cupped his lips around my right nipple and started circling his tongue around my breast.

  ‘Oh, God,’ I whispered. ‘Don’t stop,’ I pleaded, already on the verge of orgasm just from his slightest touch. ‘Yeah – oh, yeah,’ I panted, feeling the intensity build up. ‘Keep going.’ I almost forced his head down lower, my body now grinding in rhythm with Massive Attack’s ‘Karmacoma’, that was playing in the background.

  Feeling empowered I helped direct him to the perfect position to caress my clitoris, and as he thrust his spirited tongue up inside me, using both his hands to massage me, teasing my different hot spots, within seconds I was screaming with laughter, begging him to stop, as my body spasmed out of control.

  ‘JE – SUS!’ I cried, as I lifted off the ground, my eyes stinging with the stimulation, my ears popping as the muscles of my body contracted.

  Without saying anything, Michael stood up, unbuckled his studded leather belt, unbuttoned his jeans and pushed them down with his Calvin Klein boxers in one motion, to reveal his magnificently carved Adonis-impression cock standing tall and looking oh so edible.

  Oh my God, I thought. It was perfect, as if a sculptor had designed it.

  ‘You’re so beautiful,’ he whispered, as he rejoined me on the floor.

  Grabbing my rump with the full of his right hand, the back of my shoulders with his left, he firmly positioned me on all fours, in front of the now roaring fire.

  As he vigorously wrapped his hand around my hair, pulling it tightly back to gain control of me, he gave my right cheek a violent slap. Screaming with ecstasy, I could feel him enter me, asking, ‘Do you like that?’

  Knowing that he hadn’t put on a condom I collapsed to the floor to get away from him, and as I rolled on my back to face him, I did my best porn star expression trying not to lose the moment and said, ‘Sorry, baby, I need a condom.’