by Smith, Skye
"Not today, Randy," said Maya, " but set for a spell and tell us the news of the beach."
Emma squinted her eyes against the sun and then remembered her sunglasses and pulled them down from where they were serving as a hair band. The man was young and handsome and well built. Surfer type. Tanned. Tanned all over. She forced herself to look away. Yeah, sure. Nonchalant. The man had seen her staring and pulled his fanny pack strategically around to the front.
"Bunch of us made some good music last night for sunset. Didn't see you there," said Randy standing again. No sales here. Damn, that was fine womanhood. He would have to go away and calm down again before he could continue his rounds.
Emma watched him saunter away, then she turned to Maya. "His boner. You did that to him on purpose, didn't you?"
"Big, eh? Biggest I've ever seen," Maya giggled. "Listen to me. I'm starting to sound Canajun, eh?" She touched Emma. "I got you both. Deny it."
"Oh, you rotter. That was the closest I've been to sex with a man for a year."
"Well, be careful choosing one off this beach. There's a lot of casual sex going on amongst the regulars, so make sure whoever you choose wears a full body condom." They both started giggling, then chuckling, then laughing, and then rolling in laughter that would not stop, especially when they looked at each other.
"What did you bring for a picnic?" asked Emma when she could finally speak again. She waved to a now flaccid Randy as he circled back with his knapsack of beer and cider.
"Picnic of champions. Leftover sushi, leftover spinach pizza, and a bottle of Prosecco. I put the Prosecco into some designer water bottles so we don't get, like, a stern talking to by the cops."
"There's cops, I mean police, down here?" asked Emma.
"Duh, illegal beer sales, any drug you want, and someone attacking women on the trails. The constables probably bribe the sergeant for the duty. All they do is walk around all day looking at the titties and pussies of university girls." Maya motioned to some empty beer cans leaning against the next log. "Some old Asian guys walk along and pick the empties up, but if the cans and bottles are still there when the cops walk by, they will use them as an excuse to come over and ask us if we have any alcohol."
"But I may know them. I have to leave," said Emma suddenly looking all around and feeling panicky.
"Calm down. Relax and enjoy this sun. You'll get plenty of warning. They walk around in uniform, hoping that will make people think there aren't any undercover cops on the beach."
"There are undercover police too?"
"Naturally. Two that take turns. I'll point them out to you if I see one. Now eat. Here, have some designer water," she said, passing the camouflaged Prosecco.
The picnic and the designer water had made them sleepy so they lay out and snoozed and let the northern sun kiss their skins. Eventually Maya rolled onto her side to face Emma's pudgy body. "Do you mind if I caress you with my aura? I've wanted to try this on someone for a week, but I don't dare try it on men."
"Mmmm, actually I have been feeling you since I took my clothes off. The sun has been kissing and warming my skin from the outside, and you have been kissing and warming my skin from the inside. I'm in heaven."
Maya raised her hand and let it hover an inch above Emma's arm. Then she unfocused her eyes and released her concentration and moved her hand slowly down the outline of Emma's arm. "How did that feel?"
"Very warm on the skin. No, not just the skin. Warm to the bone. Very different from the warm breeze I usually feel flowing through me."
"Do you think my hand concentrates it?"
"Yes, now stop talking and do it some more," whispered Emma. "Ohh, what did you just do? Oh!"
"I matched my aura's color to yours. Brassy gold, with honey overtones." Maya giggled at being reminded of the wine tour she had been taken on through the Castle of Love near Calistoga. "With hints of cassis and strawberry and a chocolate vanilla finish."
"Well, my mind just filled with a brassy light and yes, a smell of honey, but not from my eyes or nose."
"Then shush and enjoy," said Maya and started moving her hand over the rest of Emma's body south of the head. When she came to the pubic mound she hovered a while.
"Don't be naughty," whispered Emma between gasps. God, she hadn't had this exciting a day in longer than she could remember.
"Do you have a growth in your womb?" Maya asked out of the blue, knowing that if this woman had been celibate she could not be pregnant.
"Ovarian cists," replied Emma, and came crashing back to Earth. She felt as if she were in mourning for the sensations of the past few hours - there was nothing like a gynecological question for a buzz kill. She pushed herself onto one elbow, opened her eyes and stared at Maya. "Was that just a fortune teller's guess? How did you know?"
"The color turned to gray, and the smell of, of, I guess fish." Emma wrinkled her nose , and tried not to feel embarassed at the description. But then she realized that had not been Maya's intent. She was just trying to be factual.
"You do realize that I can't allow myself to believe you. I would be a traitor to my profession." Emma looked southwest out toward Vancouver Island in silence. When she spoke again, she changed subjects to the typical thing Canadians talk about, the weather. "That is a big cloud moving over the sun. Let's go before I get chilly."
"Not just yet," complained Maya, "this is the time I come here for. Everyone stands up to dress. I like to walk between them and see if I can sense any auras. Sit a while and think. I won't be long."
"Why not my head?" Emma asked, "With your hand, you never go near to my head."
Maya was standing up and anxious to be walking around. "Like, because this is all experimental with Erik and I. I have no idea what my hand would have done to your head. I didn't want to have to carry you up the trail." She waved and then went to walk by a lovely young couple who were just standing up. She went as close as she could without being obvious. Neither had auras but the man felt hers, with splendidly swollen results. It would give them something to rush home for. If he could get his cargo shorts done up, that is.
* * * * *
* * * * *
MAYA'S AURA - the Awakening by Skye Smith
Chapter 8 - Three years earlier in Kitsilano, Vancouver
Erik turned off the recorder. He was now in the habit of recording all their experiences and typing them up when an impatient Maya wasn't standing around. It worked well because his immediate questions and her answers were included in full for future reference.
"I want to try it out on Alicia," Maya said. She knew that Erik had a dislike for her friend, otherwise she would not have mentioned it.
"I'm not your keeper. I can't stop you," he said irritably. He decided it would be stupid to deny Alicia the use of his house.
"Her aura is nearly dead, like Emma's was. I want to see if I can restore it. It may straighten her out," she explained.
"If Alicia starts hanging around this house, it's going to get sexual. By which I mean a sexual accident may happen."
"I understand." She had already had some close calls with both Erik and Karl, literally. "So what? It could be fun."
"So I want her checked out by an STD clinic. I trust you are both on the pill."
Maya did not lose her temper often, but this slur against her friend had it boiling over immediately. "You, an effing fag say that to me. Where is your STD clearance?"
Erik was shocked by such words coming from her angelic mouth. "Point taken. We will all go to the clinic."
"How can I tell her that? She'll never speak to me again."
"So it's a win, win then." He quickly raised his arm to block her slap. "You'll think of something." She walked away into her room to use the phone. He smirked to himself, pleased that he might never have to put up with Alicia again.
His smirk faded when she came back and told her that Alicia had agreed. "So, who in Kits does makeovers?"
"What, I know a, uh, woman, that specializes in it. Why?"
"Because you are paying for a makeover for me and Alicia. That is how I talked her into getting checked. She couldn't resist. She is on her way to the clinic as we speak."
"But..."
"But what?"
"Okay, I'll call Gerry and set it up."
"Wait, one more call," she said and ran back to her phone.
"The little minx. It was a bluff and I fell for it," he thought and then chuckled.
She came back. "Make the appointment for any evening this week or next except for this Friday, and make it for three. Emma's coming." She looked at his expression. "Don't worry, she's paying for her own."
* * *
Twenty-four hours later almost to the minute, Erik shut the recorder off after hearing about Maya's first day of experiments with Alicia.
"So your hand does focus your aura, and your aura does amplify other auras. You were right. I was wrong. We should be using Alicia. She can be our neutral control."
"Don't forget the chocolate. I had her eat some of her ethnic chocolate to make her aura stand out enough so that I could reach it. That's a first. Usually I reach it through initially raising the sexual sensuality. That must mean something for your research, like, that it has something to do with chemicals in the brain, and not just the throbbing in your boner."
He turned the recorder on again and told her to repeat it. Then he asked her what ethnic chocolate was.
"Alicia is AmeriMex. Her family came from the Yucatan. That is how we first met and became friends in high school. Get it? Yucatan, Maya. One of the food treats in the Yucatan is, like, this raw dark chocolate mixed with cayenne pepper. Anyway, I've always been told that dark chocolate, like, effects a woman’s brain like sex, and that cayenne opens all the little blood vessels in your body. It worked. I didn't need to get her sexually stimulated to find enough of her aura to build on."
"I'm sorry. You seem to have leaped beyond my understanding," said Erik. "Are you saying that if a person has any slight aura, even one created by a sex urge, then you can... what... nurture it."
"Your word was amplify," she said, enjoying rolling it off her tongue syllable by syllable. "It's a good word. Why don't we stick to, like, broadcasting words, because that is what I am doing. Don't you get it? I am broadcasting. Like a radio station. When I find another signal I lock in and try to improve reception."
"I, I, I...."
"You've been too busy recording and making graphs. I think you are missing the point." She held up her hand. " Not only can I amplify another aura, but, like, I can focus my own. I mean ,like, so far it's just through my hand. Maybe my chest is, like, just pushing it out through my hand. I don't know. My chest is a lot bigger than my hand."
She felt the urge to tease him by holding her breasts, but he had his eyes closed thinking. "Maybe if you took all the aura from a big area like my chest, and squished it into a small area like my hand, the aura would get stronger. Like, isn't there some engineering formula for that."
"Yes a simple one, but... "
"Do the auras you feel have odors? I mean not through your nose."
"Not that I have noticed, but..."
"You need to stop practicing with me and playing on your computer, and start practicing with Alicia."
"I don't care for her company," he said and crossed his arms.
"Why not? She's a nice person."
"Really....?"
Maya could feel a good, satisfying mad coming on. "Look Erik, I think you're getting pissy with me because I'm taking off on this aura thing and leaving you behind with your stupid computer, and now you're just taking it out on Alicia."
"Well, she has no manners. It's gross just watching her eat. She's a lowlife slut."
"Oh, blow it out your ear," seethed Maya. "She grew up in a family of illiterate migrant agricultural workers. She is the first one in their entire family that has made it to university. You tell me how she was supposed to learn manners."
"I thought you Americans put illiterate migrant agricultural workers on a pedestal like they were the coming of Jesus," he spat back.
"Huh, talk sense."
"Isn't the American folk hero the cowboy, you know, the illiterate migrant ..."
Maya had to hold her temper back. This was getting destructive. "Oh stop. If you don't like her manners, then learn her more better."
He started to correct her English, but then realized she was toying with him. "Okay, but you must help. She won't take instruction from me. I will teach you manners when she's around, and hopefully she'll take it in." He smiled at her, hoping her anger was over. A change in subject seemed in order. "By the way, what degree is she going after at U.B.C.?"
"Her MRS." Maya replied.
"Huh"
"Never mind."
* * * * *
* * * * *
Emma parked the Jetta on Fourth street, and the three of them walked past a deli-bakery that was overly popular with high-maintenance, middle-aged women whose only purpose in life seemed to be shopping. Gerry's Makeoverium was behind it.
Gerry turned out to be a woman who was six two or three in her stocking feet, which were shoved into size twelve heels, and she wore scarlet lipstick and a high collar to keep you from wondering about her Adam's apple. She greeted them all at the door, and ushered them through in a gust of Giorgio of Beverly Hills.
"Oh darlings! How sweet, you're fashionably early. Come in, come in. Erik has told me all about you, that dog! Prosecco?" He waved to another woman in gold stretch tights and a tunic. "Prosecco all around, and get Deirdre on the phone."
He had them all sit on the couch and then he asked each what they were trying to achieve with their makeover.
"I want to look more desirable to men, but less slutty," said Alicia.
"I want to look more feminine. I need a man," said Emma.
"I am tired of looking fifteen," said Maya.
The Prosecco arrived with the phone. Gerry grabbed the phone. "Deirdre, is that you?
Where are you dear, you promised.
Yes, they are here early.
Well. A hippie fairy - no dear, Tinkerbelle not Peter - who doesn't shave her legs.
A Latina. Selma Hyak has a lot to answer for. A Jap princess.
No, the other kind of Jap. She'll take the most work.
Five minutes. Make it so, Number One."
Gerry waitied with the women, and sat demurely despite the short skirt. Of course, any skirt would look short on those long legs. She sipped at her Prosecco. "I trust that you, Maya, wish to remain a blonde. What about you two? You are both ruining the health your hair keeping your roots colored. May I suggest giving your hair a respite and turn it back to dark? I have some leave-in conditioner that will restore its silkiness, so long as you don't dye it again for say, three months."
"I have no objections," said Emma, "I have been worried about how dry and brittle it is getting. Every cut I have is shorter."
"Well, these days with the leave-ons," said Gerry silkily, "it is just as easy to keep long hair as short, easier in fact." She fluffed at her hair. " I never used to be able to grow it long, but now look how lustrous it is. I tried out for a TV commercial but they had no imagination. I told them that my clients weren't impressed by seeing how good fifteen-year-old models look. They wanted to see how it worked for real people. I was too real, I suppose."
Alicia had been listening and watching, trying to see an Adam's apple jump. "Okay, dark for me too. I don't have the money for professional streaking any more, anyway. I need to be able to look good without going to the beauty parlor."
"Amen to that," encouraged Maya.
"Ah, here is Deirdre. She will be waxing you. Come, I will show you into your room. I trust you want to share a room. There are robes and magazines. Take your wine. Deirdre will start on your nether bits so that you can be decently covered when we start on your hair."
* * * * *
* * * * *
"So, how did it go?" asked Erik as they walked through his f
ront door. Then he realized that was a really stupid thing to say to women just in from the beauty parlor, and decided to rephrase it to, "You look fabulous. Oh my, and you are done earlier than I expected."
Emma was smiling ear to ear. "Look at these," she said. "Gerry has gone high tech." She pulled a folder of photo prints from under her arm and spread them across the dining room. "He feeds digital pictures of you into a computer and then has a software package that corrects the image for dress size and then pastes various fashions into place. See, if I had seven hundred dollars for that formal gown, that is what I would look like."
"Ooh, take me to the opera," oozed Erik. He gave an appraising look to her makeover photo. Emma's real hair colour was a lovely chocolate brown, and it naturally suited her hazel eyes and warmed her skin colour.
"The photos are to give me an idea of the cut and color of clothes I should be looking for. Look at this one. Green. I own nothing green. I hadn't realized how much my fake blonde hair was limiting me."
"Well, talk Maya into taking you on a round of the local thrift and consignment stores. She has a good eye for cut, color and bargains."
"I can afford new," Emma said, in a bit of a huff.
"But you may not find those styles new," Erik defended himself. "Frankly I think the current styles are crap. They are lacking in femininity, no not femininity, romance. You can either look like a fifteen-year-old tramp, or a seventy-year-old grandmother, but there is not much out there for the rest of you."
"You sound like Gerry," said Alicia, spreading her photos out. Not one of the photos had her dressed in her usual uniform of jeans and a t-shirt. She looked appealingly pretty with her shiny black hair, and just a touch of makeup to play up her dark eyes. She had on a tunic top in a warm coral colour, over some dark capris. "I for sure have to go shopping with Maya." She looked at her photos again. "You know, that Gerry is a master. His whole thing is to make you look good with the minimum amount of daily prepping. That means a minimum amount of time, and makeup, and money.
That tip of his about putting white toothpaste on my zits and letting it dry to suck out the infection, is going to save me a fortune in zit medicine."