Romance: The Art of my Love: a story of betrayal, desire, love, and marriage

by Altbridge, Tanya

  At first we talked about tennis. Paul and John told funny stories about their matches together. I added that the match I had seen at the club had been unforgettable.

  “Do you play tennis, Emmy?” Rachel asked.

  “No, I don’t play anything. But I really like watching tennis. What about you?” I asked in turn.

  “I do yoga, and I love it. It’s good for your body, and also for your head. It helps me clean out my brain.”

  “Really? How so?”

  “Well, when you’re bent into a pretzel and standing on one leg, it’s hard to keep your balance unless you can focus on just what is happening in that very moment, and banish all other thoughts from your brain. Believe me, banishing unnecessary thoughts from your brain is a wonderful, wonderful thing,” Rachel smiles.

  “Oh, I believe you! I’d love to try it.”

  “Then why not? Shall we go together Monday evening? Seven o’clock?”

  I feel like I’ve been given the best gift ever. Rachel has invited me to go to yoga with her! Yes, yes, of course I’d go to yoga. I would follow this woman to the ends of the earth if she asked me. Wow. I’ve never experienced anything like this before. She definitely had put something in the food.

  “Where did you learn to cook this dish?” I ask. “It’s really delicious. I’ve never had anything like it.”

  “In Spain. I learned from the mother of my boyfriend at the time.”

  Rachel tells us how she spent several years in Europe, studying European art and doing all sorts of odd jobs.

  “There’s nothing we won’t do, when we’re young, to feed ourselves. I even spent some time acting for porn films. It paid pretty well,” she added, serenely.

  I choke on my paella, and Paul slowly blushes with his scarlet flush. I realize that he is imagining Rachel in a porno scene. I realize this because I had been imagining it, too, which is why I choked.

  I abruptly rise from the table, ask where the bathroom is, and go. I clear my throat as best I can, and splash my face with cold water. I can feel my cheeks burning. When I leave the bathroom I’m in a hallway where the walls are decorated with black and white photographs. In them is a gorgeous naked woman, very close up. Only individual parts of her body are visible at a time, a narrow neck and loose lock of hair in one picture, a hand covering a breast in another. As I examine those pictures, my cheeks start burning again, and my head begins to spin a little.

  “Everything all right?” John’s voice comes from behind me. “You disappeared, and I thought I should organize a search party.”

  “Everything’s fine. I’m just looking at these photographs. They’re very beautiful, very unusual.” And erotic, I add mentally.

  “Do you really like them? I took them. Rachel is the model. I have a friend who’s a cameraman, and he taught me how to use the camera. Rachel agreed to pose for me. I’m happy with how they turned out.”

  “You really took these yourself? They’re great. Professional work,” I praise him, impressed.

  “It’s twice as nice to hear that from you. Paul told us you’re an artist. If you like, I can photograph you sometime. You seem very photogenic to me.”

  Slowly, slowly, I turn around to face John. He’s much taller than I am. And it turns out he is standing closer than I thought he was. I have to tilt up my head. John looks at me calmly and intently, and I feel something deep in my guts freeze.

  I’m... photogenic? John was offering to take my picture. In the photographs on the wall in that hallway, Rachel wore no clothing. Was he offering to photograph me without my clothes on, too? Mingling with the smell of paella from the kitchen I get a distinct whiff of danger, and something else, something that would break the rules. And I feel drawn to it, to that danger and rule-breaking. What had happened to my eternal wariness and shyness? I think Rachel really had put something in our food. Something that was making me feel sexy, think sexy, and want sex.

  John ran a finger over my cheekbone.

  “You have very soft skin. And these freckles. And such mysterious, Oriental eyes.”

  “My grandmother was Chinese. Real Chinese, from China,” I offer, lamely.

  John’s touch again awakens in me those same strong feelings, unfamiliar and incomprehensible. Diana’s prediction that John and I would have amazing sex together springs into my head.

  “You mean there’s such a thing as fake Chinese people?” The expression on John’s face remains almost unchanged, with just one corner of his mouth lifting a bit into a smile.

  John turns me around to face in the direction of the living room, places a hand on my back, and gently propels me forward. I move as if in a dream.

  On the way home, Paul and I speak only of John and Rachel. What a beauty she is, how well she cooks, how nicely everything smelled, and what an amazing home they have.

  “It’s the house of my dreams!” I declare.

  And we talk (well, Paul does) about what a great tennis player John is and what a generous friend, because he has agreed to help Paul with his screenplay.

  Rachel’s revelation that she had been a porn actress, and my conversation with John and his offer to photograph me, we do not discuss. I can’t make up my mind to tell Paul what sort of impact John’s physical presence has on me. I don’t want to ruin their friendship. Paul wouldn’t be happy to know that his new friend gets me so worked up. I’m not happy about it myself. Well, no, to be more exact, I’m not used to it. It’s really not typical for me. It isn’t just that he physically arouses me. When he’s nearby, goosebumps start to creep over my skin from this feeling of approaching danger. He scares me and turns me on at the same time!

  Late that night, at home, in bed, I toss and turn for a long time. I can’t fall asleep. Paul turns toward me, embraces me, kisses me, strokes my head and whispers something into my hair. Eventually, I do fall asleep. I dream about Rachel, naked. The wind tousles her auburn hair. John bows his head and looks me in the eye.

  “Close your eyes and don’t be afraid,” he says.

  I close my eyes, and disappear down into sleep.

  Chapter 6. Rachel and Sex

  Monday evening, Rachel takes me to yoga. The studio is dimly lit and there are mirrors. Soft, calming music is playing. I settle myself in quietly in the back row. I try not to look at myself in the mirror, so I don’t lose my nerve and sneak away. Rachel, on the other hand, is standing in the first row, right in front of the instructor. I can’t take my eyes off of her. I am simply spellbound by the way this woman moves. The class is full of people who are obviously not beginners. I start to get ideas about how I could draw them all as bendy trees, in some sort of pre-dawn haze. I don’t care that I can’t manage half the poses. The esthetic pleasure far exceeds my physical discomfort. And in the end, when we’re lying in corpse pose and meditating, a feel of complete ease and well-being comes over me.

  After class, Rachel and I go to the café in the gym. Rachel says that they make excellent smoothies.

  “Paul said you paint professionally. Would you show me some of your work?” Rachel asks, unexpectedly.

  “Yes. I always wanted to be an artist. Just now, at yoga, what I wanted most was not to exercise, but to paint the people who were exercising. It could turn out to be really interesting.”

  “Did you know that I own a gallery in the city? We show young artists quite often,” Rachel says. The news astonishes me. My face must have given me away, because she smiles. “Don’t worry. I have absolutely no suspicion that you’re trying to get to know me out of your own pecuniary interests. I invited you here myself, right?”

  “Right. When it comes to pecuniary interests, I’m in bad shape. That’s why I have to teach. I can’t sell my work,” I admit.

  “So come in and see me. We’ll take a look. Maybe I can help. And I like your idea about the yoga paintings.”

  I must look completely shocked, because Rachel starts to laugh. I relax and start to laugh with her.

  “Have you and Paul been together lo
ng?” she asks suddenly.

  “Five years. We’ve been married for two. What about you and John?”

  “About fifteen. John is an amazing man, one of a kind.” Rachel even closes her eyes on that last pronouncement, to emphasize just how unique her husband is. Out of the blue I remember the photographs on the wall in their house. And my conversation with John.

  “How so?” The question bursts out of me. What does Rachel see in him that’s so one-of-a-kind? I mean, she must have had lots of experience with men before John, unlike me.

  “Well, to be honest...” Rachel starts. She is looking at me closely, as if asking for permission to speak openly. I nod almost unnoticeably, giving that permission.

  “For me, all men fall into one of two categories. Those who most of all seek pleasure for themselves when they’re intimate with a woman, and those who actually get turned on by a woman obtaining pleasure from being intimate with them. John is a champion in that second category. He has some sort of sixth sense with respect to women. He always knows what we need, and he can even guess how to give us pleasure before we figure it out ourselves.”

  Rachel has a dreamy expression on her face. She must be remembering receiving all of that pleasure she’s talking about with such relish. It’s strange how she is using the plural. Why isn’t she saying “give ME pleasure”?

  “What about Paul?” Now she was talking to me. “Which category is he in? He’s so wonderful, but also so shy. I like him very much.”

  “Honestly, it’s hard for me to judge. I don’t really have anyone to compare him to,” I admit, for some reason. The words fly out under their own power. I don’t even have time to think twice or be embarrassed. “And I like him very much, too.”

  I find that I simply have to add that last phrase. To stake my claim on Paul.

  “But what about pleasure? Do you have orgasms with him?” she asks bluntly.

  I’m thrown off track by this sudden lack of ceremony. Even with Paul I don’t talk about things like this. Of course I have orgasms, the quiet, gentle kind. My physical sensations and my feelings for Paul are located in different planes. I try to explain, get confused, and start to stammer and blush.

  “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to embarrass you,” Rachel interrupts me. “I’m terribly tactless sometimes, really.”

  Immediately, I feel better. I’m so glad she said it herself! Like any quiet introvert, I feel totally awkward when people ask questions that are too personal, or want to know more about me than I’m willing to say. I always have a hard time getting myself out of situations like that. And as a rule, I try to avoid the people who put me in those situations. I like Rachel, and deep inside, I am flattered by her attention and her interest. Only why was this interest of hers so concentrated on my sex life? Somewhere in my gut, that inexplicable feeling of approaching danger appears again. Meanwhile, Rachel is still talking about sex, but I only catch the end of what she’s saying.

  “I prefer a powerful, explosive orgasm, when you forget everything in the world except for that minute. It’s a little like yoga, with a great deal more satisfaction. Of course, everyone is different, and we need different things from intimacy. Forgive me, please, for starting into this topic. I can see you’re uncomfortable with this kind of conversation, but we girls just need to talk things over sometimes, don’t you think?” I nod silently. I don’t want to make any excuses, but I’m just not ready yet to discuss the intimate details of my life with her.

  “Anyway, why don’t you stop by my gallery this week?” Rachel suddenly changes the subject. “You show me your work, we’ll have some coffee, and I’ll introduce you to Tom. He’s my assistant. A fascinating person. I know you’ll like him.”

  The whole way home, I think about what a strange, erotic effect this couple has on me. John definitely physically arouses me, and Rachel does, too. Looking at her, you understand that sex is a central part of her life, and that she enjoys it enormously.

  When I get home, the only light on is in the kitchen. Paul must be working, I think, trying to walk down the hall as quietly as possible. A female moan sounds out from the kitchen. What could that be? Carefully, I sneak up behind the door, and I freeze. Paul is sitting before the computer. His head is bent. He is biting his lower lip. His eyes are half closed. And I suddenly realize that he is masturbating, watching his computer screen. That’s where the woman’s moans are coming from. I’m scared to go further in to get a glimpse of the screen. I want to watch Paul without him noticing me. His arousal suddenly transfers over to me. I slip my hand inside my pants and start to caress myself. Paul is already close to finishing. He is breathing hard and moaning. I watch him, and I am also quickly coming to a peak. We come at almost the same time. I slide down the wall in the hallway and crouch there for a while, catching my breath. Then I sneak over to the front door and start to make some noise, as if I had just come in.

  Much later that night, when Paul had long since fallen asleep, I go into the kitchen and open the laptop. I really want to know what turned Paul on so much (and me, too, at a remove). Maybe I should also be downloading those sorts of movies and watching them once in a while, especially when I wanted to beat back my lust for other people’s husbands. I open the file that Paul had been watching. Rachel is there on the screen. She’s very young, but it’s definitely her. Two men are pleasuring her at once, and Rachel comes, and comes, and comes. I manage to come a couple of times myself while I watch.

  This is all very strange, hard to understand, and it’s not at all like me. I don’t like porn and normally, I don’t watch it. No, I don’t judge people who do. It just never turned me on before. I even thought it was a little disgusting to watch these naked strangers, pretending, for the money, that they like each other so much. All their moaning and shouting had always seemed unnatural to me. And the situation itself, in which the woman is just an object used to scratch an itch and satisfy lust, seemed degrading to me, offensive to my womanly honor.

  In this video, though, Rachel doesn’t look like an object for satisfying lust. Instead, she’s the center of everything that is happening. For her partners, her satisfaction is paramount. And judging from her response, they are able to provide her absolutely unbelievable amounts of pleasure. Rachel, in her long minutes of passion, is even more beautiful than she is in ordinary times. Her whole body shines, radiating happiness. You wouldn’t call her a sex slave so much as a sex priestess. Her orgasm really is powerful and explosive.

  Diana had told me long ago that all men watch porn these days. And it’s a good thing they do, she thinks, because otherwise there’d be no living with them. But I had never before seen that expression on Paul’s face. I hadn’t even known that he watched things like that, though I probably should have guessed. And that was what had so seriously turned me on. The fact that I had watched the video without Paul knowing, on the sly, like something illegal and forbidden, only heightened my sensations, I think. At the same time I was incredibly ashamed about what I was doing. I hardly ever get myself off. I don’t like to do it. There’s something wrong about it, something perverse, though I can’t say exactly what. I know for sure that my grandmother wouldn’t have approved if she had ever caught me doing it. Not to mention watching porn.

  Chapter 7. At Rachel’s Gallery

  At the end of the week I go right from school to Rachel’s gallery downtown. A few of my recent paintings, the ones I like the best, are in the trunk of my car, along with a folder of watercolors and some sketches inspired by yoga. I had decided to bring them because Rachel is in them. They show her the way I saw her at yoga and in the video: free, uninhibited, graceful, and feminine. I’m curious about how she will respond.

  At the gallery, I am met by Tom, the “aid of all trades,” as he introduces himself. Tom is about my age. He has a fairly exotic look: hair in two shades of pink contrasting with his almost black, bushy eyebrows and big green eyes behind the round lenses of thick glasses. He is wearing a little makeup and many, many small e
arrings. There are skinny jeans stretched over his long, lank legs, and a white dress shirt neatly tucked in. A brightly colored tie makes his outfit complete. And he is wearing a pair of Converses. Tom reminds me of some sort of fairy-tale bird. He is very sweet, polite, and quite the dandy. It would be practically impossible to make the wrong guess about his sexual orientation.

  The gallery is decorated in the same minimalist way as Rachel and John’s home. Rachel obviously prefers that sort of style. The place itself is not large, but it seems bigger thanks to the windows covering one entire wall, the light-colored wooden floors and light, almost white, walls, all hung with pictures.

  Rachel has not arrived yet, and Tom offers me some coffee. We talk about this and that. Tom, it turns out, is a computer expert and a professional graphic designer. Right now he is working on a website for Rachel’s gallery.

  I hear footsteps behind me, and Rachel walks in. She looks as impressive as ever. Today she is wearing a narrow brick-colored dress, sleeveless, which emphasizes every curve of her body, and just the right amount of makeup. She moves with almost feline grace. Simply looking at her is a treat. I don’t want to be like Rachel, myself, and that’s not possible anyway. Wrong height, wrong size breasts, hair too short, dark and curly. I have a narrow face, and slanting but bright-colored eyes, which especially stand out against my dark hair and eyebrows. My nose turns up at the end and it is covered with freckles that spread on my cheekbones. And my mouth is completely unlike Rachel’s – not so large or generous. The main differences are not external, though. Rachel moves through life with pleasure, confidence, and relish. I can’t explain it in words, but there is a fire inside her, an internal light, the kind I’ve read about in books but I’ve never had the luck to see in real life. But wait… I saw that fire reflected in Paul’s face, when I caught him at the computer.