“Nietzsche . . .”
“So you know it—”
“I heard you say it once before. When we first met. At the Giubbe Rosse. You said it then to your friends.”
“Ah, sì.”
“You want to hear one of my favorites?”
“Tell me.”
“ ‘In dreams, everything is possible.’ ”
“Ah, yes. So deep down in that Spanish soul, you may be a romantic, too?”
“Of course I am a romantic!” And I belch it like a ham, overcooking it for effect. “I am Catalan! And I am an artist!”
“Bravo, yes. Like Miró. Picasso. Gaudí. And Dalí.”
“I like the company. Gracias.”
“De nada.”
“Actually, that is what I was doing when you rescued me this afternoon.”
“What were you doing?”
“Dreaming that I was an eagle.”
“En serio?” she asks.
“Sí.”
“That says a lot about you.”
“What?”
“Allora—I once took a class about indigenous cultures,” she says. “In some native philosophies, each animal has ‘medicine’—special attributes, a lesson for us. An Eagle can be free and follow its heart; it can fly above the mundane into the light that is always available for those who seek illumination. Troppo pesante—too heavy?”
“Too beautiful—if there is such a thing. I want to live life by those words—starting now. Grazie, Carlotta. Is there an animal for you? Close to your spirit?”
She pauses. “Perhaps,” she says with a guarded smile.
“Tell me. Per favore. Which?”
“Maybe. Someday . . . when I get to know you better—”
“This might be a way to do that—”
“A girl has to retain some mystery, doesn’t she?”
“Amore,” I say finally, and it feels good to express it, “you have been the most mysterious person I have ever come in contact with.”
“Good,” she says, prideful.
“A hint?”
“Someday. Amore . . .”
It is time—of course. To kiss her the very first time. If she will have me. But something is holding me back. Not fear. But introspection. Perhaps the eagle discussion has brought it on. I don’t know. But I stand up and return to the bow and gaze out over the edge. After several moments, I slowly spin back around and face her. She is still sitting there by the forward mast.
“Why me?” I ask.
“What do you mean?”
“Why have you chosen me?”
“Who said I have chosen you?” She laughs then. I do, too, but less so. She rises to her feet and steps softly toward me. “What I mean to say is, your life brought us together. My life brought us together. There was no choosing.”
“But you accepted my soul’s invitation,” I remind her. “When I was trying to paint you from memory in my studio and couldn’t get your eyes.”
“Yes. I did.”
“You did not have to.”
“I know.”
“And here we are.”
“Yes, here we are . . . Do you want to fuck me?”
I’m surprised by her blunt vulgarity, but she has a caustic sense of humor, with her own brand of irreverence that blends, if not aligns harmoniously, with mine.
“Where I come from, to fuck also means to deceive. And no—I don’t want to deceive you.”
“Where do you come from?”
“New York. You know that.”
“But I thought you came from here—”
“I was raised here, in Mallorca, but until I met you I was living in New York. And New York stays with you. No matter where you are. Like most places do, but more so. New York is a more so city, in every way.”
“I understand. Tell me about your friends—”
“In New York? They’re all jackasses.”
“Maybe time to get some new friends.”
“I know.”
“In the kingdom of the jackasses, the ass is king.”
We share the laugh. “Very clever. Well, you got me. I’m an ass.”
“I set you up.”
“I know.”
“You know about the kingdom of the blind?”
“Yes, of course. One-eyed men are kings. And what of the kingdom of the whores?”
She laughs. “Tell me—”
“The broke one is queen.”
“Well, perhaps you don’t know this about me, but—I’m broke.”
We collapse into each other with a ferocity reserved for decades-old unrequited lovers, in the García Márquez mold.
We are greedy for each other. The hunger is palpable. The avarice undeniable. But we take it easy. We have all the tick-tocks in the world. I taste her flesh. Her lobes. Her lips. Fistfuls of sun-splashed chestnut hair. The softest mounds of voluptuous tissue swallowed nearly whole. Tongue trails feather up the inner thighs. There’s gentleness. Mania. Delicate, deliberate preambles to full-body, harsher erotic pursuits. We can’t get enough, but restraint rules. Anticipation mixed with playful and tormenting arousal. Driving each other jungle-wild. She seems to know me. What pleases me. And I know her, somehow, some way. This sensorial tease is an instinctual pact, signed without a whisper. At long last. The candle burns beside us, and our movements are glowing shapes.
There is no artifice, no pretending. Smooth, heated petals unfold, flow, and gush a fragrant signature saliva. The festival for a maestro. Perhaps his finest hour. A legato tongue-tip massage spiked with staccato bursts. A precise tempo combined with dashes of purposeful pause. A formula deciphered, discovered, then administered to overkill. Merciless. With timely supplemental explorations to accentuate the writhing, the arching back, pitches and twists, resounding shrieks, bounces, and stutters as if to a bumpy road. Until it can take no more. Curves capitulate, reversing back with a jolt to a hip-swivel over and to the side. A death to the cycle. One of a hopeful many. For us both. Labored breaths die into the pillow and become nothing . . .
We are greedy to please each other.
“I think I’m in love with you, Carlotta.”
She says nothing, but her actions scream a response. Reciprocity is on her mind, though it’s no requirement. Grateful swollen lips descend in a machine gun of kisses, each one lighter than the next. And farther down to the sensitive skin, arriving at a longing waist. And onward. The engorged member stabs away beneath her chin. It’s something she must address. And soon. Or I’ll go out of my fucking mind. It’s jungle-wild, all right. My thoughts of what could come. She kisses it atop, then lower. She trails down the shaft carefully, cautiously, holding it at the base while treating it like a fragile piece of parchment from centuries ago. Her hands cup the soft stones and massage them until they vanish in her mouth. One. Then the other. All the while her hands grip and massage. Kisses rise up, and she buries the head in her wet mouth while her hand now cups the stones. It disappears altogether from sight, and my eyeballs roll in reverse. She takes a while, she lives it, she owns it. She gets more proactive, up and down, a rise and fall, her hair strewn across my pelvis tickling me, too. She takes even more time and gets to know its every nuance. What was unknown is now known, and knowing she has that knowledge is equally enthralling. She rises up and away and looks at me and offers the slightest shake of the head.
She falls back in slow motion and gently tugs my hand. I see her splayed there, her gorgeous legs parted, her head lying peacefully on the pillow, her eyes glazed and at half-mast. “Make love to me.”
I let my chest land softly upon hers and feel her breasts pressed against me. I kiss her warmly, then with everything I have. And she returns it. She nudges me on the shoulder again, and I pull back and smile at her lovingly. To which she nods. The tip goes first and I leave it there; it’s time for her to experience jungle-wild. She half-smiles, aware of my plays, my pauses, now. But I will not. Her hands descend my back, and she covers my cheeks with her palms and applies pressure for
ward. I acquiesce partially, meeting her halfway, and she lets out something guttural, the sound heard from caves to bedrooms for tens of thousands of years. I’m done with my hesitations, and I let it go and let it swim freely all the way to the end. And the pace remains slow for a long while, until I am directed otherwise. But I am not. Not for a while. And we kiss deeply through it all.
The easy all-senses-saturated pace is preferred. Until it is not. Now a double tap to the shoulder informs me.
Legs pretzel around me, and I let it ride hard and fast until our stomachs are slapping each other, until I need to pause so as not to let fly so soon. I wait, and we kiss and pant and laugh, and it’s all far beyond the farthest side of beautiful. Until I get another soft shoulder tap and I march on like a dutiful soldier and I feel my lower back and ass being carved and shredded. And the combination of pain and pleasure defines itself. But it’s not all about her or all about me, it’s about us, and like a conductor to a symphony, I slow down instinctually once again, and the change is welcomed and sealed with more deep kisses, heads writhing and twisting back and forth at maximum lip pressure. She bites my lip and we taste the blood and I feel her swallow it and then I treat myself to the greatest gift of all. I raise my head back and look deeply into her eyes. The room is shadowed so I can’t see the twin emeralds firing, but I can make out her expression as I plunge inside her again and again and again. Just to see her eyes registering what is happening below, the privacy of it, the intimacy, the unique profundity, is a source of unfathomable joy—my absolute favorite thing.
Her hands nudge my shoulders to back away, to put me on pause. As I back away, glorious curves spin beneath me until the gorgeous backside is facing me, and she rises up, perching herself on all fours. I comply but soon after receive a slap to my ass like a crop to a horse. A request for more thrust. I grasp her shoulders for balance, then brace her hips and proceed like a battering ram. Methods are condoned and appreciated. She indicates a preference for an even deeper intimacy to bolster our mounting secrets, and the moans and cries indicate we have arrived at what may satisfy her most. Severe domination is welcome, the harsher the better. I clutch her breasts and knead them like two loaves of bread as I hammer away. I change grip and pull her to me, to the rhythm of my forward thrusts. I cannot hold back. It’s all too much, and I suddenly begin to shudder. And I succumb and cry out. I withdraw and reverse. The searing milk flies forth and covers her beautiful ass.
We lie back awhile, sufficiently exhausted, and say nothing. I feel irritation if not pain in places. She has left marks. I have left welts. We spin in and kiss lightly. I think she is smiling in the dark but can’t be sure. The candle’s flame went out a short while ago. We have scratched and clawed and ground ourselves down to the bare mattress, the twists of sheets nowhere to be found. A loving sexual greed at its finest. Rarest. Chemicals deep in the gut have been altered. Forever. For me certainly. For her, too, I believe.
Before passing out, I have an idea. “Let’s make love to the sunrise.”
“Hmmm?” I hear her groan. “Sunrise?”
“When the orange, fuchsia, pink, and violet fuse together we can greet it. Wouldn’t that be fine?”
“It would be quite an accomplishment,” she says with a yawn.
But I am thrashed and depleted. And in the groggiest of fogs. I desperately need to pass out and recharge. After all, this is merely day one.
WHEN I AWOKE, I saw the chandelier first. Then the moldings. Pricey, unoriginal paintings adorned the walls of an immaculate, luxurious room. Confused, I scanned the bedside table and found a notepad with the Ritz-Carlton Hotel letterhead. I popped out of bed and stubbed my toe on the carpet while sauntering unevenly to the nearest window. I looked at the view of Central Park, and below at the passing cars. I had indeed been an overnight guest at the venerable hotel.
I heard the shower blasting then, at the other end of the suite. I passed several suitcases splayed open, each blossoming with jeans and dresses and sprouting more brassieres and panties. I spotted the shimmering black Léger gown draped over a club chair.
The noise of the shower came to a halt. Julia emerged soon after in a cloud of mist, her head wrapped in a towel turban. She was startled when she saw me standing there. “Whoops, you scared me. Morning, baby—”
“Buenos días . . .”
“You okay?”
“Uh, uh, yeah. A little disoriented.”
“I ordered your favorite—huevos rancheros. They should be here shortly.” She was rushing to get dressed, and it took all of a minute. “My car is waiting for me. I’m late! We start shooting in an hour in Brooklyn.”
“Shooting what?” I asked.
And she was at the door already. “A Chanel ad . . . See you!”
Just like that, she left.
I collapsed in the club chair. I wasn’t feeling well. It was a combination of anxiety and perhaps paranoia. I heard a knock on the door, and I rose and ambled over to answer it. I wasn’t hungry, but I would, at the very least, take Julia’s breakfast order. I opened the door, and to add to the morning of surprises, it was Julia once more. She had a panicky buzz in her eyes.
“I need to ask you. Did you dream of that girl again last night? Carlotta?”
There was a beat of silence between us, as I did not know how to answer. I looked into Julia’s eyes, which reflected her hurried morning. Yet there was something else distilled in there, too, almost a nervousness or even a hint of jealousy. This was important to her, and so was my response.
“Yes. I did.”
She looked me squarely in the face, and I saw something die in her piercing violet eyes. And with that, she emitted a sigh that sounded like the last breath leaving her body. She wasn’t in any hurry now. Her emotional receptors, so refined and highly developed, had been overloaded. She looked as if the arrow of hurt had bypassed her heart and pierced her soul. Nodding sparely, she pivoted and walked down the hall without uttering another word.
As I saw her slip into the elevator, I knew we would never be together again, at least in that way. There would be no more liaisons of mutual convenience or late-night invitations. She now saw my nocturnal interlude as a transgression of sorts, despite the fact that we had just engaged in the most profound and intimate levels of sexual activity, resulting in our best sex yet. But she also perceived—as I had—that I had been making exploratory love with someone else, not her. That was the peak of insult. And perhaps humiliation.
I called reception for a razor, and when it arrived, I luxuriated in steamy hydrotherapy under the expansive showerhead. As I imagined a jungle rain cascading upon me, I tried to piece the evening back together.
I remembered too many details, and that indicated one thing and one alone. I had been with Carlotta after all. I could not explain it in real-life terms, other than there must be a parallel universe at play. Because Carlotta and I had been together. Of that I was certain. I knew everything about her, right down to her personal biological scents. Hot flashes of memory hit me as I dried off and shaved, and the more I remembered, the more vivid the specifics of the evening became. On that boat. In the Cala de Deià. When Carlotta saved me at sea. When we made love for the first time.
I got dressed, and as I lifted my jacket, the baggie full of Molly Boy “vitamins” fell to the carpet. There were some left, thankfully. It made me wonder if the sleeping pills had induced my surreal dream state. And my current grogginess. But I concluded that was not possible—my memories were too lifelike.
The breakfast Julia had ordered arrived, but I had no interest in huevos rancheros, or any food of any kind, for that matter. I lit up a cigarette instead and sat at the table nearest the windows. There was another Ritz-Carlton pad lying there. With a pencil I found in the desk, I immediately got to work on a sketch. I tried to recapture Carlotta’s face from my fresh memories of our Spanish voyage. I had made it my mission to get to know her better, and now that I did know her, truly and deeply, in the most intimate of ways, I h
ad high hopes that my expanded knowledge and fresh perspective would be reflected in any new creation.
It wasn’t that I was being an opportunist, simply taking from her for my art. It was just that everything about her moved and inspired me to reach for new heights. She was my magical muse, as it were; but most of all, without a doubt, I was in love with this remarkable woman. I counted the hours until I could see her again.
I turned my phone back on and spied the numerous texts Rafaela had sent me to remind me of an appointment I had at the SoHo studio with Jean Paul, my art dealer. He had flown in from Paris strictly for the visit, and was bringing with him a few well-heeled French collectors who wanted to see some work for a potential show at the Centre Georges Pompidou. I was already several hours late. I was still clutching my phone when she called again, as she had apparently been doing all morning. Jean Paul was very upset that I hadn’t shown up, as were his buyer colleagues, and they were already on their way to the airport to return to France.
Rafaela of course read me the riot act, and I of course told her I didn’t give a shit and hung up on her. I didn’t give a damn about meeting Jean Paul or his merry band of French collectors. He was the type of art-world opportunist I needed to stay away from. Even Carlotta agreed that I should not surround myself with my dysfunctional group of friends and associates any longer. Enough was enough.
Eventually, I tried to reach Uber to arrange for a cab downtown, but found that the company had actually terminated my account after the Peking Duck incident. Motherfu—!
I hailed a cab the old-fashioned way and headed downtown, back to my apartment, cut a sharp path past Rafaela, who tried to launch in on me, and locked myself in the studio. On the way in, I’d grabbed a bottle of Blue Label to serve as a one-two punch, along with an eight ball of yeyo I pulled from the nightclub utility baggie. Sufficiently jacked, I began to re-create my recent otherworldly sojourn in seaside Spain in order to put it to canvas for a new series.
I labored through the night, from detailed charcoal sketches to a vast array of oils. It was an explosion of color, passion, and love in many forms. Channeling a new energy, I was inspired like I hadn’t been in ages. If ever. This was the new me, the real me, and the best reflection of me. And I was proud of my fresh creation, the beginning of the most personal series I had ever undertaken. I was being truthful to myself and operating from a place of raw instinct. I had given birth to a new universe, my universe. I called it The Parallel Universe, and by morning it had come alive, in all its otherworldly intent, and I with it.
The Beautiful Dream of Life Page 7