The Summer Garden

by Paullina Simons

  “I don’t know.” He stared into her wet, unsmiling, disconcertingly made-up eyes. “Just don’t be. You know I can’t take it when you’re upset with me.” He kissed her pouty lips until they opened and kissed him back, he kissed her until she lay a little flatter and more relaxed on the bed, and all the while his palm caressed her small patch of downy hair.

  “Shura... don’t . . .”

  “Don’t what?” Alexander bent open-mouthed to her breasts.

  “I don’t want you to . . .” she moaned, trying to lie still, not squirm.

  “No?” Bending below her navel, Alexander rubbed his lips back and forth against her blonde silken mound, his hand nudging her thighs. “Come on . . .” he whispered. “Spread your thighs for me... like I love.” With his fingertips he stroked her lightly. “Tell me, whisper to me what else I can do to make you happy with me . . .” She said nothing. “Come on...something nice?...something gentle...?”

  She held her breath, not speaking. But now she lay like he loved. He kissed her. “Tania... look, your softest lips, your lovely pink tender lips, so moist, so parted, look, they’re not upset with me . . .” Alexander whispered soothingly, his tongue slipping in and out of her mouth while his fingers slipped in and out of her. She grasped the sheets, bare and open under his hands.

  From his years with her, from the thousand beats of their common time, there were few things Alexander knew better than her body’s response to him. He stopped touching her. A breathless “Ah,” escaped her mouth.

  He waited a few moments, and then resumed his caresses, increasing the pressure ever so slightly, and when she moaned in a peaking tremor, he pulled away again. A barely stifled heave left her hips. When Tania was happy she pleaded with him in two languages at this juncture to do all sorts of things to her.

  But not tonight. She wasn’t even touching him. Tonight she pleaded nothing, spoke in no tongues, her eyes closed, her lips parted, even as her curving body began to shudder.

  “Tatia . . .” Alexander murmured, looking at her, “please tell me, anything at all you want me to do to make you happy?”

  She turned her face away, in a deep moan, her head back, her throat elongated, her hips rising up to him. She was glistening, but she wasn’t pleading.

  He shook his head, kneeling between her splayed legs. She was so stubborn—and so blonde and bloomy.

  There were so many things he liked to do to her, but tonight there was barely time for her penchant weakness—his fingertips caressing her nipples while he softly sucked her—before she cried out, clutching his head, and became neither reluctant nor unforgiving, nor stubborn. Alexander didn’t pull away. He kept his heated mouth over her, his hand on her, his insistent fingers on her, and she didn’t—and couldn’t— stop crying out or quivering or grasping onto his head until he thoroughly released her and then and only then did she unclench slightly and lie panting with her feet still tapping out a rasping drumbeat on his back.

  Oh Shura, she whispered. Oh Shura was certainly better than Shura, don’t.

  Yes, babe? Climbing up and kneeling over her, Alexander put himself into her moaning mouth, but he was so aroused he didn’t need another thrust, another squeeze of her hands. He needed only one thing.

  Getting off the bed, he pulled her forward to lie in front of him and leaned between her legs to kiss her. She reached for him, taking him, pulling him in; her eyes open, her lips open.

  His hands gripping the backs of her thighs, Alexander thrust once, twice, then stopped. Straightening out, he moved shallow and slow, and then as deep deep deep as he thought she could take. Tatiana’s mouth was in an O, she couldn’t breathe. Tania . . . too much? he whispered. She couldn’t speak, not even a yes. He waited a moment, he would have liked a yes, waited, pulled fully out, thrust fully in, and then she was suffocating and crying out. Holding her as steady as he could, he pulsed shallowly to prolong her moaning spasms and then stopped for a few moments, to catch a breath, to let her catch a breath, to kiss her, to nuzzle her breasts, to whisper how sweet she was like this as he stood over her, his hands on her folded thighs, bearing down on her, seeing her, seeing himself; he resumed the asymmetry of his jagged motion while continuing to whisper about his desire and her sweetness until she cried out, her stretched arms trying to grasp onto anything, and melted out again, moaning helplessly... and now it really was too much for her. Alexander knew he should stop. He knew he needed to stop. But he didn’t stop. Too soon she began to sound close to agony instead of ecstasy, and then she was convulsing and crying out.

  Okay, okay, shh, he said, stroking her, watching her as she lay gasping, her eyes closed, her thighs open, her body in a shiver. Tania, you’re beyond lovely, he whispered, caressing her, touching her lightly, with his hands, with his mouth, until she was soothed, until she was softened and her time was lengthened.

  When he came back on the bed and climbed on her, holding her legs up against his rigid arms, she started to shake her head from side to side. It’s too much like this, please, she whispered. I can’t take it. He released her legs—but couldn’t help himself, the ratchet of her plea too much for him—released her legs but not before two deep full slow agonizing thrusts and her two deep full slow agonizing cries. Leaving her raised legs live and loose, he took her like she loved, on his upright arms in what she called his arc of conjugal perfection, fitted into her slender thighs, her lips, her milling hips reaching for him, her fingers desperately clasping into his chest and neck and head as if to navigate him, in spondaic sync, in iambic rhythm. Come on, Shura . . . come on, Shura . . . come on, come on, come on, come on. After she quivered out, he didn’t even wait before he came on, he took it the way he wanted it, placing her trembling legs straight up onto his shoulders. But she shook again and whispered, I can’t take it, you’re too much for me like this, please, please. This time he was implacable, undeterred and unreleasing, whispering back, yes, but you’re so good for me like this, and was steady and slow and unceasing through her rattling body and grasping arms, eventually lying flush on top of her, his arms encircling her, his body overwhelming her, confining and surrounding her, confined and surrounded by her, completely consuming her so that when she came again, it was like an earthquake inside him. And during her impassioned cries, having forgotten herself, she recklessly whispered a rash I love you.

  Now that is what I call a whisper, said Alexander, rubbing his lips against her eyebrows.

  Oh, Shura . . . She lay slack underneath him, softly weeping, her face in his neck. Her arms and legs wrapped around his back.

  Are you still upset with me?

  Less upset, honey, husband, she moaned. Less upset.

  Lifting off her, he whispered, Get on your hands and knees, Tatia.

  She turned over on her hands and knees. Lowering her head into the sheets, her arms stretching out, she raised her hips to him. Come on, Shura. Come on. Come on. Everything was prone but her hips.

  His hands covering her buttocks and the small of her back, eventually he had to close his eyes and hold his breath because it was so fucking good . . . until she, in her tumult, in her gasping abandon, tried to crawl away from him. A drenched Alexander leaned over her quivering weakening body, his chest on her back, his face in her satin hair, fondling her breasts, threading his taut hard fingers through her taut soft ones, slipping slowly out and slowly in. You’re so good, Tatia, he whispered. Just a little more. You’re so beautiful . . . you’re so lovely . . .

  He finished married, stressed and stark, on top of her and in her arms, and after stroking her to calm her down while she begged him for mercy in two languages even as she was coming down, Alexander, propped up on his elbow, lay beside her soaked, racked body and kissed her face, gazing at her all freshly loved and parched and breathless. “Why do you get so frantic?” he asked. “I swear, there are times you act as if you’re married to someone else. What’s the matter with you?”

  Her eyes were closed as she received his kisses, her hand stroking the b
ack of his head. She moved to cradle into him. He pulled the quilts over them. “I’m sorry I was late coming home,” he said. “I won’t come home that late again, I won’t upset you. But what are you worried about?”

  “You told me you weren’t going to see any girls . . .”

  “Come on,” he whispered. “Shh.”

  Her damp face became tight.

  “I took Steve up to the suite,” Alexander said, wiping her forehead and speaking with reluctance, “and fell into a chair. There were, I don’t know, thirty of us, it was loud, there was music, and commotion, and I was still sitting there trying to sober up a little when two or three girls were brought in—complete with their bodyguards.”

  She looked up at him.

  “What? Tania, you have to get that drunk just once in your life, to understand what it’s like. There is nothing but stupor in the chair. You saw me at five, after sleeping in the car for hours. Can you imagine what I was like at two? I couldn’t walk. I was a disgrace.” Alexander laughed lightly.

  Tatiana didn’t laugh. “What were they doing?”

  “Who?”

  “The girls, Alexander.”

  “I don’t know.” He didn’t want to upset her. “Were they dancing?”

  “I don’t know.” He paused. “I think so.” They had been naked and dancing. “You are such a good girl,” Alexander whispered. “You’re such a good girl.” He kissed her lips. “It’s all right. They might have been dancing, but I don’t think you can call what I did watching, I was so out of it. But I shouldn’t have come up.”

  “So where did the perfume on you come from?”

  “As I was trying to get out of the chair, one of the girls came by and said something like, you need help getting up, cowboy? Wait! Where are you going? You’re in my arms, I just made love to you.” He held her in place. “Tania, I just made love to you,” he whispered, looking down into her face. “You’re in our bed, this is the final destination, last stop, all alight here, there’s nowhere else to go.”

  Her lips were trembling.

  “Let me finish telling you. I don’t want you to hear this third-hand from Amanda who might hear a more slimy version from Steve.”

  “Oh, so now your best friend is slimy? I can’t listen to one more thing.”

  “One more. And you are my best friend. Listen.”

  “I can’t listen. I can’t.”

  “She came by, said some stupid things, Steve was standing right by me the whole time. I got up, I’m almost sure without her help. I left. And that’s it.” He stroked her unhappy face. “I promise, I swear.”

  “Did you... kiss her?” Tatiana started to cry.

  “Tania!” He pressed her head to him. “Holy God. Of course not. She stood next to me, grabbing my sleeve. She must have reeked for her perfume to still be on my clothes. Steve thought I was too drunk to drive. I didn’t want to hear it. He may’ve been right. I left anyway.”

  “That Steve.” Tatiana shook her head. “Was the girl... naked?”

  The girl had been barely clad. “I don’t think so. I think they only get undressed for the dancing,” said Alexander, not letting Tatiana move away an inch. He saw such misery on her face. “Look, this is the thing— I went up to the suite, I sat in the chair, I didn’t leave right away.” His hand was gliding over her breasts, her stomach, her legs, like he knew she loved; she was like a cat, she adored to be caressed, slow and light, from her shins up to the face, to the hair, and back down, through everything. If his words couldn’t soothe her, perhaps his hands could. “I shouldn’t have gone, that was my mistake, but I did nothing wrong.” Alexander paused. “I’m going to tell you something—do you remember that night in Leningrad when I came drunk to see you at the hospital?”

  “Oh, I don’t want to talk about that now.”

  “I do. That night, I was in Sadko, and Marazov had women with him, and one of them, very flirtatious, sat on my lap. I was drunk, and young, and full of myself, as you remember—and I barely knew you then. We had behind us only the Sunday bus ride, the Kirov walks, and burning Luga. And we were at a complete dead end. It would’ve been so easy. I could have taken that girl in ten minutes in the back alley and still come to see you at the hospital and you would have never known. But I didn’t—even then. I came to you in the middle of the night, despite everything stacked against us, despite Dimitri, despite your sister, who thought she loved me.”

  “She did love you. Dasha did love you.”

  “Yes. She thought she did.”

  “Oh... help me,” she whispered.

  “I came to you because you were the only one I wanted. Do you remember how we kissed that night?” he whispered, cupping her breast. “You, sitting topless in front of me, you who had never been touched— oh God! I go insane now remembering the state of myself then. You know what it had meant to me, and you know what it means to me still. Don’t you remember anything?”

  Tatiana was shuddering in her own memories. “I remember . . . But . . .”

  “Look at me, feel my body, touch me, touch my heart, I’m right here. It’s me,” said Alexander. “I stayed away from whores even when I thought you were gone from my life and I was at war. I shouldn’t have gone to the Ho, but, honestly, what would I want with anyone when I have you? Who are you talking to? Who are you being angry with?”

  “Oh, Shura . . .” she whispered, clinging to him.

  “You know all this like you know my name,” said Alexander. “I come every night and kneel at your altar. Why do you worry about nonsense?”

  And with his voice and his hands, with his lips and eyes, his kisses and caresses, and deathless ways about him to bring her and himself divine ecstasy, he soothed her and found peace and bliss in her, for his promises were strong but his love was stronger, and when they, wrapped around one another, finally fell asleep, made up, relieved, beloved, they believed the worst of the Balkman world was behind them.

  A Day at a Wedding

  Jeff and Cindy’s wedding was the following Saturday afternoon, at the First Presbyterian Church with reception at the Scottsdale Country Club, filled with white lilies and beautiful people dressed in spring colors.

  Standing at the side of the altar in her strapless peach taffeta ballgown with a circle ruffled petticoat, Tatiana stared at Alexander in his black tuxedo, trying not to remember their own altar, their small Russian church, their Lazarevo sun over their heads filtering through the stained-glass windows almost ten years ago.

  She saw his face, his eyes staring at her. Outside the church he found her and very carefully—so as not to disturb her peach bows and silk pleats and petticoats—lifted her into the air for a moment without saying a word.

  There was good food and good music, the girls had flowers in their hair, someone caught the bouquet—not Amanda—steak was good, shrimp even better, the speeches slurred and funny. Cindy was a good-looking bride, even with her too-short hair, and Jeff in a white tux looked like he belonged on a wedding cake. Ten of them sat together at the bridal table, and Steve kept alluding to the bachelor party, and Alexander kept humoring him, but the one who wasn’t laughing was Amanda. Rather she was laughing fakely and every time she laughed she cast furtive glances at Alexander and then at Tatiana. After the nineteenth or twentieth furtive glance, Tatiana couldn’t help but notice.

  The Anniversary Waltz began to play—for Jeff and Cindy. Tatiana searched for Alexander; he was talking to people three tables away and didn’t look up. She resumed her own conversation, but in a moment, when she turned, he was standing at her chair. He stretched out his hand to her.

  Alexander and Tatiana danced to their wedding song, unable this once to hide their intimacy from prying, idly curious eyes; their hands entwined, their bodies pressed together, they waltzed by the banks of the Kama in their Lazarevo clearing under the crimson moon, an officer in his Red Army uniform, a peasant girl in her wedding dress—her white dress with red roses—and when Tatiana lifted her glistening eyes to him, Alexan
der was looking down at her with his I’ll-get-on-the-busfor-you-anytime face. She couldn’t believe it—he bent his head and kissed her, openly and deeply, as they continued to swirl away the minutes of someone else’s wedding.

  As they walked back to the table, Tatiana saw Amanda’s cold, judging stare on Alexander and a pitying glance on herself. “Why is she looking at me like that?” Tatiana whispered to him. “What’s wrong with her today?”

  “She must stop giving him milk. Tell her that.”

  Her elbow went in his ribs.

  Steve and Jeff were getting quite drunk, even though it was still the afternoon. Their comments about the upcoming wedding night started getting cruder. Jeff plonked down and said, “Alexander, you’ve been married a century. Do you have any advice for the newly married?”

  Another glance from Amanda.

  Alexander said, “It’s probably too late for advice, Jeffrey-boy. Wedding night’s in three hours.”

  “Come on, give me the wealth of your experience. What did you do on your wedding night?”

  “Drank a little less than you,” said Alexander, and Tatiana laughed.

  “Come on, man, don’t hold out. Tania, tell me, is there anything I should know? From a woman’s point of view?”

  Oh, how loudly Steve laughed.

  “Jeff, all right, enough, man,” Alexander said, getting up and helping Jeff straighten out, pushing him away from the table.

  “If I were Jeff,” whispered Tatiana to Alexander, “I’d spend some time doing the thing that Cindy says he almost never does—but that’s just from a woman’s point of view.” Oh how loudly Alexander now laughed, and Steve, who must have thought it was at his expense, glared at Tatiana.

  She got up to go to the ladies’ room. Amanda got up to go with her. As they were walking around the dance floor, Tatiana said, “What’s the matter with you today? You don’t seem very happy.”

  “No, I am, I am.”

  “What is it? Cindy’s wedding making you blue?” Tatiana stayed dry through her own irony.

  “No, no. I mean, a little, yes, but . . .” She took Tatiana by the arm. “Can I talk to you?”