It Took Dominion Everywhere

Behind her dark hair, behind her glasses, her pale eyes must have widened.

For I had reached into the metropolis and produced Clark Kent.

“I’m Wilson,” he said, offering her his hand.

“Esther,” Nicole said, taking his hand.

“Pleased to meet you, Esther,” he smiled.

“May I take your coat?” I said to his back. “Wilson? Your coat?”

He turned to me. “Oh, right.” He tugged an arm from his coat as his eyes returned to Nicole.

He draped his coat over an arm. “So, are you visiting New York, Esther?”

“May I take your coat, Wilson?” I repeated.

“Oh right, I’m sorry,” he turned to me. I took the coat and suggested we move into the living room.

Wilson sat in a chair. Nicole sat close to my side.

We exchanged pleasantries. Wilson learned that Nicole is a Southerner. We learned that Wilson came from the Midwest to work as a model.

“You’re certainly handsome,” Nicole said, coolly stating this matter of observable fact.

“Thanks, that’s nice of you to say.” He paused, scratching a temple. “You know, I have to say . . . well, when you didn’t have a picture of your girlfriend, I thought . . . well, I thought that I should expect someone . . . well, someone not that pretty. But Esther, you are really a gorgeous girl.”

“Thanks,” she nodded, accepting his compliment as yet another fact to be acknowledged.

“Gorgeous,” he repeated, his eyes on her.

“You thought you might not be attracted to her,” I teased. “And yet, here you are. You dog.”

He laughed. “Well, yeah, I guess I am. But I liked your picture, and, well, that’s what I was being asked to do.”

This was the correct response.

“Oh yes, your assignment,” I said, trailing a finger on Nicole’s bare leg. “Let’s get started on that. How about you undress for us?”

He raised his eyebrows. “You mean here? Now?”

“No better time nor place.”

“Uh, sure. Why not?” Wilson stood and began to unbutton his shirt. His eyes watched my finger on Nicole’s leg. She was seated against me. I could hear her breathing accelerate as she braced for the unknown of a man’s body. An unknown man’s body.

I turned to lightly kiss her hair.

Wilson tossed his shirt in a chair, paused a moment, and then raised his undershirt as he stepped from his shoes.

I gently brushed the hair from Nicole’s face.

Wilson looked into her eyes as he unzipped his pants. He stepped from one leg, and then another. The pants joined his shirt in the chair.

He brought his knees up to remove his socks. I traced Nicole’s kneecap.

He stood. He ran his thumbs under the waistband of his snug-fitting shorts. Slowly, he lowered them to the floor.

He stood and smiled.

“May we just appreciate you for a moment, Wilson?” I asked.

“Sure, of course.” He stood with his arms to his sides.

“Did you ever see such a statuesque man . . . Esther?” I whispered.

She shook her head. My fingers traveled from one leg to another.

“His face is so attractive . . . his hair is so full and wavy and black . . . his eyes so dark . . .”

I caressed an inner thigh, parting her legs slightly.

“And that body . . . such broad shoulders and defined arms . . . that wide chest and smooth skin . . .”

My fingers vanished under her mini skirt.

“Those thick, strong legs . . .”

A finger vanished into her body.

She drew a breath.

“And that cock. So thick, unlike mine, with those big smooth balls . . .”

A second finger joined the first.

“Two men are here now, two men who find you so—what was Wilson’s word?—'gorgeous' . . . two handsome men who look nothing like one another . . . spread your legs, girl. I want to show your pussy to the handsome stranger.”

Nicole leaned back, adjusting as she spread her legs. I lifted the skirt.

“Such a pretty girl,” I said.

“She is really is gorgeous,” Wilson said, his voice low and slightly reverential. His cock was growing full.

“Yeah, she is,” I nodded, certain that she noticed my use of the third person. I looked down. “Very tight pussy, though. She’s not yet much more than a virgin.”

“Hot, man,” Wilson said, touching himself.

“I think that before we do anything else, Esther, I’m going to fuck you.” I took my fingers from her body and stood.

“Okay,” she said lightly.

“Wilson, please pick up Esther and carry her to my bedroom. Follow me.” I turned and walked down a hallway, not looking back.

I stood by the bed waiting as Wilson came to the bedroom door holding Nicole in his arms. Her arms were draped on his wide shoulders, her head resting against his cheek.

He turned to one side to clear the doorframe.

“Put her on the bed, please,” I requested.

The dark-haired stranger gently placed the hourglass teenager on my bed. Wilson stood to one side, looking to me. Nicole instinctive drew back her legs.

“Sweet Esther,” I said, crawling over her legs. “Let’s show Wilson what you’ve learned since yesterday.”

She looked at Wilson. “It’s a lot,” she grinned.

“I can imagine,” he nodded.

I removed her glasses, placing them on a nightstand. I raised her shirt and unfastened her bra. I kissed her neck and sternum, her breasts and belly, taking my time until I reached her skirt.

I unfastened a clasp and lowered a zipper. She lifted her hips as I pulled the skirt slowly down the length of her legs.

“Shit,” Wilson whispered, devout.

I kissed her cunt.

“Wilson is impressed by your beauty,” I said quietly. “He doesn’t know about your mind.”

I darted a tongue to her clit. She squirmed.

I slide over her body to her ear. “You’re lying to Wilson. Stop it.”

She turned to face Wilson. “My name is really Nicole.”

He smiled. “My name is really Wilson.”

“Thank you,” I said. I stood and quickly removed my shirt and pants. Nicole looked up at me, watching me return to a form more familiar to her. My nudity was her blanket.

I raised an arm and pointed to Wilson. “He’s beautiful,” I said. “Do you want to fuck him?”

She looked to Wilson, then back to me. “No.” She edged her body towards mine, spreading her thighs as she moved. “I’m particular. I want you.”

This was the correct response.

I took deliberate care in rolling on a condom. I made it a show for four eyes, two so pale, two so dark.

She sighed as I entered her. I moved slowly, back and forth, giving her my full length and then taking it back, again and again.

Her moistness spread the fullness of my cock.

I began to move faster.

“Yeah, man,” Wilson said, moving to crouch on the bed near us. “Fuck that pussy, man. Fuck her.”

I stopped, holding her calves in my grip. I looked down to Nicole. “You can blow him.”

She looked over and took his cock in her hand. “Good,” she smiled. Wilson moved closer.

“It’s only her second blowjob,” I told Wilson.

“Actually, it’s my ninth,” she said, swallowing him.

Sweet girl, I thought as I renewed my thrusts. During a month in which I was counting the number of people who blew me, she was counting each and every time she puts a dick in her mouth.

“Unh, shit, yeah,” Wilson sighed, falling forward. “Suck that cock, slut.”

Nicole’s throat murmured.

I fucked into her hard. Wilson moved forward to feed his cock into her. He pressed against my shoulders for support.

I put an arm around him, kissing his neck.

He turned his face to kiss me, passionate and wild. I took his hair in hand, giving him my mouth as my flesh moved into Nicole’s body.

It was a little after nine on a cold, clear January night. Lighted specks defined the Manhattan skyline in an accumulation of countless right angles.

Behind one of those countless specks, in my bedroom, a little after nine on a cold, clear January night, our isosceles was the most beautiful, heroic form in my metropolis.

Blackbird Whistling, Or Just After

She told me she craved sushi.

“Aren’t you vegetarian?” I asked.

Nicole looked chagrined. “I make an exception for sushi. I love it, and there’s none near campus.”

I told her I knew a place. There was an early bird special, even, if we got there before seven.

“We can make that easily,” she said.

“Sure,” I agreed, pressing deeper into her. “We’ll just finish fucking and go.”

“Right,” she said, clutching my shoulders.

The sun set.

We kept fucking.

Rush hour noises faded.

We kept fucking.

I noticed the time. “Okay, no more sex,” I said, pulling out. “We want to be early birds.”

“Right,” she said, swallowing my cock.

We managed to extricate ourselves, quickly shower, and dress.

“Is that all you’re wearing?” I scolded. She wore a light shirt and a mini skirt that scarcely covered her panties, leaving her long legs bare. “It’s January, you know.”

“I didn’t bring tights,” she shrugged. “I’ve got my coat. I’ll be fine.”

“It’s freezing. I’m sure I have some sweats or something that might fit you.”

She peered at me with her one visible eye.

“I know, I know,” I shook my head. “You’d rather freeze than look unfashionable.”

We walked briskly to the restaurant. We were seated by a floor-to-ceiling window.

Her legs were red and raw from the cold. The proximity of her bare skin under the table was distracting. We hadn’t worn clothes in the twenty-four hours since she arrived; we left the bed only when necessitated by the exigencies of bladders, hunger and her nicotine addiction.

Now, for the duration of a meal, we were unable to touch one another without being observed by passers by.

My teeth tore into raw fish.

“I’m glad I came,” she said, her chopsticks adroitly capturing sashimi. She sat very erect, bending slightly forward as she brought the tuna to her mouth.

“I’m glad you’re enjoying yourself,” I smiled. “It’s really been a whirlwind, huh?”

She nodded, chewing. She covered her mouth with a hand. “I can’t believe I went through with it.” She swallowed. “But I had to get away from school to do this—and of course, finding you also made it possible.”

“You’re gracious. But what do you mean about leaving school?”

“Well, my friends regard me as somewhat asexual . . .”

“Ha! If they could see you now.”

“Seriously, I’m called an ‘ice princess.’ They think I’m frigid.”

“You have no concern there.”

“This we know,” she smiled. “But in truth, it’s a convenient fallacy, this image people have of me. I’m not interested in anyone on campus, and I’d rather not be bothered. I’d rather stay in the library, frankly.”

I took a piece of eel, listening.

“So by coming here, and seeing you, I’m able to pursue my sexuality without the bothers and interferences of my friends, or gossip, and the nonsense of all that.”

“In other words, you can let your hair down.”

A grin appeared under the swoop that covered her face. “Precisely. And it doesn’t hurt that you know what you’re doing.”

“I practice,” I smiled.

When the check arrived, she insisted on going Dutch. “I have to pay for myself,” she said, opening her bag. “I’m feminist.”

“Fine by me,” I said, reaching for my wallet. “I’m cheap.”

She put her arm in mine as we walked home.

I took pictures of her red, raw legs. She bent forward as I photographed the curve of her buttocks peering from under her skirt.

I took her panties.

To Shine in Use

I led the Stevens girl and her hourglass figure into my bedroom.

“Lay on my bed, pretty girl,” I instructed.

She sat on the bed and brought her long legs to the duvet. She reclined, letting her head rest on the crook of an arm. Her eyes gravitated to my bookshelves.

She glanced back as I undressed. Her eyes took in my body, recording the image of the man she had traveled to meet. She saw me nude before she knew my name.

She removed her glasses, placing them on a nightstand.

She was quiet as I moved to her side. I lowered my mouth to hers. We kissed, my hands getting to know her body, her hands learning the feel of a man’s body.

I moved to cover her with my torso. I opened my mouth to contain hers, to refocus her tongue and teeth from urgency to ardor. My hands held her cheeks firm before pushing her hair back so that I could see her face.

I pulled back for a look, but my mouth drew me back to hers.

My hips pressed into her. She trembled as before.

“I think we should fuck now,” I said, reaching for a condom.

“Yes, please, let’s,” she said. I could tell she meant for that phrase to sound nonchalant, but it came out fast and tinged with nervousness.

“You okay?” I asked.

“I’m very okay,” she smiled. “Come on, let’s fuck.”

I kissed her as I positioned my cock against her cunt. “I should warn you,” she said. “I’m pretty tight.”

“I know this already,” I said, sliding my head between her wet lips.

“I hear that’s often advantageous for the sensations of the male organ,” she smirked.

“I’ve heard that myself,” I nodded, opening a bottle of lube. “That is, once you get the male organ in there. Here, let me lift your legs up.”

I pressed forward, parting her slowly. She gasped. I pushed a little more, edging my way into her.

Her pussy was tighter than a miser’s heart.

I soothed her thighs and breasts, murmuring as I went deeper into her body.

I dropped my body, pressing our bodies together as we kissed. I felt her pulse race against my chest and though my cock.

“You okay?” I whispered.

“Yes,” she nodded. “God, this is good.”

“It is good, isn’t it?” I kissed her neck and began to slowly move inside her.

She began to move back.

Soon, our fucking followed the fervor of our kisses. I grabbed her shoulders, pressing deep as I flipped us.

“Unh!” she groaned, suddenly on top.

“Now, you grind down on me,” I suggested.

“Oh, that’s incredible,” she nodded. Her face was gone again, vanished into her hair. I caressed her slender waist and palmed her firm ass.

She rode me back and forth before, in an epiphany, finding her rhythm.

“Baby, you are so beautiful,” I said softly. “And you are doing so well.”

“This is so incredible,” she repeated, paying close attention to her body’s sensations as she fucked me, closely studying the effect of sex on herself.

She was cerebral, even in her sensuality.

I pinched a nipple. I raised my head to chew on her breast. I bite hard, holding her flesh in my teeth.

She fucked down on me harder.

I let her enjoy herself for a nice long while before we took a break.

“Sex is really great,” she said, then laughed. “Understatement.”

“I’m a big fan.” I said, standing. “Hey, do you mind if I take some pictures? I want to document your body before we fuck it up too much. That bite on your tit is going to be purple soon.”

“It is?” she said, looking to her breast. “I barely noticed that you bit it.”

“Cool, right?” I retrieved my camera. “So, do you mind?”

“Not at all, for your private viewing.”

“Of course.” I adjusted the lighting. “Though, if we get a nice blurry one, I may ask to post it on my blog. Don’t worry, I’d only do that with your approval.”

“Fine. How do you want me?”

“Just act natural,” I said, snapping. “I’ll adjust my angles.”

We talked as I snapped. I told it that I was only now beginning to photograph my friends in bed. “I’m not the brightest bulb,” I said, peering at the viewfinder. “Three years into this life, and I finally realize I should be documenting it in pictures.”

“You’ve got words,” she replied.

We sat to review the images.

“Look at this one,” I said. “You look just like a fifties pin up.”

“Son, I’m hot,” she laughed.

“The camera loves you,” I said, putting the camera aside. “But now, I guess we can no longer delay the inevitable. We need to see how bad your blowjob is.”

“God, I’m sure it’s awful,” she winced. “I’ve never done it.”

“You’ve never sucked cock at all?” I asked, tugging off my condom and reclining in the pillows.

“Nope,” she shook her head. “Never.”

“Well, that won’t do.” I held my cock forward. “Let’s see what you’ve got. Just try it nice and slow, and I’ll talk you though it.”

“Okay, thanks.” She stepped forward on her knees and lowered her face to my cock. She took it in hand and gingerly licked the shaft.

I petted her hair. “That’s so sweet, so nice . . .”

Her tongue caressed my cock, her pale eyes alternating between my eyes and my cock.

I reached for my camera. “Let me document your first blowjob, pretty.” I snapped some photographs as she brought my cock to her lips. “Aw, that’s just lovely,” I clicked. “Okay, now suck my dick, darling.”

She looked up, her eyes on me and my camera. “’He goes to supper: not where he eats, but where he is eaten.’"

“Source?” I asked.

“Shakespeare,” she said into my cock. “Hamlet.”

“Very smart. Now suck my dick.”

She took my head into her mouth.

“Nice, nice . . .” I commended.

She went lower.

“Good, that’s great . . .”

She went lower still, pulling my cock into her throat.

“Whoa, wha wha wha!” I gasped. I dropped my camera to the bed. “Hang on, whoa!”

She started to pull back. “No, I didn’t mean stop,” I said. “Do that again.”

She swallowed me. I pumped slightly. She had all of me.

I rested my cock in her. She continued to hold me in place.

I fucked slowly. She swirled her tongue.

I took her head in my hands and pushed my cock back into her throat. She didn’t hesitate.

“Okay, come up for air,” I panted.

She sat up and wiped her mouth. “Was that okay?”

“Are you kidding?” I said. “You’ve never sucked cock? Never?”

“Nope, never.”

“Kid, you are a born cocksucker. That’s great head. Really, really great. You must have been absent the day they handed out gag reflexes.”

“Thanks,” she smiled. “But I have a question: how do I breath when you’re in my esophagus?”

“Ah, good question. First, take a deep breath before you swallow me. Second, remember, you don’t have to deep throat the whole time. You can tease with your throat before you plunge my cock back. Also, when you are sucking, you don’t need to keep your lips firm the whole time. You can breath through your mouth.”

“Oh, like this?” she asked, taking my cock back in her mouth. She panted around the sides of my shaft. “Hmmph?”

“Perfect,” I said. “You learn fast. Now, get that cock out of your mouth. I’m going to fuck the shit out of you.”

She sat up. “Yes sir, professor,” she grinned.

“Call me that again,” I said, reaching for a condom, “And I’ll fuck you like you’ve never been fucked.”

“I’ve never been fucked . . . professor.”

“All that is past now,” I said. “Hand me that camera and get your ass to the edge of the bed.”



The next break found us actually leaving the bedroom.

“So, now that we’ve fucked, can I know your name, Jefferson?”

“If you’ll give me yours, pretty girl.”

“You don’t buy ‘Esther?’”

“I do not, no.”

“Smart boy. It’s not my name. I borrowed it from Saul Bellow. Esther Fenchel is one of the eponymous character's love interests in The Adventures of Augie March.” She nodded to the books on a side table. “You should read it, if you can tear yourself away from Valley of the Dolls.”

I laughed. “I embarrassed to say that I haven’t even started Valley of the Dolls.”

“What are you reading?”

“I’m reading this great biography of Bing Crosby . . . ”

“Weren’t you reading that at Christmas?”

I felt a twinge of remorse. “That was just three weeks ago.”

She raised an eyebrow.

“It’s six hundred pages!”

She shrugged. “My name is Nicole,” she said.

I told her my name. “Pleased to meet you, Nicole.”

“Likewise.”

I poured a bourbon and sat to watch as she pulled out a package of Marlboro Lights.

“I should’ve warned you. I’m a chain smoker.”

“You might’ve warned me of a few things,” I said, sipping.

“There were a few things of which I was unaware,” she rejoindered. “And others you needed to discover.” She lit her cigarette and exhaled.

She looked up, resting the cigarette in her fingers. “’Yet all experience is an arch where through gleams that untraveled world, whose margin fades forever and forever when I move. How dull it is to pause, to make an end, to rust unburnished, not to shine in use.’”

She flicked an ash.

I swallowed the bourbon that rested in my throat.

“Source?” I asked.

“Tennyson,” she answered, drawing a puff. “Ulysses.”

“Impressive that you quote,” I nodded.

“It’s what I do,” she replied, stamping out a dead butt. “It’s how my mind works. I capture language. I can quote Tennyson, Eliot, Shakespeare . . . and your blog.”

“My blog?” I sputtered.

“Yes, of course.” She drew another cigarette. “Remember when you took my panties?”

“Very well,” I smiled, raising my bourbon. I took a sip.

“Do you recall what you said as you took them?” She lit her smoke.

I furrowed my brow. “What I said? Well, no, not exactly.”

Her lighter clicked on the table. “You said, ‘cute panties, did you wear these for me?’”

I looked at her, not following.

“So I provided the next line, ‘I often wear cute underwear for no reason at all.’”

“’The next line?’” I asked, resting my bourbon in a palm.

“That’s exactly what you said to someone else when you first met. So I replied with her response.”

“Wow, are you serious? I said that? And you can quote it?”

She exhaled a plum of smoke. “That’s how my mind works.”

“Incredible. Well, I suppose I need some new material if I’m getting redundant.”

“Yeah, you may want to work on that. Remember in our web cam conversation, when you wrote ‘you didn’t have to be attractive, but it helps?’ That’s what you said to Celia in your first post.” She took a drag. “Well, a paraphrase, but approximately the same.”

“I hope you don’t think I carry a set of stock lines,” I apologized. “I guess my mind just has its limitations.”

She drew a puff and exhaled. “You don’t have any cause for concern. You’re an excellent writer.”

“Thanks. Well, I’m honored to be in your repertoire . . . though a little daunted by the company of Tennyson, Eliot and the Bard.”

“You have one advantage over them,” she said, flicking an ash.

“What’s that?”

She took another drag. “I can’t fuck dead writers.”

I took a sip of my bourbon. “Nicole, finish your cigarette.”

She put it out. “Done.”

Thesaurus

I could feel her eyes on my back.

We had only spent a moment at the door exchanging glances and bussing cheeks before I took her coat.

We had never met. We didn’t know one another’s names.

Yet she had come to New York to spend a weekend with me.

Now, as I turned to hang her coat in a closet, she was giving me the once over. I took my time, allowing her to look. It was only fair; after all, I had the home court advantage.

I closed the closet door and turned to reciprocate her gaze.

She smirked, shifting her weight from one hip to another.

“You might have told me,” I said, reprimanding her.

“What?” she sassed. “And ruin the surprise?”

I liked that. I stepped forward to take her face in my hands. I kissed her deeply.

She had told me her name was Esther, but I assumed that wasn’t true. No one named girls “Esther” nineteen years ago. Nineteen-year-old girls are named “Ashley” or “Jennifer” or “Madison,” the last after that Daryl Hannah movie that had been popular a few years before they were born.

“Esther,” or whomever it was now standing in my apartment, had contacted me after reading my blog. Her introductory note was complimentary and polite, which is always pleasant, but more unusually, it avoided common words when more exact options were possible. The more syllables per word, the better.

This gal is either wicked smart, I thought, or she’s damned handy with a thesaurus. Either way, I was enticed . . . if not inveigled.

We traded notes now and then until she faded from my inbox. She later wrote to apologize, noting that the end of a semester with a double major could be exceedingly onerous.

Our correspondence resumed.

We never traded photographs. She didn’t request one, and I didn’t really care what she looked like. She had me going with wit and a vocabulary that was gorgeous, lavish, luxurious, splendid and sumptuous—that is to say, in a word provided by my thesaurus, impressive.

After a month or so of trading intermittent bon mots, I asked if she had a web cam. Of course she did; she’s nineteen. I suggested that we instant message with cams.

As her image came into view, I was glad to see that she was easy on the eyes. “You didn’t have to be attractive,” I wrote, “But it helps that you are.”

“Likewise,” she wrote back, her lips slightly pursed.

The truth was, though, that I really couldn’t tell much about her appearance. Her camera was trained on her head and the dorm room behind her. Over one unseen shoulder was a well-crammed bookcase; over the other, a white wall bare but for a poster.

She wore a newsboy cap, pushed forward and down, and glasses that were scarcely visible in the forest of dark hair that hung in her face. Only the lower third of her face was unobstructed.

She was evidently pale and had lips. Beyond that, I couldn’t have picked her out of a line up.

No matter, really. I was glad to put face to words, naturally, but I was after other quarry.

I wanted to take her fine-tuned vocabulary for a spin.

As we traded quips—cracks, jests, sallies, drolleries—I soon realized that I was barely keeping up. She parried my every sentence by three, coming back fast with pithy humor and precisely chosen words, each typed without error and burnished—buffed, polished, shined, furbished—to crystalline sheen.

This much was clear: whoever it was behind those glasses, she wasn’t fudging her smarts. She appeared to be the real deal, the sort who could waltz her way across the Mensa ballroom.

Still, I was only seeing the cards she dealt. I was looking right at this person on my screen, but her face was hidden in a disguise of cap, glasses and hair. I was conversing with her, but she hid herself in a thicket of words. All of that was wrapped up and presented under an unlikely name.

After an exchange that had been agreeable, congenial, pleasing and engaging, we signed out. Our correspondence continued without cameras; we had satisfied that curiosity as well as we could.

Still, other curiosities remained.

Finally, I took a step that was perhaps inevitable, ineluctable, ineludible and certain.

“If you are ever in the city, it would be a pleasure to meet,” I wrote.

“I can come during the winter break,” she replied.

“That would be great,” I said. “And, well, if you need a place to stay, I can put you up.”

“You are certainly complaisant,” she responded. I reached for my dictionary before thanking her for the compliment.

Now, she was in my living room, her masks intact but for the one secret she could no longer keep.

As I kissed her, I placed a hand on her hip.

“You act as though you’re ashamed of it,” I whispered.

“Not at all,” she asserted, her voice firm, revealing none of the open passion of her kiss.

I stood back. “Well, may I at least appreciate it?”

She leaned a hand on a bookcase. “Go right ahead.”

She wore a white cotton shirt, so tight that the buttons barely met. Her nipples were hard and clearly visible, for she wore nothing underneath.

“This is a lovely sight,” I said, caressing her shirt. I nuzzled into her neck. “And your clothing smells so fresh. Still, I want to remove this.”

“Go ahead.”

She began to shudder as my fingers moved down the buttons of her shirt. The front opened to reveal flesh, but I averted my eyes to undo her cuffs. When her wrists were free, I removed her shirt and tossed to one side.

“You’re trembling.”

“It’s cold outside.”

“It’s very warm inside. You’re nervous, and that’s fine.” I pressed my body to hers. “It’s alluring, actually.”

I took her mouth back into mine. Her kiss was immediate and slightly clumsy.

I stood back to stroke her torso. I turned her body so that I could look at her back.

“This is very nice,” I said, touching the black skirt that draped to her knees. “But this, too, needs to go.”

“Yes,” she said, a slight frog in her throat.

“So brave,” I whispered.

I unbuttoned the skirt, unzipped its side, and knelt to lower it to the ground. She stepped from the skirt, gently raising her high heels.

I looked up at her, touching her legs and torso. I savored the responses of her trembling flesh.

“Cute panties,” I observed, touching lace. “Did you wear those for me?”

She stopped trembling, resuming her composure. “I often wear cute underwear for no reason at all,” she smiled.

“Yes, well, I’m afraid these also need to vanish.” I lowered her panties slowly, offering a hand to steady her as she lifted her heels. I put the panties aside and allowed my eyes to take her in.

I nuzzled my nose in the soft, sandy blonde pubic hair that gave away another secret—her dark brown hair was a deliberate choice. Perhaps she had become a brunette for effect, to dramatize her smooth pale skin. But now that I was in on the larger secret, I suspected it was a diversionary tactic, intended to make her appear somewhat mousy, like the bookworm she preferred people to see when they looked at her.

Looking up to her face full of hair, I still had no clear sense of the color of her eyes.

I stood and pushed back her hair. She looked at me, now trembling again. Her eyes were pale, limpid aquamarine, the color of a clear sky viewed from underwater.

I traced a finger to her waist. I needed to address the secret she had kept from me.

“You didn’t tell me about this,” I chastised. “You must’ve assumed I would want to know.”

“Now you know,” she said, shrugging. “I have an hourglass figure.”

“Yes, you do have an hourglass figure. That’s the right word for it. I might’ve said you are built like a brick shithouse.”

She laughed. “Ever the Southern gentleman.”

I nodded and leaned to kiss her. My finger moved across the slight curve of her tight belly, and down to her slit.

I toyed with her moistness.

“Wow,” she said, for once at a loss for words.

I kissed her ear lobe.

“It’s . . . it’s been a very long time,” she added.

“Since?” I whispered.

“Since I’ve been with a man,” she said, shaking under my touch.

I placed a steady hand against the base of her spine. “How long?” My tongue traced the curve of her neck.

“Just that one time,” she answered. “When I was fourteen.”

“How old was the boy?” I nibbled her clavicle.

“My age,” she swallowed. “Well, fifteen.”

“An early predilection for older men,” I noted, cupping a firm breast. “And only girls since then?” I took a nipple in my mouth.

“Unh, yeah. Girls.”

I stood to kiss her. That mouth, so adept in forming words, was still learning to kiss.

“Don’t worry,” I said. “I won’t be gentle.”

She held me close. “Who is your favorite modernist poet?” she whispered.

“I go for Frank O’Hara,” I answered, kissing her eyelids each in turn.

She looked into my eyes. “I’m a Stevens girl.”

“We’ll meet at Rilke,” I said, taking her hand. “Now come with me. I want to show you what happens to Stevens girls.”