chapter four

It’s exactly like I thought it would be.

-Teddy Pendergrass, Close the Door

P: Good morning

S: back at ya.

P: That pic of you on your post the other day?

Hot.

S: Thanks.

P: Just sayin

She loved writing for him. Bending and shaping and molding the words, trying to fit them together so that they would look like the way he made her feel. They did it together, like kids lying on their bellies side by side, amidst a scattering of crayons and coloring books. Together they painted intricate, detailed, sensual pictures.

P: I want to taste you

S: Wow

P: Do you taste good?

S: Of course I do.

P: Tell me

S: How I taste? I don't even know how to begin to describe that.
Womanly.Sexy.
Decadent, like a really great secret that nobody else knows.
Something like that.

P: Like a deep dark secret. Exposed with great effort

S: Then finally told in bits and pieces. And once you get it all

you realize it was totally worth the wait.

P: Yes yes exactly

It was the most creative she’d felt in years. It had been a long time since she had an outlet. The solitude of her new life gave her plenty of time to write, and she often went through the exercise, but true inspiration came back once she began making stories with P. He brought her out and dusted her off, played muse to her writer, and together they created their own adventures.

P: Okay. Tell me a secret fantasy.

S: Aside from a rendezvous with my

pretend internet boyfriend, you mean?

P: Tell me. What would happen?

S: Hmm. Well, since this is fantasy, then let’s say I’m on my book tour. I’m doing a signing somewhere in the city, and you come. Get in line. You see me first. And as you get closer to me you send me a text. You’ll have to decide what it says, but certainly it’s something provocative. And when you watch me read it you finally get to see what I look likewhen I read something from you that makes me all blushy. So I scan the crowd and there you are. For real in person. We lock eyes and I instantly feel excited. Tingle. Fidget. And when I sign your book I write down my hotel and room number. Good start?

P: Yummy. It might say I wonder what you taste like right now.

S: That would do it.

So, I get done working. Go back to the hotel. Shower. Try to choose something to wear. Change clothes a couple of times. Wonder if I should wear my glasses or go without. Take a long look at myself in the mirror, wonder what you’ll think when you actually get to see me up close and for real.
Put on a little of my favorite perfume. Decide on a dress. Consider no panties for a minute, but decide to wear them anyway because it will be so much fun to have you take them off of me later. And I am completely nervous, butterflies like crazy, terrified of you looking at the real me and deciding that fantasy was better. And I’m really hoping you’re serious about wanting to buy me a martini,
because my hands are actually shaking a little bit. I keep waiting to hear you knock, but you call up instead. Giving me one last chance to talkmyself out of this. But I don’t. I come downstairs and we are finally face to face. I finally get to put my arms around you and feel what you feel like. I finally get to smell what you smell like. I get to reach over and touch your hair. You suggest cocktails or dinner or whatever you would suggest we do first. And you do all of the goofy chivalrous stuff that I am such a sucker for. Hand on the small of my back to lead me through the door. Offer me your arm.
So, where do we go? Where do you take me?

P: I love reading you. Makes me hard. Call if you want to hear me cum.
We go to a small blues bar.

S: Small blues bar is perfect. So perfect. Dark table somewhere out of the way of anyone who might notice if you happened to slide your hand up my skirt. And I can’t decide if I’d rather sit across from
you so I can stare and drink in the very sight of you, or if I want to sit next to you, right up close.

P: Still waiting for the phone to ring.

S: I can't. Not tonight. So just tell me what we're drinking in the small blues bar. And tell me if we chose to sit across from each other or side by side.

P: You would hold me to the martini. Grey goose 3 olives.

S: You are so in my head. Great choice. I am so relieved that Martini doesn’t mean gin to you. So, we start off across from each other so we can just stare. You notice my hands shaking and you cover mine with yours. Mine are like ice, but yours are warm. And calm. If you’re nervous too, you’re doing a much better job of hiding it.

Are you? Nervous?

P: No. Only because I've reached the point that not tasting you is worst thing that can possibly happen. Everything else is easy in comparison.

With their foundation established, made strong with lots of trust and affection and a healthy dose of lust, she became ready to play. He made her feel mischievous, like a cat with a ball of string, batting around her desire and waiting for the perfect opportunity to pounce. Words were pretty easy for her to produce, even though she still blushed and fidgeted her way through many conversations, so he pushed. He was good at planting seeds, wanting something just one step further than where she was comfortable going. He was good at making it seem like it was her need for more that drove them forward, but it was all at his suggestion. He needed her just as much as she needed him.

P: Send me a picture.

S: A picture? Is there something wrong with the images

I'm creating with the words?

P: Nothing at all. I'm just very visual. I need to see.

S: I'm very squeamish about pictures.

P: I want to see what you hide with clothes.

S: I cannot imagine showing myself to somebody new.

The last time somebody saw what I hide under my clothes

for the very first time, it was long before stress and age

and babies and I was also very very drunk.

This is so much harder than writing.

P: It's ok. It will get easier.

Let me see your eyes.

Sending pictures didn’t come easy. She couldn’t stop being critical. They were never good enough, never looked like she felt on the inside. So she made a rule that when he asked for a photo she would only take one. Because she just couldn’t spend all that effort agonizing.

And his appreciation of what she sent made her a little more willing the next time. While he was never one to say “don’t be insecure, you look great” he did understand that she would respond differently to the words hot or pretty, sweet or sexy, thank you or good girl. He understood that foreplay for her was more about her mind than her body, and that playing with words could make her both adventurous and compliant, and anxious to try things she never would have considered otherwise.

She was starved for the attention.

P: I like knowing my words can affect you that way.

She had grown accustomed to the change in her husband’s eyes. Where he used to be turned on by her quirks and insecurities, he now reacted to them as if they were symptoms needing some kind of treatment. His patience was replaced with irritation, his admiration with mere tolerance. They still got along, they were still friendly, but she was withering, and her husband didn’t seem to notice.

P was supposed to be a fantasy, something to arouse and attract her so that she could put the spark back into sex with her husband. She knew that this was supposed to be a game, with P giving her the attention and words that she needed to feel special, and her giving P the secrets and the pictures that he needed to feel connected to someone.

But it quickly became more than a game.

P: Take another picture. Let me see your eyes and smile

S: I only take one. It's my rule.

P: Break it

For me

S: well, I guess it's the least I can do for someone willing to

exert all of that NON sexy chat effort just to get to this point.

P: Thanks and umm I like both types one isn't for the other

S: Sure it isn't.
She was never one of those overly affectionate people. She did well with hello and goodbye hugs and kisses, and she liked having people near her, but she really had to make a conscious effort to give the motherly snuggles and the wifely caresses as freely and as often as her family required. But P made her want to be touched. She found it became easier and much more enjoyable to sit close to her kids to read stories, to cuddle at bedtime, to kiss away the hurts or squeeze away the nerves for them.

Her husband’s touch was familiar and deeply rooted in his own likes and preferences, and she realized that she really had no idea anymore what hers were. So in the quiet moments in the dark early hours of the morning when she was unable to sleep, she would reach down and slide her fingers under her pajamas and let herself feel what P did to her. Trying to be still enough as not to wake her husband, but still able to explore and learn the ways to make her own body respond, taking her time, taking forever if she wanted, not feeling pressured to produce an orgasm so that they could move on to the next step. Rediscovering all of the places, how hard or gentle, how fast or slow, what made her wet, what made her quiver, what takes her over the edge, finally releasing the desire that thinking of P created inside of her.

And in shower, eyes closed, feeling the hot water fall onto her neck and shoulders, she’d wish it was the heat from his hands that was relaxing her. And in those few private, hot, steamy minutes with the door locked and no fear of being discovered or interrupted, he become real to her. The water became his fingers pouring over her, massaging her body into such intense orgasms that she’d feel dizzy for seconds after. She’d have to close her eyes and take a few slow, deep breaths before she could dry off and go on about her day. Because she felt him there, inside of her, all the time. Every minute.

That feeling is what made her take the pictures. That feeling is what made her unable to tell him no.

P: So hot.

And it's the look in your eyes
Naughty like you know you are
breaking rules but like it. Can't help it

P was playful, leading her with subtlety and finesse, knowing exactly the way to break through her nerves and get her to follow along. They had a pattern. The first mention was merely to plant the seed. He knew she would balk and pretend to say no, but really she was just buying herself a little time to savor the idea, thinking over how she might actually make it happen.

S: Well. You've done it again. Completely
flustered.

P: Made you wet?

S: I am not sending you a picture of it.

P: Lol

Tragic

The second time he’d turn the tables on her, manipulating, daring her to say no. He made her consider that whatever it was they were dancing around was not so much something he wanted as it was something she needed. Something she needed to do for herself, even if just to prove to herself she could.

P: Question

S: Yes.

P: When you send me a picture of your pussy

I'm not talking about

When you decide in your head that

"if he asks again, I'll do it"

I mean when you want need me to see how wet I

make you

And I finally agree

Would it be rude to remind you of this

conversation?

S: What are you saying?

It's almost like you're daring me to send you a

picture. Like I'm a kid

who can't back down from a dare.

P: Incorrect

S: Correct me.

P: I no longer require a photo

S: So you're doing that trick they teach you in sales
training. Taking it off the table.

P: Lol if it's on the table I would say yes take it off

and find the spray cleaner please

S: What are you, 13?
Wait a minute. You're not really 13 are you?

P: Lol my mom says you are too old

S: I am so going to end up on To Catch a Predator,

aren't I?

P: Lol permaybe

If he had to ask a third time, she gave no argument, but often, there was no third time. By then he was right, she did need to do it. She did need him to see.

P: I love seeing you

Knowing you needed me to see

And she began to understand what it was that P needed. She began to anticipate his requests, and before long he didn't even have to ask.