This time he isn’t dreaming. Her skin shines, slides beneath his tongue, the salt of her a subtle tang. He wants to consume her; he wants to savor her. 

He opens his eyes to see her. The air shimmers with their heat. He might be dreaming but he isn’t; he has been waiting years, anticipating but never quite believing this moment would ever happen. But here they are, at once familiar and entirely unknown, in a place neither of them has ever been. 

The room lies in disarray around them: bedcovers, pillows, clothing flung. His briefcase, open, spilling paper. Chardonnay dripping from the nightstand. All subsumed in quicksilver delight when she whispers his name. 

Ah. Her head bends over him. She is wearing her hair long, as she once did. He has an urge to pull it. Later.. They could be twenty-two again, except he knows it’s better now. Better that he’s found her for the second time-- she a woman, not a girl; he a grown man, not a pup. 

Jesus. She’s slipping down his fly, slowly, each little zipper tooth popping with anticipation. He groans. Yes, angel, yes.

This is what he’s wanted since before her marriage, before his. Since law school. Since college. Since that hard-on in Advanced Exposition. Since their awkward gropings against his rusted Karman Ghia in the parking lot. Forever. Wanted what could never happen but they both knew must.

She turns her face up, half in shadow, looks at him with long, glittering eyes. He feels himself pulse. Exquisite pain. Her smile is full of fire. He touches her lips with his finger, presses between them, watches the soft, bellowing motion of the flesh beneath her cheeks as though it were a miracle of physics. 

She bends her neck once more. Her mouth is on his shorts; her breath steams through them. Now she slips a finger between cotton and skin. He sighs and closes his eyes, leans back. 

She has bounced him out of his shorts like a toy, is stroking him with movements like liquid air. He moves against, between, around her flesh. He opens his eyes. She looks up and their eyes meet. She glances down between his legs and then up again, smiling. 

Now. 

"Nice," she says, appraising. 

It takes a second. A pop in his head like the plug pulled from a drain. Nice. That’s it? Nice? Is he being ranked? He feels himself shudder. Nice. He feels himself shrink. "Nice" is what this means to her. 

A quick shiver as the sweat evaporates from his skin. He grimaces, limp in her hands. 

She glances up. 

He looks away. 

She drops him and sits back, wipes her mouth, shrugs. 

"That’s okay, honey," she says. "It happens." 

He looks into her face, hard. The skin is lined around her eyes, the flesh beneath is dark. He realizes that she dyes her hair. He sees their encounter— their destiny-- for what it is: they’ll have a nice fuck.

Copyright © 2001 Maryanne Stahl. All Rights Reserved. May not be re-printed in any form without express written consent of the author. Do not copy or post.