Picture Perfect
by Michael Bracken

The lake house smelled of mothballs and dust when
I opened it a year after my husband’s untimely death at 54, and it took all day and much of the evening to air the place out. I spent most of the time unpacking my SUV and cleaning the house in preparation for my month-long stay. Then I uncorked a bottle of my favourite red wine and carried it and a glass onto the deck overlooking the lake.

Russell and I had enjoyed many an evening sharing a bottle of wine on that deck, and sitting alone in the darkness reminded me again of how much I missed my husband’s touch, his kisses, and his lovemaking. I had not been with a man since Russell’s passing – had not even had so much as a coffee date – but despite my growing desire for physical affection, I could not imagine any man ever replacing my husband.

The more I drank, the more I thought about Russell, and the more I thought about the many times he had taken me right there, on the deck. We would usually be leaning against the rail, admiring the way the moonlight reflected off the water or searching for movement in the surrounding woods that matched the sounds we sometimes heard. He would wrap his arm around my waist and soon we would kiss – always a soft, gentle, lingering kiss that grew more urgent the longer it lasted.

Before long, his hands would be under my blouse, then under my bra. We would peel off one another’s clothes and by then I would be wet and ready for him.

The first time we had ever had sex at the lake house, my husband had laid me out on the deck, but the splinters he’d pulled from my backside and his knees an hour later convinced us missionary wasn’t the best position on untreated wood, so I would turn away and brace myself against the rail as he held onto my hips and eased into me from behind.

Remembering our lovemaking excited me. My nipples strained against my bra and my panties grew damp with desire. I slipped my free hand under my sweatshirt, pushed aside the cups and stroked the erect buds. Then I set my wine glass aside and unzipped my jeans. I slid my hand under the waistband of my panties, through the damp tangle of my public hair, to my swollen pussy lips.

My clothing was too tight so I kicked off my sandals and peeled off my jeans and underwear, dumping them in a heap beside me. I scooted down in the chair and spread my legs, opening myself to my fingers. I slipped two in between my swollen labia and pushed them as deep as they would go. Then I drew them out until only the tips remained inside and did it again. I pressed the ball of my thumb against my engorged clitoris and massaged it as I stroked my fingers in and out.

With my eyes closed, I imagined it was Russell’s fingers inside me. I stroked harder and faster and cried out his name just before I came. And then I caught my breath, my thighs clamped around my hand, and I shivered as the first orgasm I’d had since my husband’s passing raced through me.

After a moment, my entire body relaxed and I sat slumped in the chair, my legs spread wide as I pulled my hand away.

The sound of someone coughing politely made my eyes snap open and I found myself staring at a young man standing at the top of the stairs that led down to the path to the lake. He was at least 20 years my junior, had black hair pushed behind his ears that brushed his shoulders, and he wore a black T-shirt, faded blue jeans, and black motorcycle boots. A silver chain connected his wallet to a belt loop and dragon tattoos covered his forearms. The bulge in his jeans caught my attention.

I quickly gathered my clothes and pulled them on. ‘How long have you been watching?’

‘Long enough,’ he said. ‘Who’s Russell?’

‘My husband. Who’re you?’

‘Taylor.’ He jerked a thumb over his shoulder into the darkness of the woods. ‘I’m staying in the Wilsons’ lake house. I saw the lights on earlier and thought I’d check things out, make sure no one had broken in.’

‘No one’s broken in,’ I said. ‘It’s my house.’

‘You haven’t been here in a long time.’

‘A year,’ I said. ‘Maybe a little longer.’

‘Why?’

‘My husband died.’

‘Russell?’

I nodded.

Taylor remained where he’d been when I’d first opened my eyes. He said, ‘So you’re alone?’

I didn’t invite him any closer. ‘Yes.’

‘Well, then, I’ll leave you that way.’ He hesitated before adding, ‘If you need anything, anything at all, I’m just down the road.’

I watched my young neighbour descend the stairs and disappear into the darkness. Then I finished my wine as
I stared in the direction of the Wilsons’ lake house.

*               *               *

Two days later, Taylor showed up on my doorstep with a bottle of wine – the same wine I had been drinking the night we first met. Not a brand that could be found at the beer-and-bait shop in the nearest town, so I wondered how he had come by it.

‘I hope you don’t mind,’ he said as he offered me the wine, ‘but I thought you might enjoy this.’

Instead of taking the bottle from his outstretched hand, I looked over his shoulder at the Harley-Davidson Fat Boy he’d parked on the gravel drive next to my SUV. Then I stepped aside and invited him inside.

‘I was preparing dinner,’ I said. ‘Would you care to join me?’

‘Sure,’ Taylor said as he followed me into the kitchen. ‘All I have is peanut butter and mouldy bread.’

‘That’s all?’

He shrugged.

‘Set the table on the deck.’ I pointed to the cabinets where the plates and wine glasses were stored, and to the drawer where he would find tableware and a corkscrew.

I tested the linguini, then lifted the pot from the stove and emptied it into a colander I had already placed in the sink. I rinsed the pasta, shook out the excess water, then dumped it into a pan of sautéed shrimp and vegetables. After mixing everything together, I transferred it to a serving bowl and carried it to the table outside. My unexpected dinner guest was pouring the wine as I placed the food on the table.

After we settled into our seats, I asked about the wine.

‘I ordered it online. Had it shipped overnight.’

I considered how much that had cost him. ‘That must have strained your budget.’

He smiled. ‘Not at all. I make a pretty good living with my photography.’

‘Really? What do you shoot?’

‘Nudes.’

I don’t know what I had expected him to say, but that wasn’t it. I quickly changed the subject. ‘How long have you known the Wilsons?’

‘Years,’ he said, as I served our meals ‘Mrs Wilson – Edith to you, probably – babysat me when I was a toddler.’

‘How did you convince them to let you use their lake house?’

‘They need the money, so I leased it from them last year,’ he explained. ‘I’ve turned the garage into a studio.’

I twisted linguini onto my fork and was about to lift it to my mouth when Taylor said, ‘I’d like to shoot you.’

My forkful of pasta remained on my plate. ‘Why me?’

Taylor stared directly into my eyes. ‘Because you’re beautiful.’

‘That’s kind of you,’ I said, ‘but I think we both know it isn’t true.’

‘Let me show you what I see through my camera lens.’

I had unintentionally shown him my most intimate parts. What could he possibly show me in return?

The next morning, Taylor arrived on his Harley-Davidson, and I rode halfway around the lake on the seat behind him, my arms wrapped around his thick chest, my heavy breasts pressed against his back. The wind whipped his hair into my face, and the potato-potato-potato rumbling of the powerful motorcycle acted like a giant vibrator between my legs.

We turned off the lake road onto an overgrown and barely visible dirt lane that led to an abandoned shack and disintegrating dock.

He removed his high-end digital camera from one saddlebag and another bottle of my favourite wine from the other, making me wonder just how much he’d had overnighted to him. We drank the wine from red Solo cups until I relaxed, and then he positioned me, fully dressed, on the dock with the lake behind me and the mid-morning sun over his shoulder.

He took dozens and dozens of photographs, touching me intimately but not sexually to adjust my pose between each series of shots. He never once suggested that
I remove my clothing but he did surprise me once while he was adjusting the position of my head. With the tips of his fingers under my chin, he lifted my face a fraction of an inch, and then he covered my lips with his.

The kiss was so gentle I almost surrendered myself to it – almost. But before I could pull away, Taylor stepped back and snapped several close-ups of my mouth, my lips still damp and swollen from our kiss, the tip of my tongue darting out to find the faint residue his wine-flavoured lips had left on mine.

He stepped farther back and lowered the camera. ‘We’re done.’

I stood and reached for the camera. ‘Let me see.’

He pulled it out of my reach. ‘Not yet.’

‘When?’

‘Dinner.’

‘You expect me to cook for you again?’

‘I’ll cook, Calista,’ he said. ‘I’ll bring steaks to put on the grill.’

Taylor wouldn’t let me look inside the leather portfolio he’d placed at the end of the deck table until after we’d eaten the thick T-bones and vegetable skewers he’d grilled for us.

Of all the photos he’d taken, he’d only chosen three to print – one of me staring pensively across the lake, one of me laughing with my head thrown back, and one close-up of my lips with just the tip of my tongue showing. I did look beautiful, and the photograph of my lips was the single most erotic picture anyone had ever taken of me.

‘Where are the rest?’ I asked as I flipped through empty sleeves.

‘I deleted them.’

Surprised, I looked up from the mostly empty portfolio. ‘Why?’

He touched my arm and I felt heat rush through my entire body. ‘I only want perfection.’

I swallowed. My nipples tightened. I felt myself dampen with desire. I wet my lips with the tip of my tongue.

And then I pulled away, breaking the spell.

My body wanted the young man sitting across from me, but not there, not where Russell and I had so often consummated our relationship, not with a man young enough to have been our child if we’d ever had one.

Taylor stood and cleared the table, carrying our dirty dishes to the sink and washing them while I dried and returned them to the appropriate cabinets and drawers.

Then he collected his portfolio and I walked him to the door. He touched the side of my face with his fingertips and brushed his lips across mine, leaving me hungry for more as he walked across the gravel drive to his Fat Boy.

In the shower that night, I scrubbed myself a little too roughly, causing my nipples to stiffen and my clitoris to swell. I’d not been with a man since Russell’s passing and I sought to punish myself for my unexpected desire for my young neighbour, as if scrubbing hard enough would wash away unclean thoughts.

My unquenched desire felt somehow traitorous, as if by merely imagining myself with Taylor I was cheating on my dead husband. Yet the harder I tried to cleanse away my guilt, the more I remembered of Taylor’s touch – the way his lips had tasted and felt against mine, how I’d felt with my breasts crushed against his back, and the rumble of the Harley between my legs.

I removed the massaging showerhead from its holder and aimed it between my thighs. I spread my swollen labia so the pulsing water could play against my throbbing clit. I came quickly, crying out a name that was neither quite Russell’s nor quite Taylor’s. Then I dropped the showerhead, slumped to the shower floor, wrapped my arms around myself, and rocked back and forth until the water turned cold.

Each day of the next week was much the same. Taylor took me to some secluded spot on the back of his motorcycle, shot dozens, maybe even hundreds, of photos, and then returned me to my lake house. He came back for dinner, which we prepared together, then he showed me one or two or half a dozen photos from that day’s shoot.

His kisses during the photo sessions and at the end of each evening no longer surprised me, but his lips lingered a bit a little longer each time, and one time our tongues met, briefly and tentatively, during a goodnight kiss.

At the end of the evening a week after the first photo shoot, Taylor asked, ‘Would you like to see my studio?’

I told him I would.

‘Tomorrow.’ He suggested a time. ‘I’ll be waiting.’

I had been to the Wilsons’ lake house many times over the years, so I was surprised by how nervous I felt as I drove up. Taylor heard my SUV approaching and met me when I parked behind his Fat Boy. Then he took my hand and led me into the converted garage.

Two Macintosh computers with large, hi-resolution screens occupied one corner, various printing equipment filled the end closest to the garage doors, and white background drapes had been mounted on one wall. In front of the background was a queen-size brass bed with a variety of lighting fixtures pointed at it. Beneath one of the computer tables was an opened case of the red wine, with several bottles missing.

Taylor logged onto one of his computers and opened up a web browser that had his website set as its home page. Then he sat beside me and walked me through the online photo gallery, showing me photos of nude men, women, men and women, men and men, women and women, in all manner of combinations, of all races, and all across the age spectrum. Some were candid, some were artistic, some were erotic, but none were crude or pornographic or in any way degrading to the subjects. He showed me the list of galleries where his photos hung and how people could order prints of his photos.

Then I posed fully clothed on the bed and Taylor took several dozen photos of me, explaining as he went how everything worked, from the lights to the camera to how he touched up photographs on the computer to how he printed the finished images.

‘These are just roughs,’ he said as he printed a copy of one of the photos he’d just taken. ‘I have my gallery-quality prints done by a place in Dallas.’

I visited twice more and downed half a bottle of wine before I felt comfortable removing my clothes and posing on the bed, and I’m not entirely certain how Taylor convinced me to do it.

He took several photos before he stopped to adjust the lights. When he reached the light stand less than a foot from the bed, I stared directly at his crotch.

‘You’re aroused,’ I said.

‘You’re a beautiful woman,’ he replied. ‘It’s difficult not to be.’ He finished adjusting the light, aiming it at fraction of an inch higher.

‘Doesn’t that interfere with your ability to take photos?’

‘I press the shutter release with my finger,’ he said with a smile.

I reached out, hooked two fingers in his belt, and pulled him to the bed. I unzipped his jeans, reached inside, and discovered that he wore no underwear.
I pulled his erection through the opening and stared at it.

Taylor’s cock was hard, harder than Russell’s had been during his last few years. I thought my husband had grown tired of my aging body but later learned his lack of rigidity was a symptom of the heart problem that ultimately took him from me. But Taylor didn’t have that problem. He didn’t have that problem at all.

I wet my lips and wrapped them around the mushroom cap of his erection as I took his stiff shaft in my fist and began pumping up and down. When I tasted a drop of his pre-come, I licked it away.

Taylor peeled off his T-shirt and unfastened the belt holding his jeans in place. They slithered down to his ankles, where they pooled around his motorcycle boots.

I didn’t try to take his entire length into my mouth – I knew I couldn’t – but I hooked my teeth behind his swollen glans and continued painting the head of his cock with my saliva as I pumped my hand harder and faster.

He reached down, threaded his fingers through my hair and held the back of my head. His body stiffened and then he came, firing a thick wad of warm come against the back of my throat.

I swallowed and swallowed again, surprised at how good it tasted and at just how much I’d missed the taste of a man.

When his cock stopped throbbing, Taylor pulled away. While I rinsed my mouth with a swallow of wine, he sat on the side of the bed, removed his boots and his jeans, and then turned to me.

He placed one hand on my thigh. ‘I only intended to take your portrait.’

‘But I need more than that,’ I told the young photographer as his hand slid up the inside of my thigh and I parted my legs. ‘I didn’t want to admit it to myself until just now.’

His fingers reached my swollen labia and I spread my legs wider, opening myself to him. I was wet with desire and he easily slid his middle two fingers into me. He pressed the ball of his thumb against my swollen clit and massaged it as he stroked the inside of my pussy.

As he stroked me, his cock snaked back to life and rose from his lap, as rigid as it had been before.

‘What is it that you need, Calista?’ he asked.

The steady rhythm of his fingers and thumb was driving me toward orgasm. I could barely answer his question. ‘I – need – you – inside – me.’

He leaned forward and whispered. ‘Are you certain?’

‘Absolutely.’

Taylor pulled his hand away and then he rolled onto the bed and onto me. When the head of his cock pressed against my opening, I grabbed his ass and pulled him into me. His erection sank in deep and a gasp of pleasure escaped my lips. I had forgotten how good it felt to have a young man inside me.

He braced himself on his hands and stared down into my eyes. I wrapped my legs around the small of his back, hooked my ankles together, and thrust my hips upward to meet each of his deep, powerful plunges.

I couldn’t restrain myself – I didn’t want to restrain myself – and soon my entire body quivered with orgasm. I caught my breath, then held it as a second, stronger orgasm tore through me and left me a quivering puddle of womanhood.

Two, three, four more strokes slammed into me, then Taylor came, too. He collapsed atop me, and we lay like that until his cock finally softened and slipped from me.

We remained in his studio bed for several hours and Taylor didn’t take any more photographs that day.

The rest of the month duplicated that first day in Taylor’s studio. I posed for him in the morning and he would take several photographs before he joined me in the bed. We had sex with abandon, as if I had somehow been freed of restraints I hadn’t known bound me, in the studio, in his rented lake house, on the back of his Fat Boy, in the woods surrounding the lake, and always his camera was close at hand, the perfect shot perhaps eluding him. Taylor never showed me any of the photos he took during the last part of the month and I never asked to see them.

The young photographer didn’t replace Russell, but my time with Taylor let me put my grief behind me and reminded me that I was still a desirable woman with a long life ahead of me.

Our last night together – in Taylor’s bed, not mine, never in mine – I said, ‘I leave tomorrow. I have job to get back to and –’

He silenced me with a finger to my lips and made love to me one last time.

I had been home more than a month when I accepted delivery of a crate from Dallas that was narrow but almost too tall to fit through the front door. I waited until the deliverymen were gone before I opened it and discovered a framed, life-size photographic portrait of myself nude. Taylor had found perfection among all the photographs he’d taken, and he’d signed the bottom corner indicating that the print was 1 of 2.

I stared at myself for a long time, finally seeing what Taylor saw through his camera lens.

I am beautiful.