Madame Lupe, Wanda’s dancing teacher, said, ‘The tango, she is a dance of love and courtship. The man, he tries to dominate the woman. She pretends to resist as she lures him into her clutches, when she “surrenders” and he is hers. The lambada, she is different. This is the dance of pure lust. The man and the woman are equals, both ver’ hot for each other. We dance from here.’ She clutched the crotch of her emerald-green Velour pants. ‘It is the love making while standing up, including the frottage. When the last notes of the music fade away, there is no doubt what comes next. They will fall to the floor and ravage each other in the frenzy of the fuck. You understand, huh?’
‘Yes I do, thanks, Madame Lupe.’
‘You are coming along ver’ good. Your lovers will be proud of you. Next time, I want to see you in four-inch heels, not those silly baby shoes, OK?’
‘I’ll try.’
Wanda rushed through her shower and changing. She had a lunch date with the moms and Henry, at a Thai restaurant that was on the other side of the city. After that, they had an appointment to try out flavours of wedding cake, then on to finalise the menu for the reception.
There was no reasonable way to do it by public transport. She was forced to drive. Inevitably, despite her GPS, Wanda got lost and was late. The moms were eating ice cream and drinking coffee. There was a blank place where Henry must have been sitting.
‘About time,’ her mom snorted.
‘Sorry. Where’s Henry?’
Lucinda said, ‘We needed the guest list so Henry went to fetch it.’
Wanda’s mom added, ‘I gave him a key to our place and the password for your laptop. He’s clever. He’ll know how to print it out.’
Wanda sank into a chair. Oh? Henry. Her laptop. The files for Dr Sullivan, full of her dreams and fantasies and the actual truth about what she and Kitty had done together? Cold slimy panic gripped her guts.
‘Oh! Hm, Mom, I changed my password a while back,’ she lied, though she’d meant to. ‘I’d better go help him.’
She tore out of the restaurant, ignoring her mom’s cry of: ‘You could phone it to him.’ She gunned her engine. How long did she have to save her life from total disaster? Could she cross the city in six minutes or less? She could but try.
Impending doom focused her attention on the route but it still took the best part of an hour. Wanda parked. Should she just run away and never return? Could she fake an illness and then a coma? What she had to do, of course, was go in and face the consequences of her libidinous and perverted imagination. There would be a price to pay. Henry would dump her. Her mom would disown her. Perhaps she’d still have a friend in Kitty, but she’d be poor. Filthy rich people don’t chum around with paupers.
Suicide seemed like it might be an excellent solution, if there was a way to do it that wouldn’t hurt.
What the fuck! Wanda braced herself and went in. She called, ‘Henry? Are you here, darling? Where are you?’ Could he have got himself lost? That didn’t seem likely. Henry wasn’t the type. She slowly trudged through the living room to her bedroom. Oh, God! He was there, intently reading something on her screen. It wasn’t the guest list. She froze.
In a dangerously calm voice, he said, ‘Good afternoon, Wanda.’
She gabbled, ‘That’s not real, none of it. It’s dreams and stuff. None of it ever happened. You can ask my shrink, Dr Sullivan. He’ll tell you. I have a condition. I can’t help those thoughts. It’s not my fault, really it isn’t. It’s like Tourette’s.’ She dried up and waited.
He looked at her and said, ‘You realise that this changes everything, don’t you, Wanda?’
Her last hope died. ‘I –’
‘I was going to wait until after we were married,’ he continued.
What on earth did he mean by that? Wait for what?
‘I’ve known all along that you’d need training, Wanda. I’ve been impatient to start, so I’m not that disappointed to have to commence now.’
‘Training? What do you mean?’
‘Discipline. I’ve seen your potential all along. After a short period of instruction, you will make me the ideal wife. You’re beautiful and have an incredibly powerful sex drive. It certainly helps that you are also sweet and charming.’
Hope bloomed, along with total confusion. ‘Thank you, Henry, but I still don’t understand what it is that you’re talking about.’
‘You soon will. Our mothers are going to keep those appointments without us. They’ll phone before returning. Those are the instructions I gave them.’
‘You tell your mother what to do?’
‘My father trained her well. Now, you still have that riding crop I gave you?’
‘Of course.’
‘Here?’
‘Yes.’
‘Good. Go fetch it.’
Wanda turned and walked away like an automaton. He wanted the crop? She couldn’t think what for. Come to that, she couldn’t think at all. Her mind was a total blank. It was as if her brain had frozen solid. She could do as she was told. That was the extent of her volition. The crop was on the top shelf of the hall closet. She took it down and carried it on two open palms back to where Henry waited. He’d taken his jacket off and rolled up his sleeves. What muscular forearms he had!
‘Take your skirt off,’ he said.
She did as she was told, still not understanding what was happening.
‘And the panties.’
That sounded nice. He was telling her to take her panties off. That had to mean that something sexual was going to happen. A corner of her brain woke up.
‘Bend over my knees,’ he said.
The corner of her brain closed down again but she did as she was bidden. His hand pushed her top a little higher and then caressed the cheeks of her bottom. She enjoyed that. He liked her bum. That was a good thing.
‘Do you know what I’m about to do, Wanda?’
She shook her head and then managed to squeak out, ‘No, Henry.’
‘I thought not. I was absolutely right about you, my darling.’
‘Of course you were, Henry.’
‘Ready?’
She nodded without understanding. His arm rose. There was a swish and a line of fire bloomed across her upper thighs.
‘Is this real life, Henry? Not a dream? Not a fantasy?’
‘This is absolutely real, Wanda.’ The crop came down again.
Wanda’s new life, her perfect life, had finally started. She’d never need to fantasise again.
Henry Chandler’s Cream of Carrot Soup.
Two pounds of baby carrots, chopped.
Two pounds of Vidalia onions, chopped.
A quarter pound of butter.
2% milk.
½ and ½ cream.
Salt and pepper.
One teaspoon of dried oregano.
Dry sherry or Worcester sauce.
Melt the butter in a large heavy saucepan. Add the onions and stir as you simmer until the onions are transparent.
Add the carrots.
Add 2% milk. Enough to just cover the vegetables.
Keep simmering until the carrots turn to mush, adding milk as necessary.
Add salt and pepper to taste, plus the oregano.
Keep stirring and simmering, adding ½ and ½ cream until you have a thick creamy consistence. If the mix gets too watery, slowly heat it till it thickens.
Pour into soup bowls.
Decorate each bowl of soup with a swirl of either sherry or Worcester in the centre.
Serve.
Leftovers can be frozen and reheated.
Alternatives.
Use chicken stock instead of milk.
Decorate with blobs of thick sour cream instead of the sherry or Worcester.
Substitute small tender parsnips for some or all of the carrots.