I, Rene Mountbatten, sat in a little corner of the, oh, so elegant hotel lobby. I made a wish for action – any kind of action. My mouth grated, dry as the Sahara – all the booze last night; my guts churned – too much food; my head thumped – a terrible flight.
My husband, Ben, had told me that he wanted to play cards with some idiots who were on the plane. Hated cards. I had wanted a good shag and it was plain he hadn’t.
A man sat near me and flicked through a New York Times. This was my chance. I did not want to talk to women today; I spent my life with women. Three daughters and a surgery full of nurses and receptionists are enough for anyone. I am a sexist, bad, socially inappropriate bitch and need deep voices today.
He introduced himself as Solly Wittenberg. “My wife’s originally from Montreal. Jean. French. I’m from Buffalo. We live in Detroit.” A nice little potted bio. Couldn’t have been much shorter.
The specimen of American manhood was incredibly sexy. Why and how? An orderly bulge vibrated between his pants. His face was the kind with hollows under his cheeks. I’m a sucker for hollow faces. His lips curled as if about to smile. My headache was suddenly gone. Instead, I had an ache somewhere in my lower belly, an ache crying out for some medicine.
I tightened against the fine cotton of my shorts. He breathed as if a mass of electrons zapped in random – fizz, buzz all over him, vibrant. He floated across from me, his body hardly putting any weight on the seat. I imagined the tight soft depressions in his behind; I dreamed his clean-man air. I wove fantasies of touching him, sucking him, tasting him, swallowing him. I pulled his skin inside me, my skin inside his.
I cried in pain deep inside myself while they talked about the European Union, Scotland . . . I heard my own voice prattling on about the medical services in the UK compared with those in North America . . . and he was getting pissed off. All I could think about was the movement of his back as he thrust deep into me.
My family had often told me that I don’t have conversations but give lectures. No foreplay is as good as listening to a man’s voice and having that same man listen to my voice. I had to keep him with me. He had an aura of expensive body lotion. His hair curled and trembled off the tight skin of his face. I sensed myself feeling it between my fingers, comparing it to the fine curly hair he must have around his balls and cock; I imagined myself familiar with all his sweat and pores.
I said, “There’s a part in Fay Weldon’s book Darcy’s Utopia when a character says . . .” Shit, this sounded boring. He was going to leave.
He replied, “Fascinating. Interesting. Something to be considered.” By the blank daze on his face, he was praying to some god to take this dull, tedious woman out of his life. Beam me up, Scottie.
Oh, this man will have a long, thick, firm pink dink; I tasted it, the flavour made the skin of my mouth soft, warm; flesh, flesh, flesh. Lust always turned me into a guppy: mouth, no brain.
He asked politely, “You vacationing with your husband?”
“He’s around. Ben. Playing cards. Something like that.” I itched to get down and unzip him. Nothing filled my head but sex, sex, sex. All the time sex. Other people have proper thoughts about politics, business, art, work, brain surgery, economics, buying bread. He has deep brown cow’s eyes. If he closed them, I could lick the lids gently. Run tiny kisses up the uneven bridge of his nose.” . . . our problems in Scotland . . . “I sounded so authoritarian, so full of bullshit. Buddy, you are talking to the original nut here. He stood and held a hand out for me to shake. Such manners! I took it, shook it. I did not bend down, kiss it, infuse the jasmine of his flesh into my head, slide it right up between my legs. He pulled me up. We held hands for a moment too long. Too long in the best Harlequin fashion we were locked in gentle combat.
“See you around, no, doubt,” he said.
“Hopefully,” I said and regretted my shorts and shirt, my socks and my shoes; regretted the hotel, wild for a jungle, wild for a deserted beach, a wild underbrush. Blink. Life is real. Life is wooden. “See you around.” Stood waiting until he was gone as if I were a statue, frozen to the spot. The Greek statues were blind. If I had no eyes I couldn’t see him, couldn’t imagine sex with him.
Perhaps it was time to find husband? Must be time for lunch. In the daytime cave of the bar my “better half sat with three other people – two women and a man. They were vaguely familiar. They had been on the same plane. I hadn’t talked to them. He talked to everyone, bouncing up and down the aisle like a bad child. Mr Sociability when it suited him.
He half stood. “Hello, love, this is Jack and Linda and Linda’s sister, Fiona. They’re from Hamilton. My wife, Irene. We’re all playing.”
Play? What? Where? With whom? Why?
“Poker. Playing poker. Want to play?” he said without much enthusiasm, his words slurred.
They all appeared to have had a bellyful to drink and seemed happy. I did not want drunken, happy talk.
“It’s almost time for lunch,” I said, detecting a very definite whine in my voice.
He laughed. “That’s Rene! Always looking after my precious tummy.” He focussed on cards as he talked.
“Well, it’s time for lunch and I’m hungry. Are you coming soon?”
“No, I’m playing cards right now, can’t you see? When the game is finished, then I’ll have lunch. Not before.” His voice cut through me, cold as ice. This was going to be a fantastic, exciting, thrilling holiday. When he spoke in iambic pentameter, I knew it was going to be bad.
“Fine. Can I have the room card, please? If it’s not too much trouble and doesn’t interfere with your game too much. I have a need to freshen up before lunch.” I was excessively polite. He handed me the security card.
Had to pee. Wondered if I could find the room again in this labyrinthine place. Strayed along identical corridors. A sign said rooms 302-350. The door to my room was open. Their suitcases stop between the beds. I went in. The man from Buffalo sat on the toilet. The extractor fan buzzed.
“What the hell are you doing in my room?”
He didn’t seem at all perturbed. “I would imagine it’s clear enough what I’m doing. I had to go and the door was open. Guess the maids left it open. They were occupied, must have thought it was my room. My wife has the keycard to our room. They only give you one. Something faulty with the machine. Nothing works in this hotel. When a man has to go a man has to go.” I didn’t mind a stranger using the room for a fast pee but this wasn’t right, not right at all.
“You should go.”
“What harm am I doing?”
“It’s my room and I want it to myself.”
“Are you giving me time to wipe my arse? Finished, anyway.” He did the necessary, washed his hands and left the room without saying anything.
Now I would have the room to myself. My own hotel room, this home for the next two weeks. The holiday was all paid up, the plane did land, his mother had been bribed to keep the children so we can have this “second honeymoon”. Second honeymoon? Knew it was a stupid idea. Wasn’t the first honeymoon in “Romantic Bermuda” bad enough? One long fight. Ben and I did just fine when we saw little of each other. I would not play cards on holiday. Not cards. I sprayed the room with Xanadu. Peed. That was better. God! I’m beautiful – so the dressing-table mirror announced. Took off my blouse and bra. God, I’m beautiful. Ben didn’t know what he was missing. Silence. Peace. Cupped my hands and sniffed them. The man was on my skin. My own sweat wafted up to me. Peace after the roar of the engines. Rubbed oil on my nipples and they stood out red and hard. I had to have the most beautiful nipples in the world. Turned round to look at my butt. Not bad for a lady of thirty-something with three children. Not bad at all. Not a rear-end to be ashamed of. Took my new bikini out of the case and dragged off my shorts. This totally beautiful naked woman. God, I’m beautiful. I lay on the bed and concentrated on how the holiday should go.
For a start there would be a knock on the door. I would be naked.
“Who is it?”
“It’s me, the man from Buffalo. Forgot my book. Can I retrieve it, please?” His voice soft and polite.
God, this man is too polite. Politeness deserves politeness in return. He used my toilet uninvited and I will answer the door naked.
He drifted past me as if he was used to people who answered the door naked.
I reclined on the bed, leaned on one elbow. I was in the mood for . . . whatever.
“I left it on the chair beside the bed.” He found it and stood holding it. “Going swimming?”
Stupid question. His short tight blond curls glistened in the shuttered afternoon sun. He had to have the blondest hair ever seen on man. Not fair for a man to have such beautiful hair. I ran my hands up and down my legs, stroked a nipple. “Getting changed. Felt tired. Needed a rest. You flew in today? Is the book any good?” I combed the rich, black hair between my legs with my fingers. The curtains drifted in and out in the gentle breeze of the air-conditioner.
“Detroit. The book is good. Took your suggestion and picked up Darcy’s Utopia in the shop across the square. They have a good selection. Started it when . . .” He indicated the toilet.
I nodded. “How nice. Yes. Nice. What do you do?”
“Flower business. What do you do?”
“Nice to have a flower shop. What do I do? Doctor. Skins.”
Long, long legs finished somewhere under his arms. I would have given my right arm to have legs like that. He wore short, short, blue shorts and every fold of his body knobbed plain under them. He sat on the edge of the bed and fondled the cover. A long slow shrug. Every cell of my skin tingled, exploded, effervesced.
He said, “It’s cool here. We’re in the other block, the annexe . . . cold there but cool here.”
I shifted over slightly so he could have some room. “How was your flight?”
Oh, this conversation was moronic. I knew it and I knew he knew it. I would have to create something better than this.
“Same as yours, I guess. Boring.”
I stroked my belly, imagined it was his belly. “Husband is playing cards. Hate cards. Not much point in coming on holiday and being bored, is there? Especially when it’s a second honeymoon.”
“Yours, too?” he said. “It’s our second honeymoon too.”
“Funny that, isn’t it? Both on second honeymoons and my husband playing cards. Well . . . now he’s shit-faced.”
“My wife departed on a bus tour. Detest them. Usually I ends up in some bar picking up someone to talk to. She’s amused by talking to strangers. Never talks to me. Well . . . sometimes talks but never listens. Same, every holiday. Talk, talk, all the time.”
“That’s nice. Better than playing cards. What’s her name?”
“Lisanne. And yours – I mean your husband’s?”
“Ben.”
“That’s nice. And yours?”
“Rene.” He toed off his sandals and rested back against the pillows. “You smell nice,” he said.
“Thanks.” I bent over and sniffed behind his ears. “So do you.” He had large strong ears. I liked ears. Ears are the nicest part of a man I sometimes thought. I licked the lobes one by one. “Ummm. Now you.”
He lightly feathered each nipple with his lips and then licked them; he rolled them round in his mouth, turn about turn. So delicately, it was hardly a touch. He folded my breasts together, the dark line between them concentrating the oil I had used earlier. He ran his tongue down the valley, down my belly down to my belly button. I took in a deep breath. Lovely. I nibbled up and down his strong thick biceps. He tasted of clean flesh, chocolate, mineral water, gin, honeysuckle . . .
He slipped off his shirt and lay back on the bed. His giant hard-on pushing against the denim of his shorts. I got up and locked the door. Let Ben Dearest come and bang on it. He should have taken up the invitation when it was offered. I worked too hard to miss one day of holiday. The only sound was the hum of the air conditioner and the occasional crackle of starched sheets.
Solly was smiling and drinking in my body. Oh, I could tell he liked it. I sat on the bed and looked down at him. Unzipped his shorts and tugged them down. He was beautiful. He was plainly a man who kept himself fit. Not a spare bit of flab on that body. Tight. The muscles of his abdomen rippled as I ran my fingers up and down them. His balls were neat and tucked in. His circumcised cock rested like a tree trunk, thick, solid, against the hollow of his belly. I bent down to nuzzle him. Big on nuzzling, I was, like a cat. A man had to smell right for me. Yes, male musk, clean sweat. I licked his cock up the shaft and finished with a kiss on the tip of his nub.
“No way. My turn, first,” he said and sat up. He stretched me out so I was exposed on the bed absolutely straight. He kissed me, running his tongue round and round just inside my lips. He lifted my arms right above my head and kissed under each arm in turn. He sniffed me like a dog sniffs a tree.
“I always sniff. Scents really turn me on.”
“Funny. Me too.”
“You smell like jasmine.”
“You smell like vanilla.”
He moaned and sucked my nipples, rolling them round and round. “Your tits taste of brandy.”
I sighed. I was going to rise off the bed and fly like an angel. It had been so long since I had a good fuck I could come any minute. All of my body cried out for it. Cried. Wept. Moaned. Shouted.
He crouched down between my legs and opened me like a flower. He divided the thick black hair so he could see what he was doing. In the mirror of the sliding door of the wardrobe, I saw this gorgeous man bending over the body of this beautiful woman and I was amazed that it was Rene. He spread my lips gently to expose my clitoris and ran his fingers down it as nimbly as warm water tumbles over pebbles in a tropic stream. I raised my body to his face. He wet a finger and just touched the tip of my clitoris. Then the tip of his tongue contacted it. He rolled his tongue into me as if it would reach right into me as far as my cervix. Now he was pulsing his own rhythm, he was moving with me, his tongue circling, circling and rolling against me. He relaxed away from me and I tried to tip his head back to its place but he sat up and kissed me. I tasted myself and him mixed: his lips and the slightly sweet love juice of my own. My orgasm was building up from my vagina into my chest, right into my head. He reached over and fumbled in the pocket of his shorts and took out a small packet.
“Well done,” I said.
“Always prepared,” he said.
“Me too, but they’re in the suitcase.” I sat up on his thighs. He opened the packet and took the condom out. I laughed. “Good god! What on earth?” He had a blue condom, with gold spots.
He smiled. “Way out. Blue spotted. I mean . . . Couldn’t resist it.”
I slid it onto his cock and it became a leopard spotted thing. His balls were tight and so close to his body there was nothing spare, nothing hanging loose. I kissed the tip. The rich, aromatic taste of jelly babies. Good.
“Time to get down to things.” Down to it he did. He bent me over the edge of the bed and pushed his cock into me, right into me until it was part of my own body. I knew I was coming, coming with the largest orgasm ever. He supported himself with one hand and the important finger of the other hand did its thing on my clit. Nothing, but nothing would stop me now. He readjusted his angle and I grabbed his hand and replaced the finger at my clitoris and now he was in the rhythm and I was sure that he was coming and nothing mattered but that great dick inside me and he was coming into me and I was coming and I pulled his hand away so he could concentrate on his own orgasm and fingered myself so I came with him and I did and did and did and went on coming and coming, using his spent dick like a dildo. He was wonderful. Wonderful.
He finally let his cock slip out and went into the bathroom to do the necessary. I stretched, collapsed on the bed, tried to find my body again. It was all in bits in the galaxy somewhere.
He returned to sit beside me, a towel wrapped round his waist. He ran a hand up and down my body. “Do you think we should bother with our spouses or just disappear and leave them to themselves? Your husband and my wife.”
“Well . . . see them later, perhaps. Depends how we feel.”
“Sure.”
“We could both go for a swim.” I liked the idea of a swim.
“Then perhaps . . . see what happens.” He absently stroked my breasts.
“Sounds good to me. Isn’t it funny about the second honeymoon bit?” His cock was again hard and sticking out making an umbrella of the towel.” We are to be on our own, more or less. So it seems. We should amuse ourselves. It could well be a second honeymoon but not you and your wife and me and my husband.”
Yes, this is what would happen. I willed it to happen. Perhaps later I would hang around the pool and see if I could bump into him. And if I didn’t, so what? I would have him in my mind and it most likely would be better than anything that would be real.