ANOTHER ASSIGNATION WITH CHARLES BONNET
K. L. Gillespie
The smell of rubber tickles my nose and it feels good as I stretch the elastic band out and allow it to snap back on my fingers over and over again. Each time I do it, the rubber band releases a fresh flood of aroma and reminds me of stolen moments from my teens devoted to fumbling and fucking under an old oak tree in the woods behind my house with Jonathan, the boy next door.
The rhythmic snapping hypnotises me like a metronome and the hubbub of my office blurs into white noise as I lose myself and my inhibitions once again under that old oak tree. The sun warms my face and birdsong fills the air. His hands are on my body and his breath is moist on my skin. He pulls out a condom and I can remember its smell and the way it felt between my fingers as if it was yesterday. I helped him peel it on and…
Trng-trng…trng-trng…
The phone starts to ring, ripping through the rose-tinted, sentimental memories of my youth and a sigh begins in the pit of my stomach and escapes from between my lips as I reach out and pick up the receiver, elastic band still in my hand.
It’s my mother; she worries about me constantly and phones me often. I struggle to put all thoughts of Jonathan from my mind and hers at rest as she bombards me with a thousand questions. I can understand why she worries, so I tell her I’m fine and pretend I’m going out with friends tonight. She seems satisfied by this and after a few minutes of general chitchat she hangs up.
As soon as I have replaced the receiver I hold the rubber band to my nose and try to recapture Jonathan, but my memories are playing hide and seek with me, teasing me from around corners and mocking me for not being able to picture his face. The harder I try the further away he gets until I am left with nothing but a pile of work to get through before the end of the day.
Five o’clock arrives and I leave the womblike confines of my office and step out into the great big wide world.
The West End’s noisy today and even though I’ve lived here for five years, if I’m not careful I’ll get lost so I cement a thousand-yard stare on my face and make a beeline for Charing Cross Station.
The traffic fumes sting my nose and the streets are full of obstacles to overcome. A police car, with its sirens blaring, half circles me as I wait to cross Shaftesbury Avenue and a group of Italians chatter away quickly to my left while to my right an American lazily notices the obvious. A rickshaw whines by and as soon as it has passed I take my life into my own hands and step into the road with a babel of voices ringing in my ears.
The next thing I know a bus whistles past me, taking me by surprise, and as the wind catches my face I gasp, lose my balance and stumble backward.
As I prepare to collide with the pavement I feel arms around me, fingertips pressing into my shoulders, and a distinctive scent enters my nose. Cinnamon. Sweat. Leather. Tobacco. A unique aroma which announces his presence with a bang. I breathe him in deeply, trapping every drop of his essence in my olfactory canal and savouring it slowly before committing it to memory.
This is love at first smell and I am overwhelmed. Suddenly my life becomes a compulsion to make this strange man mine. Unable to resist, I brush my fingers over his hand and a network of nerve endings dance over the surface of my skin, registering the soft warmth of his body and the faint pulse of his life force.
My senses are racing toward overload as I fancy I can taste his strong scent in the air; my mind wanders and I find myself imagining him in my bed, naked and sleeping off a wild night of sex. I would trace his entire body with my fingertips and then I would…
I am dragged back to reality when he removes his hands from my shoulders and I pray now that he has lifted me to my feet he isn’t going to just walk away. I still need to hear the sound of his voice to complete the picture and I urge him to speak to me under my breath.
“Are you okay?” he eventually asks, thank god, and his words vibrate gently in my ears. His voice is deep and warm, like butter at room temperature, and as he speaks to me the rest of the world fades into the background and his utterance fills my head.
I repeat his words over and over in my mind, and I can feel him looking at me, waiting for an answer. My face starts to burn so I break the silence by mumbling something incoherent—but I have no idea what because all I can think of is him, stripped bare between my legs, submitting to my every whim.
Once again my fantasies are cut short when he hands me my white stick and my heart sinks as I sense myself through his eyes for the first time. Out of pity he offers to see me across the road and I hate myself for accepting, but I need more to create him fully in my mind.
I know time is running out so I run through a mental checklist—smell, touch, taste, sound, all accounted for—and then the foreplay is over. He makes his excuses and disappears into the throng but that’s London for you, faceless, especially when you’re blind.
Nevertheless as I walk away I lift my hand to my lips and I can still smell him on me. He is under my nails and on my skin and I can’t wait to get him home.
My train pulls into the station and I search out the nearest door with my stick. I enter an invisible carriage and wait behind a gray curtain for the doors to close and sever my connection with the buzz of the outside world.
As soon as the doors shut I am alone. Everything disappears into a wall of silence, but I’m used to living in an invisible world. I know there are people all around me; someone to my left is eating a burger and the woman in front of me is wearing Poison, but I can’t see them and unless I can hear them or touch them they might as well not exist.
I submissively let someone lead me to a seat and count the stops as they pass until the tannoy announces that I have reached my destination. Only another 438 steps to go.
When I arrive home I head straight to the bedroom and begin searching my memory for him but his smell is fading and time is running out so I quickly set about slipping out of my clothes.
As I’m undressing I begin to wish I’d had the courage to run my fingers through his hair and over his face, but I tasted him in my mind after all and as I position myself on the bed I am sure that will be enough to bring him to me tonight.
The soft satin of my bedspread embraces my body as I sink back and recall the sensation of his hands on my shoulders and the taste of him in the air. I lift my hand to my nose again and inhale his odor deep into my lungs, trapping it there until I can hold it no longer. Cinnamon. Sweat. Leather. Tobacco. I run through the memory like a mantra and in the blank darkness I search inside myself for him.
I part my legs and my eager fingertips seek out the triggers that open up the most dormant part of my mind. Quivering with excitement, I conjure him and he appears before me, by the window.
I know he is smiling as he climbs onto the bed behind me and wraps his arms around my naked body. I can feel his sweet breath on the back of my neck like a cinnamon-scented breeze. His pulsating life force warms my skin and as I collapse into him, I place his hand on my breast and shake with delight as he squeezes my nipple between his thumb and index finger. His warm voice murmurs sweet nothings into my ear and I can feel him planting tiny kisses on every notch of my spine.
I can feel his cock hardening in the small of my back and I press myself against it as his hungry hand searches out the cleft between my legs. I arch my back and he slides his fingers into me, holding me tightly by the base of the spine with his thumb. I shiver with anticipation and hold my breath to intensify every flutter and gyration.
As I reach the peak of my pleasure I whisper the secrets of my darkest desires to him and he takes my vulva in his mouth and parts my swollen lips with his tongue. I wind my fingers into his hair and pull him closer until his nose nudges my erect clitoris.
Gently, I rock his head toward me, increasing the rhythm at my body’s whim until I am fucking his face with abandon and my senses shift ceaselessly, evoking sight out of sound, smell, and touch. I am about to come but the orgasm is secondary because a miracle is happening.
As I writhe in his arms the gray curtain that shrouds my life begins to disappear and he transports me to a world of light. With a cry of ecstasy I come out of the uncharted void, and for a few seconds colors whose names I don’t even know fill my mind and I can snatch them from the darkness. They pulsate in concentric circles like a kaleidoscope and I stare at them in wonder as they shift like curtains in a breeze before my eyes. And they are bright, so bright that I have to narrow my eyes to look at them, but they are the most beautiful things I have ever seen and I drink them in greedily while I can because I know they won’t last long, they never do. Then, with a shudder I am plunged back into the darkness.
Sex is my way of seeing and my imagination has a luminous eye. Passion gives color to my mind and for a few seconds I cease to be imprisoned by my own identity. Every time I do this it ends in a little death and part of me feels sad—because it was such a short affair, like the life span of a mayfly, destined to expire. But tomorrow is a new day and who knows who I will bump into then.
Sleep comes easily. I don’t dream but when I wake up my mind is still reeling from the night before. On the way to work my senses are on hyperalert and I realize I am searching for him in every person I pass. I can’t concentrate on anything and my appetite, usually so hearty, has jumped ship. Maybe I’m coming down with something. My mother phones and with three questions she has diagnosed my problem. I am in love. It makes no sense in my head but my heart understands, and an hour later I am back on the street where we met, in exactly the same spot, 173 steps from my office and about to cross the road.
I’m still there forty minutes later, sniffing the air, desperate for a hint of cinnamon or a whiff of leather. Waves of musk, citrus, clove, and Brylcreem assault me from every angle but I don’t find what I am looking for. He doesn’t show and I go home alone.
I’m not hungry so I go straight to bed. For almost an hour I try to conjure him before me again but he is just a shadow that lingers outside my window and refuses to come in. I know he is watching me though, and this quickens my pulse and I slip my hands under the sheets and slowly start to run my fingertips over my naked body. I know the contours of my body better than anything else in the whole world and within seconds I am rushing headlong into seventh heaven. I shut my eyes and will the colors to come, but I orgasm in the dark and it leaves me feeling emptier and lonelier than when I started.
I can’t sleep so I put the radio on for company and wait for the morning. The velvet tones of the night time presenter rock me gently but my mind is racing, chasing after the cinnamon man of my dreams. I try to imagine running my hands over his face, tracing the contours of his lips, running my fingers through his hair. It’s driving me mad and I know I have to do something about it. I have to try to find him again, starting first thing in the morning.
Sunrise drags its feet and I count the minutes one by one until the alarm goes off.
I rush through work on autopilot, determined to leave early; I was too late the day before and that’s why I missed him. It never crosses my mind that he is a tourist, or just passing by—something deep inside tells me that we will meet again, it’s just a matter of time.
It’s getting late and I’ve been waiting so long that my feet are numb. I’m beginning to feel faint and my mind has started playing cruel tricks on me. Every now and then I can smell leather or sweat or tobacco but never together, never in that evocative combination that identifies him.
There’s a war going on in my head and I’m beginning to listen to my own logic. I know I’m being stupid but rational rules hold no sway over my heart so I continue to stand there, smiling sweetly at every good samaritan who offers to see me over the road; feeling like a fool but refusing to give in.
Suddenly I start reeling with hope and my sixth sense kicks in, forcing me to turn round.
Cinnamon. Sweat. Leather. Tobacco.
He’s here. He’s nearby. I’ve been given another chance.
I take a deep breath and turn in his direction. I hear myself saying hello, it doesn’t sound like me but I know it’s me because the words came out of my mouth. The next few seconds seem to stretch out for hours. I can feel my face burning up and I wish the ground would open up and swallow me.
What have I done? My mind is spinning: Did he hear me? Is he ignoring me? Is he as embarrassed as I am? Is he still here?
Then I hear it, the same warm, buttery voice that melted my heart. He remembers me, he asks how I am, he tells me his name. Charles. I smile and I know he is smiling back. He asks me how I am and if I plan on throwing myself in front of a bus today. I laugh. He laughs. It’s all going so well.
He asks where I am heading and I reply; he’s going to Charing Cross too and he offers to walk me there. I accept and I know that by the time we arrive I’ll be 438 steps away from seeing again.