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BLOGGER'S NOTE: I'm currently working on a bit of fiction because the demons in my imagination need a bit of excercise. Not "exorcise" asin to remove, but "excercise" as in to stretch their legs. :) I'm thinking of posting a disclaimer of sorts, because I might have to. In the meantime, please be advised that the current post "Part One - Thirteen Days" is a work of fiction, likewise for any posts pertaining to it. Just remember - it's all a work of fiction.

Part One - Thirteen Days Apr 5th, 2004 7:31:28 am EST
Thirteen days.

It’s been thirteen days since Elyse has been gone. Just disappeared. Gone. No foul play suspected, of course. Not a “real disappearance”, mind you. No smashed window and upended wineglass. No busted locks or sign of a struggle. Nothing as interesting or as dramatic as that, just gone.

Gone, daddy-o, real gone.

Her smart little overnight bag she used to take on her smart little seminar weekends missing, only she had quit her smart little advertising job weeks ago. To write The Great American Novel, she joked, although if that had been indeed the reason she quit he hadn’t the slightest idea what her version of Great American Novel was about. Only that she had stopped slipping into his office to watch him work, admiringly, to be sure, but never seeming jealous. She was far too cool for that.

Yes, he was a writer too, only he was incapable of holding a day job like her, especially after he got published. Martin Michael Reedy, author of the novels “Slick” and “Peasant Under Glass”. Maybe you’ve heard of him, maybe you haven’t. He’d assume the latter, though it would be just like him to do so. He had only shown up as a bright red blip on the radar of a few extremely fashionable style mags and web ‘zines where a couple dozen sleekly-dressed and smarmy kids that looked half his age were immediately dispatched to interview him. All of them seemed to wear the same cool glasses and chatter in the same coke-fueled way, though Martin guessed it probably wasn’t fashionable to do blow anymore. An army of identical hipsters descending on him like a plague of locusts to pick his brain to bones and spew it all back out in record time online, wonders of the electronic age they were. He rather liked them, those smirking, pop culture vultures with their PDAs and cell phones constantly bleeping and flashing, only the color of their I-Books to differentiate them. He liked the way they wrote, too. The constant media cross-referencing of his work to movies, to songs, to other books even, drawn from their vast internal databases. Their machine-gun wits and snarky elitism. Some of them even had a real future in writing, he thought, though never so smug as to call them the next Martin Michael Reedy. Who the hell was he, anyway?

Just some guy in worn out sweatpants and a holey Joy Division tee shirt with a wife gone thirteen days, apparently. Just another sorry bastard who hopes to roll over and put an arm around his woman and find out that the last thirteen days were the product of low self esteem and an overactive dream-trace. Martin Michael Reedy is a once successful author who now spends the majority of his time opening his medicine cabinet to take out a little blue jar of something bewitching his missing wife used to wear in her hair and smelling it. Not the kind of thing that looks good on some young journalist’s blog, he’d wager.

Thirteen days. Thirteen days and Elyse Reedy, formerly known as Elyse Macintyre was gone from his life with as little fanfare as she’d entered it. Martin was fresh out of college with a few contributions to anthologies boasting “Fresh young voices in modern fiction” as luridly as Live Nude Girls! under his belt. This was enough to establish him in the promising young upstart section of barfly society where he conducted himself in typical blowhard fashion in all the fashionably unfashionable pubs in the city. Little indie bars where one could down several pints from dirty glasses and drown themselves in a sea of feedback from local bands and the spillover of easily impressed co-eds with cute haircuts, dark lipstick and philosophy majors. Martin did just that, drinking in all the Guinness and the pussy one could handle, much to the delight and consternation of his quieter and shyer pals with writerly pretensions.

One of the bars Martin frequented was called J.J.’s, rumored to be named in loving tribute to author James Joyce. Martin liked that one the best for sentimental reasons. One of which was that he admired Joyce, not for “Dubliners” as any other respectable young writer would, but for the lurid and lustful love letters he penned to his common law wife Nora Barnacle:

“Have I shocked you by the dirty things I wrote to you, my Nora? My dirty, black-eyed schoolgirl. You think perhaps that my love is a filthy thing. It is, darling, at some moments. I dream of you in filthy poses sometimes. I imagine things so very dirty that I will not write them until I see how you write yourself. The smallest things give me a great cockstand - a whorish movement of your mouth, a little brown stain on the seat of your white drawers, a sudden dirty word spluttered out by your wet lips, a sudden immodest noise made by you behind and then a bad smell slowly curling up out of your backside. At such moments I feel mad to do it in some filthy way, to feel your hot lecherous lips sucking away at me, to fuck between your two rosy-tipped bubbies, to come on your face and squirt it over your hot cheeks and eyes, to stick it between the cheeks of your rump and bugger you.”

Fuck. Martin had to hand it to him. Joyce was a tough act to follow. He remembered reading a collection of Joyce’s dirty love letters and being both disgusted and humbled by the man’s apparent madness for tail. He also remembered being jealous of Joyce’s luck in finding a woman he could confess such utter depravity to, debase himself so completely for. Considering most of the women Martin met would blanch at the word “cunt” no matter now topically and reverentially uttered, that kind of prostrate intimacy seemed an unattainable fantasy. Still, though, how could Martin resist drinking in a bar named, however distantly, for the man who wrote: “It is wonderful to fuck a farting woman when every fuck drives one out of her”? He couldn’t, so he didn’t, and he drank there often.

The other reason Martin spent many a night at J.J.’s was that they boasted a cute redheaded bartender named Elyse who shook a mean martini and was always ready with a light for your cigarette. She listened patiently, a thousand times if once, to Martin’s thoughtful deconstruction of “Bladerunner” and offered her own cogent argument as to why the much more violent international version of the film was better. They debated about literature and politics hotly in between Martin’s innumerable skirt-chasing interludes, and discussed the ongoing battle of the sexes on the rare nights that Martin failed to close the deal. He liked Elyse, for sure, but in his misguided self-importance had made it up in his bloated, drink-addled head that her lack of college education put her at a distinct advantage. Somehow beneath him. Jesus. What a moron he was.

Years he had gone knowing her, this strange, brilliant conversationalist who lit every one of his pretentious Nat Shermans with her scratched silver Zippo and called him “Smartin” and made him laugh and mixed the best mojito he ever tasted, despite informing him; “only assholes drink mojitos” with a wicked smile. For years the only truly worthwhile conversations he had in that bar were with her and he still couldn’t see it; how perfect she was for him. How much more than pretty she was. What a jerk off he was for discounting her out of hand for lacking the proper credentials. And then finally, one night when Martin had struck out particularly hard and last call had been called long ago, Elyse turned to him and said; “Well, Smartin. Usually my policy is ‘don’t shit where you eat’. With that in mind, how’d you like to come home with me for a nightcap?”

For once in his life, Martin didn’t have some snappy comeback for her. His underestimated bar wench. His green-eyed confidant. All he could do was down the rest of his drink in silence before muttering, almost meekly; “Lead the way”.

In the two years they dated, not a moment passed that Martin didn’t feel like all that time spent at J.J.’s sopping up booze and chicks was wasted when he could have been spending it with Elyse. Elyse with her easy laugh and rapier wit. Elyse with her long body and ever-hungry desires. Elyse with her encyclopedic film collection and the knowledge to back it up. What a fool he was.

Before long they were married in one of those simple city hall ceremonies using the advance from his first book to foot the bill for a fantastic reception and a honeymoon in Jamaica. There they rented a bungalo in Negril and spent every night smoking joints the size of their femurs with the locals and fucking in a wild-eyed sweaty frenzy.

Somehow that good luck just seemed to carry over into everything, she landing a job at an ad agency writing some extremely financially rewarding copy, and he raking in the returns from the cult success of “Slick” and already working on “Peasant Under Glass”. They were young and successful and, for the most part, untethered. Elyse had made it clear that she wasn’t terribly interested in having kids, and that was just fine by Martin. She already had a daughter with a previous husband, a smug French art dealer. Martin knew Elyse’s daughter’s name was Samantha, and that she lived in Europe with her father, and that was about all he knew. All the more time to travel and attend hip parties and be fashionable with you, my dear.

Martin wasn’t sure where it all went wrong, but he thinks it was with that smarmy little fuckweasle that Elyse got paired up with at the agency to tackle a particularly huge ad campaign for an athletic shoe company. Jimmy, the guy’s name was. A skinny little bastard with a laugh like a jackass and an unsavory fondness for invading one’s personal space. Martin met him at one of those aforementioned hip parties and disliked him immediately, even before he noticed the sychophantic way he trotted around behind Elyse, hanging on her every word.

Martin remembered with the awful clarity of hindsight the end of one of their dinner parties, where Jimmy was literally the last to leave despite a million borderline rude occasions Martin had given him to shuffle off on his way. Elyse, who had displayed a disproportional soft spot for the oily little twerp on many occasions, shot Martin a look before finally offering to see Jimmy out. As Martin sat finishing a smoke on the balcony, he remembered feeling oddly aware that the goodbye seemed to be taking a rather long time. Under the pretense of refilling his scotch from the decanter in the hall, Martin stumbled into a seemingly innocent tableau that made the back of his neck grow cold for reasons he knew now were surely a bit of second sight. Elyse stood in the hall, head tilted slightly down, eyes turned up at Jimmy, with her hands clasped behind her back. Jimmy, back to the door and facing Elyse, big, stupid shit eating grin, slowly let the smile fade from his face when Martin walked in and rather hurriedly excused himself. It was Elyse’s posture that had made Martin uneasy, always a tough girl, meeting every interaction head-on like the ram that was the namesake of her astrological sign, he had only ever seen such a submissive pose in their bedroom. It gave him a sick feeling to stumble on it then, right there in the hall, with that punk. But he chalked it up to paranoia as she threw him a quick smile, kissed him on the cheek, and started up to their bedroom, casting that “are you coming?” look over her shoulder.

What he didn’t let himself think about until now was that she never met his eyes during that moment. Not once.

In the months that followed, they seemed up to their necks in success once again, she for coining a simple phrase for a pair of sneakers that became almost a double entendre of sorts, a few words that were soon splattered across tee shirts and billboards everywhere. He was navigating his own success, his second book proving that he wasn’t a man to fall victim to a sophomore slump and he could indeed pen a novel every bit as sharp, edgy and daring as his first. Elyse, as proud of Martin’s success as she was of her own and every bit as encouraging said she found it all very inspiring and was thinking of quitting the agency to try her own hand at writing. If the years with her had taught him nothing else, it was that his wild Irish rose could do anything she set her mind to, and hell, they had money to burn. She should go for it. You only live once, right?

Well, Martin wasn’t sure where Elyse was living in the weeks that followed, but it didn’t seem to be with him. She had set up a sort of office the next room over from his office that had previously been the guest room. If Martin tilted back in his chair at his desk, he could see outside his door into the mirror that ran the length of the hall and reflected the reversed contents of her tiny office next door. The little futon against the wall, the sleek little Ikea desk where she set up her Powerbook and typed away furiously into the wee hours of the morning, the cell phone that seemed to ring even more often than when she worked at the agency. He could even see the almost thoughtless way she kicked the door shut when she answered her cell, but he couldn’t make out a word of her hushed tones.

More and more he’d awake alone in their huge over-draped and over-pillowed featherbed that she had taken such great pains to decorate as opulently as some Louisiana riverboat. He’d pad down the hall and find her sleeping well past noon curled up on that futon in her office, cell phone asleep on the floor beside her. Later in the day he’d hear her from his own office blearily getting herself a coffee before having at the Powerbook again.

What could she have been writing, he couldn’t help but wonder. It was a mystery to him now. For the Powerbook was long gone with Elyse, and so was her merrily chirping cell phone, her day cream, her night cream, her cleanser, her toner, her toothbrush, her reading glasses, some of her underwear and a few of her favorite outfits. Was the perfume gone too? He opened the medicine cabinet and yes, it appeared so. But that blue jar of hair stuff was there. He opened it up and inhaled, smelling crushed flowers and spices and a clean wet smell like rain. He remembered spooning her in that big, Louisiana riverboat of a bed and smelling that smell, only it smelled better, because it was on her. He felt sick and tired and it was only three o’clock in the afternoon.

Thirteen days. Thirteen days and she had been gone. Was she ever coming back? He didn’t know, but he remembered when the number thirteen used to be a lucky number. His lucky number. Thirteen days and Martin’s wife Elyse was missing. Not missing like kidnapped-missing, missing like just-walked-away-without-a-word missing. What the hell was Martin Michael Reedy going to do now? He had been asking himself that question every day now, and had yet to come up with a suitable answer. He thought he might have had one just then, but he was interrupted by the doorbell.

The doorbell? Well, who the hell could that be?…

(to be continued…)

(1) Comments

Synesthesia Feb 18th, 2004 1:19:17 am EST
Have you ever gone to your kitchen wanting something, but not knowing what? You open the fridge and give it a desultory poke around. A few rapidly drying vegetables, a bit of cheese, a yogurt cup or two, no, nothing there. The cookie jar where you stash your eclectic mix of chocolate nibbles? Nah, not in a chocolate mood, surprisingly. You want something more substantial. You eye the bread box and decide a sandwich is too substantial, and go to the cabinets instead.

There you find the too-big bag of pecan praline granola you picked up weeks ago at the health food store and you know its probably stale, no, you know its definitely stale, but you find yourself tearing into it anyway, eternal optimist that you are.

And something happens with that first texturally unpleasant bite, something you didn't expect.

The pecan praline granola is hard and stale, to be sure, but the ginger and honey have mellowed into a strange taste that wafts into the nostrils and hits you as if you had taste buds there too. It makes you think of the sensory condition known as synethesia where people taste music and see sound. Where words take on a physical shape in the mouth and color has a smell.

The strange smell/taste of the granola sparks an immediate and sharp recollection of a certain night last summer, one you remember with a pinpoint clarity that momentarily transports you.

You remember the humid air lying heavy and oppressive against your bare skin. The way it made your lungs feel slow and sodden and your breathing deep as underwater sleep. You remember they way the clean cotton sheets felt almost damp, slightly sticky against your back. You remember hands sliding over your warm, moist body. Shaping you out. Defining curves and describing shadows. You remember the smell of lilacs just in season, a few sprigs of which you acquired dubiously earlier that evening from the neighbor's overhanging branches. Amazing how they can just fill a room like that, possess it, turning the very air around you purple with its tender, evocative scent.

You were as hypnotized by those tiny lavender blossoms as you were by the heat, by those exploring, loving hands. Oh, those hands. Those amazing, sensitive fingers. The way they painted small bundles of nerves luminous with delicate strokes, lighting up pleasure points with firefly glow that flares in the dark.

You are aware of how aware you are. The night, the season, and the poignant ministrations of your beloved have conspired to make you maddeningly aware of your flesh, aware of the air around it, aware of every little stirring, every little touch. Like a mild intoxication you breathe in this dream, heavy-lidded and passive, drinking it in through your skin.

And all of a sudden, it's like the night itself is loving along with you. For as your thighs fall sleepily open to welcome those thoughtful, considering hands, the blue velvet sky outside parts and begins sprinkling thick, sparkling drops on the warm, rich, living soil outside the window.

No sooner does the susurrant whisper of the rain fill the room then a cool, dry breeze slips through the window with catburgler stealth. You can only see the sparkle of each others' eyes and a subtle gleam of teeth as you both smile at each other and sigh; "ahhhh" in mutual delight.

And the smell. The smell is just like it is now. The ginger and honey smell just like summer rain, for some reason. Of heavy drops on the overheated world, on the dusty window screens, on the damp lilac air. Ozone and water and warm desire smell of honey and ginger.

And this moment will hang suspended forever in the silvery web work of memory, shimmering and perfect, waiting to be plucked some cold, gray day in February, and bitten into like a ripe, bejewelled plum. And you will pass the juice of this fruit from your own lips to your beloved's and smile as he says; "ahhh!" again, only this time with the same longing as you did when you found yourself with a handful of stale pecan praline granola in your mouth, plunging unexpectedly headlong back into summertime.

Soon, my love. Soon.
(0) Comments

My Thigh Makes a Lovely Pillow Jan 23rd, 2004 1:22:50 am EST

No other number in history as elicited more twitters, or given more pleasure, than the number sixty-nine.

69.

Everybody knows what it means.

I mean, my god, just look at it standing there! It couldn’t possibly be more descriptive could it?

It’s a visual equivalent of the old “thrusting-the-index-finger-of your-right-hand-into-the-ring-of-the-thumb-and-forefinger-of-your-left-hand” gesture. Which everyone knows is the international sign for fucking.

Or perhaps you’re a lefty and you do it the other way, what do I know?

Chances are you could probably go anywhere on the planet, possibly anywhere in the galaxy, and everyone will know you’re saying; “Hey! Fucking!” as you furiously jab your left (or your right) hand-hole with your erect digit.

People might laugh, people might blush, people might gasp and get offended. And while they may not appreciate it, certainly everyone will know what you’re doing.

You filthy-minded pervert.

And now here comes the somewhat unlikely number sixty-nine to take its place as a universally recognized sex symbol. Do you think its infamy is as widespread as that aforementioned bit of sign language yet? Can you get on a subway in Tokyo with your thick, black Sharpie and scrawl it on the plastic interior wall of car #6 on the express to Shinjuku, fold your arms and smile lewdly, confident every cat gets what your layin’ down? Will the schoolgirls in their sailor suits bow their pretty heads and giggle into their palms, only the tops of their rosy cheeks visible to you? Will the salaryman politely avoid your eyes, allowing you one last chance to save face? Do you think remote tribes in Africa will burst into spontaneous, delighted laughter as you use your walking stick to draw in the sand: “6...9”. Will they nod vigorously and knowingly, perhaps with their own variation of the “looks the same upside-down as it does right-side up” quip?

And how the hell long has the number sixty-nine been around, anyway? I know the actual number has been around since, well, The Big Numbers Bang, but how long has this particular meaning been ascribed to it do you think? I only remember having it explained to me in seventh grade by a bunch of horsy faced, sweaty, prepubescent boys, but surely this history must preclude my awareness of it, yes? It would be very vain of me to think otherwise.

And it’s funny how this curiosity didn’t strike me as particularly shocking or offensive or weird at the time, but instead the imagery seemed…well…rather silly, actually.

I wish I could say that feeling has gone away over the years as I have experienced the pleasures of “hovering just below 70”, but I can’t say that it has. I can’t get over the fact that whether I am upside-down or right-side up, someone has to not so much look like, but more specifically up, an ass. And for some reason I just can’t get past the ass.

(Incidentally, my issues with the ass in general is an ongoing battle with me, but this an exploration for another day.)

While I got the mechanics of it, felt and understood how something like this could lead someone to orgasm, I must say that I never truly appreciated how delightful the number 69 was until my adventures with LushBoy.

Until him, the ass stood between me and total enjoyment. I would be lost one minute in a sea of oceanic sucking, feeling deliciously helpless beneath masculine underpinnings, my hands stroking the strong thighs flanking my face, feeling the power of this dominant presence above me, and then all of a sudden…

WHOA! Hey there, asshole! Howya’ doin’?

I can’t help it, but I get a bit giddy. I start having juvenile, amusing thoughts that I imagined I saw daylight when he raised his head and opened his mouth to moan. I want to say; “You don’t have to wink at me anymore, you’ve already got me in bed, flirty-pants!” Or, perhaps; "Hey! Stop staring at me!" or worse; “Oh no! Here comes that asshole again!” I know it’s childish, but for whatever reason, I can’t help but find it funny. And while I am the first to insist that funny CAN equal sexy in almost any situation you find yourself, it just doesn’t work for me in this case.

Now before anyone goes thinking I have some miscast superiority complex in regards to being the bottom, I get even MORE distracted being the top in a sixty-nine. My ass, in all honesty, is not my best feature. It never has been. In fact, the only time I consider my ass even half-way passable is clad in a pair of boy-cut hot pants, and even then I have no damn business wearing anything remotely like that in public.

My ass looks bad in a thong, my ass looks bad in granny panties, my ass looks bad in bikinis, and my ass is simply no great shakes bare-assed. But hey, I can’t be bothered to waste my time fretting over such trivial matters, can I? No, I have come to accept my stat-ass in this world.

Yes, dear reader, it is true. I am the ultimate bad-ass.

But how does one get around the ass when factoring a sixty-nine, seeing as the ass is such an essential component in the equation? More to the point, how does one who is apparently so ass-distracted get around seeing the ass while doing the math?

Strangely, the answer came to me in a bout of utter sexual laziness. Actually, it wasn’t so much laziness as it was a deep and well earned late Friday night exhaustion. We had both had hard days at work and were winding our way gently and compassionately through the ways of love. We were kissing each other all better. We were licking each other’s wounds. We were writhing away the day’s tensions and untying each other’s knots with kind, considering hands. And as we shifted and drifted, we found each other in some strange forward-spooning configuration, literally staring down each other’s junctions.

What was now a peaceful and calm meander threatened for a moment to become a perilous journey of misplaced humor and anxiety for me, but no!

Without a word we folded into each other, joining mouths to sex sideways, my head cradled on the pillow, and him slipping his velvety-hard length between my waiting lips, and I bending one leg, like I do in most peaceful sleep, as an offering for his resting place. And as he lay his head down and his lips met mine in that secret kiss, I learned two things:

One was that I could arrive at the number sixty-nine working out the math any way I liked. (Oh, my love! Thank you for fitting me so perfectly!)

The other thing I learned was that while my ass may not be perfect, my thigh makes a lovely pillow.

(3) Comments

Thank you! Come again! Dec 27th, 2003 12:06:00 am EST
I have an idea. It may sound like the flakiest idea I've had to date, but it's "sound as a pound", as the Brits are fond of saying.

I want to open a sex shop.

No, I want to open a "sensuality boutique".

I have had this dream for as long as I can remember. When I think about the question "what do you want to be when you grow up?", it's not like I can say "an astronaut" or "a cowgirl" anymore. I'm thirty-one for god's sake! However, having a realistic mindset about committing to a career can be, frankly, a little bit heartbreaking. I suppose I could imagine other ways to make a living, but they all seem so tragically boring. When I think about commanding my little pirate ship of earthly delights, however, my heart goes all a-pitter-patter. I long to peddle sexual liberation, orgasms and memorable nights of passion! I long to counter shame and mis-information.

I suppose this is proof that I'll never grow up. The way a child dreams of owning a candy shop or a theme park, it has the same wish-fulfillment excitement about it for me, but dammit, I don't care! I don't want to grow up. I want to be the starry-eyed Tinkerbell of my own sexual Neverland. I want to lead people on an Odyssey of discovery of themselves and of each other.

But *unlike* a child running amuck and gorged on sweets, it's not simply a cheap excuse to sample the wares. Well, at least not *only*. I mean, after all that's a fine idea. No, I want to do this because I think I can do it "right".

I mean, I *know* I can.

In the face of the Republican legislation of personal sexual practices, I want to be the little bird on your shoulder that reminds you that it's okay to want pleasure. Of course you already know that, but who doesn't feel a little bit of a pervert when confronted with lurid packaging advertising ass-invasion and clit-blasting? No, no, we must do away with this shameful dichotomy; garish packages will have to go, but so will shame. In its place will be tasteful little gift boxes and transcribed information. Wonderful little shopping totes of alternating designs that could have come from any fascinating and exclusive boutique. Most of all I want shoppers to leave feeling that they got immeasurable pleasure at a bargain price. I want them to leave feeling empowered and a little wiser. I want them to leave feeling the excitement of buying anything they truly love: a good book, a box of chocolates, a fine fragrance, or a technological gadget. I want it to be different from any sex shop I've ever seen.

I want it to feel as safe and inviting as your best girlfriend's bedroom. I want it to have the informal and knowledgeable "vibe" (ah-ha!) of an alternative record store. Minus the snarky elitism of course. I want it to be a place people are delighted to hang out in. A place with a sense of humor. I want it to be an educational hotspot, of sorts. A little sexual salon where knowledge is shared and ideas are exchanged and creativity is fostered. I want to offer a cut of proceeds to charities like various sex-related help and advocacy groups. I want to assist in funding sexual health and educational resources. I want to schedule workshops for sexual challenges like sexy safe sex, reclaiming your sexuality after a rape, making love despite sexual dysfunction, what-have-you, in addition to the usual gay/fetish/couples-friendly workshops. I'm not driven by a desire for a personal cash-empire; it's much, much more. I want to do right by sex to make up for all the ways it has been done wrong.

I also want to do right by the retail business for all those that have had negative experiences working for someone else. I want to employ all of the talented, creative people I see every day whose brilliance is thwarted because they don't have a proper venue to offer their gifts in. I want these people manufacturing the exclusive products, offering ideas, designing logos, mastering the web-site, decorating the store & displays and helping in a million other creatively satisfying, invaluable ways. I want to make them happy and excited to go to work and to be able to make a living for themselves at something they really enjoy doing. I want employment at my boutique to be a positive experience that is much sought after.

I want to put a creative spin on what is sexy. I want to redefine "sex shop merchandise" to include things that stimulate every aspect of sensuality. I want to include candles and fragrance lamps to light & scent the boudoir or anywhere else for that matter. I want to sell erotic art and photography that can't be found anywhere else. I want treats that bring sensuality to the skin, the hair, the lips, the hands, the feet, the taste buds, and every other area beyond just the genitals. I want to offer untraditional lingerie that is so much more than a scratchy piece of lace up your ass and a bunch of boob hardware. I want it to be something cute, fun, sexy and comfortable enough to go from sex to sleep as easily as I do sometimes. I want to offer a library of erotic and educational books and videos that are, for lack of a better turn of phrase, the cream of the crop. I want to offer cruelty-free, leather-alternative cuffs, collars and spanky-gear that is just as sturdy and well crafted as traditional leather goods. I want my logo-branded tee shirts to be "the" fashion statement for cool, sensually aware & liberated people everywhere. The thinking persons' version of the "slut" & "porn star" tee.

And, naturally, I want the best, top-of-the-line, most solidly-constructed & most elegant sex toys you can get; strict quality-control on all merchandise, tested by real people, so everybody goes home happy. I want it all sensibly categorized; "this one's quiet", "this one's powerful", "this one's discreet", with a sample of each one laid out on tables so that you can touch it, turn it on, see what it does, whatever. I want the most knowledgeable and helpful staff on the planet to advise potential explorers.

Sure, there are shops everywhere that are doing this, but they are rare. There are only a few in my state, and none are doing it quite the way I envision. They aren't as affordable, accessible or agreeable as they could be, and that's a niche I'd like to fill. Sensuality for the masses! That's my motto. But what good is a motto when you've nothing to back it up? Yes, dear reader, sadly I am broke. I don't come from money, don't currently have much of a way to make any, and know no financial backers. How am I to get my little love shack up and running to become the amazing resource I know it can be?

For all my lofty dreaming, writing up a business proposal should be number one on my list of things to do. Even if it never gets me anywhere, there's nothing wrong with a little productive fantasy play.

After all, a girl can dream, can't she?

(5) Comments

Everyone Gets Lucky Once Dec 11th, 2003 1:22:11 am EST
Everyone gets lucky once, even me.

Even me; the unluckiest girl ever in love. Even I can get lucky. After a string of heartbreaks that managed to make my hairdresser scream, I finally got my lucky break. My lucky break was named LushBoy.

Well, of course that's not his real name, but protecting the innocent and all that. For you see, innocence plays a real part in precisely why I am just so damn lucky. Lucky, lucky, lucky me!

I pride myself on my lack of innocence, or, more specifically, my knowingness. Oh yes, I am very knowing. For as long as I can remember, the lure of sex has been irresistible to me. My deepest memories of childhood are rooted in it, thick with it, dripping with it. I was born adrift on a sea of sex. Dreaming in my drunken boat of sex. I have been studying it all my life.

From my first crayon scrawls of "boobies" and "pee-pees" and huge, round bums, to the dizzy adventures in summertime bushes with the local boy who initiated me into the ways of nudity at the tender age of six. Did I know that the pitter patter in my unopened rosebud was arousal? No, of course not. But my instincts ruled me then as much as they do now, and I knew somehow that this feverish, throbbing hunger and the sight of flesh were inextricably linked. So, naturally I continued my experiments as often as possible.

...And, as I recall, got caught as often as possible.

Oh, that I could have continued my research in peace! But no, 'round every corner, though I should say accomplice shrubbery, parental outrage seemed to await me! Caught with boys and girls of every flavor, en flagrante as they say, in some of the most compromising positions imaginable. Once with my bum pressed tight in a sort of gluteus kiss with the bum of a boy I still like to think of as Tarzan. Once with a girl, I don't remember which, as we stood face to face, fingers laying bare our most intimate of organs for each other like small, pink, bio-lab dissections. With the exception of the now notorious "bum kiss", all of these surgeries were non-invasive. Looking but not touching. Showing and telling. "Wanna' see me pee?". Mere technical demos. The occasional foray into public nudity. You know, an "I dare you to run to that tree and back naked", kind of thing.

...Jesus, I think I was even spotted and tattled on by neighbors! I'm sure I should be mortified, but the whole thing just seems hilarious to me. Beautiful, funny and slightly disturbing. My poor parents. My poor neighbors. Must've given them a fright.

You'd think after a start like that I'd have been a handful in my teenage years, but not really. It was all still show and tell, but now the biggest sex organ of them all, the brain, was beginning to swell and flush with desire. Dog-eared Nancy Friday anthologies spiced with some Anais Nin and lots of "supernatural horror". Supernatural horror is always a sure bet for lots of depraved sex. Some under the guise of ritual and some with the bite of a vampire as a penetration euphemism. All of it raw and blessedly hot. Clive Barker, I adore you! You wrote about what it was like to be a woman so believably that only an ass like me could be shocked (and heartbroken!) when you came out. But I digress.

By 16 I was a connessoir of trashy lingerie. I was long legs in high-heels and micro-minis and that retrosexual goldmine the garter belt. I thought I discovered the garter belt. I thought I invented it. Jesus Christ, why wasn't everyone wearing these?! So versatile! So comfortable! So nice to look at! I was doomed to be a pioneer of the garter belt all on my own. And judging from the disapproving way my mother eyed those black and white and violet and cafe au lait colored clusters of ribbons and hooks dangling from the shower curtain rod after I had carefully handwashed them in lavender delicates wash, perhaps that's for the best.

But still just sex as playtime. A glimpse of thigh here, just to cause a reaction, and falling into a swoon when I did. Feeling both powerful and prey-like, enjoying eyes on me but feeling oddly trapped because of it. Knowing that the way I dressed and my self-aware little gestures were promising more than I was fit to deliver. A spy in the house of love. Cock-tease. And even though I attracted hoots and hollers and sometimes very polite and ardent advances, I didn't feel pretty. I didn't feel beautiful even though I got red to my ears every time I heard it, which was a bit too often for my own good.

18 seemed a pretty good age to lose my virginity, so I did. I wish there were more to the tale than that, but there isn't. I was sure by that ripe old age that love didn't exist because I was 18 and knew everything. I was tired of sitting around imagining what it was like to nudged open, or rent apart, as the case may be, so I employed the services of a good male friend, who had once been a boyfriend, to preside over the grand opening ceremony. I bought condoms for myself unashamedly, and used them correctly and was proud of my own self-possession. He was big and although I was soaked to my knees it hurt like hell and it was sweaty and cramped even on the bench seats of his Ford Granada. Even "ribbed for her pleasure". I didn't expect to come the first time and I didn't, even though I had done so a zillion times by my own hand. And for you skeptics, a zillion is still a conservative estimate. We banged sweatily away at each other a few more times over the course of that summer, but quickly grew bored with each other. At least I think it was mutual, because it was around then that I learned how to screen calls.

Mere months after declaring "love is dead, long live sex!" I fell in love for the first time. It was as tumultuous and breathtaking as I always hoped it would be. He was a friend first and a lover suddenly and unexpectedly. It just came as a revelation to me one day. I love him! And I told him rather fearlessly out-of-the-blue and I remember him shouting with relief. He said we both felt the same way and only I had the courage to say it and he thanked me. It was, up until then, the best day of my life. It was wonderful and frantic and filled with laughing and crying; crying for joy and crying with heartbreak. We lasted a year. He left me for a girl I introduced him to 3 days before my birthday. I remember offering to be his "bit on the side" just to keep him in my life. His soft, curly hair and wild blue eyes. His brilliant mind. His effortlessly perfect body. Oh, my lover. I hate myself now for being such a pushover, but even still I recognize I offered the continued use of my body to him out of the honesty of my own desires too. You see, I wanted the continued use of his body as well. But he didn't bite and thank god for that. As much as I wish I wasn't, I'm too much the jealous type.

It was six years before I fell in love again, and it was even more tragic than the last. But both before and after, I began to amass some great stories. My own dog-eared anthology of amusing exploits all carefully chosen and rare but incredibly unique. Perhaps chosen FOR their uniqueness. Musicians and artists with a way with words and mild substance abuse problems. An unlikely, white-collar dom with a penchant for spanking my bottom raw and a tireless arm. A lovely, lithe European boy that I picked out of a crowd as the prettiest, only to find him also intimidatingly hung and with an inexhaustible lust. A man 10 years my junior when I was coming up on 30. (And yes, though the former was older chronologically, he was still a boy to the latter man. There is a difference that has nothing to do with age.) Even a girl who was my very best friend, and another girl who was sort of a friend of a friend.

And in between these these dalliances were what I like to think of as my occasional petty theft of sex. A few strange, brief moments that it seemed, not only to me, but the friends I chose to relate them to, as things that could only happen to me. A not-underage-but-uncomfortably-young boy who spotted me in a sexy goth club one night and sweetly acted as loving pet to me over the course of the evening's revelry. He lolled with his head on my shoulder, stroking my hair and telling me how cool we (my friends and I) were as though he knew nothing of awkwardness. We drove him home safely, a little higher than he was before he met us, but utterly unsullied. (even though sullying him would have surely been delightful.) And one night at a gay club finding myself crowded in a gender-nonspecific bathroom stall with a flaming "tighty-whitey dancer" who got me high, then showed me his ass, and then jerked off for me while I stood behind him. I peered rapt through the crook of his elbow with my arms around his waist and my hands criss-crossed around his perfectly pumped pectorals watching him pump his perfectly plumped cock, whispering my guttural appreciation. I couldn't understand what compelled people to think it was alright to behave this way around me, but I was pleased that they did.

But for all my adventures, it was all rather cynical, I suppose. Pop psychology would surely call it "intimacy issues". The older I got the more I liked to spend time on my own. This whole love thing wasn't panning out the way I had hoped, and there seemed too many compromises. Not to mention that even the two or three times I had been in love, wildly in love, I couldn't imagine spending "forever" with any of them. I was beginning to believe that the whole "lid for every pot" thing was bullshit, but I was oddly comfortable with that. I wasn't afraid of spinsterism because I knew I could do it brilliantly. I could still have lovers and guy friends and the occasional absurdist fling, so who needs a soul-mate? I'd be good at this spinster thing.

But the one man I continually discussed these matters with, my one guy buddy who knew of my junior league tart days straight through to my days of being bound and flogged, the one man who knew of my desire to boldly reinvent spinsterhood, well, he turned out to be my luckiest break yet.

One night while playing Telephone True Confessions, we began spilling our deepest darkest secrets to each other. We shared a litany of shames and regrets and secret longings. I had always thought he was cute and sexy, but far too valuable to fuck and therefore, fuck things up with. Everything about him seemed to deserve my most careful consideration. But I must admit, after Telephone True Confessions, I began having uncontrollable urges regarding LushBoy, this most special of friends. Just as we were about to hang up, LushBoy seemed to stall. This led to intimations that he had another big secret to share. There was much hemming and hawing, but LushBoy was very reluctant and left his final confession for another day. I went to bed that night in a hell of curiosity, waking the next day to find an e-mail that explained it all.

LushBoy was, in fact, an innocent. A virgin. I was reeling. Do they even make those anymore? Is anyone even born a virgin these days, let alone a virgin at 30? LushBoy became even more exotic to me than before, and I felt even more amazed to know him. Imagine me, jaded little me, knowing an innocent! It was ludicrous and delicious and when I called him that day all delightfully a-twitter, he wondered aloud what I thought he was going to say. In perhaps my only unguarded moment since the beginning of time, I answered; "I was hoping you would say you liked me!"

I immediately wondered if that wasn't the wrong thing to say. Did he think I was preying on his amazing purity?

...Was I?

In all honesty, I didn't know. I wanted to push, I wanted to pry, I wanted to grab and devour. I wanted to be his first, last and always. I wanted to make him mine, mine, MINE! I found myself strangely envious of his purity, not because I regretted my past, far from it, but because he still had sex to discover for the first time. I found myself excited for him, but could I bear the thought of his maiden voyage with anyone else but me at the helm?

No. No, I don't think so.

Sticky situation, this. It seemed unsavory that someone as rife with sin and cynicism should even be allowed to make eye contact with someone so innocent, let alone sexual contact. So how much of my desire was driven by greed for what I saw as possession of this crowning jewel? Did I want to fuck LushBoy before this revelation? Yes. Most definitely. I had often steered our conversation to erotic content in the past to test the waters, and had, on one memorable occasion, given him the "full court press". For the uninitiated, the Full Court Press is a friendly hug that lingers a bit longer than it should and includes a certain amount of pelvic pressure typically absent from "friendly" hugs, usually with an open palm on the small of the receiver’s back in a firm gesture of intention. It's a good barometer for gauging attraction but ambiguous enough to allow both parties to save face if one or the other isn't interested. Usually deals are cemented almost immediately following a full court press, but in LushBoy's case, the reaction was so unreadable that I was left baffled enough to suffer my attraction in silence. The taste of his flesh remained confined to late night imaginings and involved masturbatory fantasy.

Now, did I want to fuck LushBoy after his confession? Well, let's just say that after the confession, NOT fucking LushBoy became inconceivable to me. And this was exactly the reason I no longer trusted my judgement.

Although passivity never was one of my strongest traits, I made a concerted effort to leave the ball in his court. I made him aware of my attraction, gave him an honest account of just how far back in history it went, and then tried not to slaver over him like choice prey whenever he was near. We discussed options, fears and repercussions and, after years of knowing each other, went out on our first official "date".

He had already made it clear that he felt it was difficult for him to make any "first moves", and although first moves are my specialty, I found myself strangely humbled at the idea of being the first to hold his hand, to touch his hip, his leg, his hair, the first to kiss him.

Yes, dear reader, for LushBoy was even unkissed! Virgin lips, as well! Looking back, I don't know how I kept from bursting into flames around this rare delicacy! And what's even stranger is how he managed to remain in his pristine state all these years. ("It's all in the wrist!" he joked when I asked him that very question.) For here was a boy who was funny, smart, kind and interesting. A boy with talent and wit and a goodness that showed in the face. And on top of that; utterly beautiful and undeniably sensual. Full, ripe lips, laughing eyes, a beautiful boyish smile, hands that were capable-looking and lovely with a fit little frame to carry it all. Utterly fuckable. Any moral/religious obstacles? No. Any orientation issues? No. Any performance problems? Nope. Lack of interest in sex? "I wish!" he answered. Hmm. So what was the deal, you ask?

Far as I can tell, he seemed a big fan of unrequited attractions. At least, this was how it all started. He'd develop crushes on unavailable/unsuitable women and suffer his desire in silence. A completely acceptable quirk when you're 15, 16, 17, but as the years wore on, the idea of making the leap became more and more intimidating for him. Before he knew it, youth was beginning to skate past him with a speed I think we're all familiar with and he found himself at an age where confessing virginity became akin to confessing some rare and fatal communicable disease. The few women he did admit his condition to only made matters worse, treating him like some enfeebled freak. Oh, if only those fools had an idea what pleasure they missed out on! On second thought; I'd rather they didn't. He'll have an army of women howling outside his window like stray cats forever!

Kissing LushBoy blew all my greatest first kisses out of the water, and believe me, I collected great first kisses like fine Faberge eggs. My hand on his chest feeling his heart pound as if it would smash free of its bone-cage and spatter my face ruby red. Using my lips to lever his gently open. Feeling him flinch a bit as my tongue tried to touch his. Forgetting for a second the care with which I was to proceed and trying to snake my hand into his lap only to be met with his fingers circling my wrist and a soft but firm; "not yet." Ooooh, it was heaven and hell! It was a torturous rapture and even though I wanted it to go on forever, I was still me, after all, and I was dying to tear him open like a Christmas present and wallow in his sweat. We left it at just kissing that night, and I stumbled in my door after he left more turned on than I've ever been in my life.

It was a whole, endless week before we got the chance to sleep together for the first time, and I was as nervous and excited as I probably should have been for MY first time! For all of my cavalier, cocky attitudes about sex, could I possibly live up to his expectations? What kind of expectations does someone have about sex after 30 years? Would I be a disappointment to him? Was I even his type or just "any port in a storm"? Would everything be awkward afterwards? I was about to find out.

I undressed him with care, surprised that he was more muscular than I had expected, kissing him as I unbuttoned his shirt, tugged at his tee shirt, and just as I went for the jeans he stops me and says, eyes wide and almost accusing; "you too!" I laugh and do my best to catch up, for modesty's sake, and we unbutton each other's jeans at the same time. Yes, everything most certainly was in working order and I was completely amazed by just how substantial that working equipment actually was, laying to rest certain fears that perhaps he was less than impressively endowed. I fought the urge to grasp that long, thick, beautifully hard cock of his and drop to my knees for fear that he'd flee the scene. Even though there was nothing more I wanted to do at that moment.

Instead I took it uncharacteristically easy, every move tentative and rich with meaning and respectful of the newness of it all to him. I wanted to cement every detail, not just for him but for me. I wanted to savor every second of his shy glances, his modest downcast eyes when I caressed his cock, the way he made an effort to hold my eyes when I guided his hand between my legs, directing his motions. You see? Like this. Little circles. Feel that? See how wet? Kissing his mouth slowly and deeply, tasting him fully, meshing as much of our skin together as possible. Easing my hands down before my body as I kissed a path down his chest, his stomach, rolling my tongue around on that delicious jut of hipbone I find so maddening about boys. Feeling his fearful anticipation of my trajectory, seeing the sheets balled in clenched fists at his side and a "wait! you don't have to..." as I moved to taste him. I smiled and smoothed the tightness of his stomach with my hand and explained as delicately as possible that I knew I didn't have to, I WANTED to, not out of obligation, but because I truly loved this. I would show him in a minute and he'd see.

I will forever swoon at the memory of his sharp intake of breath and how perfectly synchronized it was with the elegant curve of him sliding over my tongue. I wanted to swallow him whole, he was so delicious. And such a perfect fit, as if he was custom built for me. I felt him grow even harder and longer, his erection pulsing and leaping with every swirl of my tongue. I could have loved him with my mouth forever, but I felt some reassurance was in order. I crawled up closer to him and put his hand on my inner thigh, which was slicked after only a few minutes of sucking him. See? I asked, sliding his hand up even further to my soaking pussy. See how much I love it? The almost surprised look on his face made me smile, and his eyes slowly grew more grave and intense as he kept his hand where it was, slowly working it back and forth, feeling me now, exploring. I marveled at what a quick study he was; the way he sought out my clit, finding it fast among the other folds and ridges, feeling its length, testing its hardness, watching my face, my eyes, as he moved in different ways.

Before long I began to ache for him inside me. I reached into my bag which I had conveniently left beside the bed, and grabbed a condom. His eyes darted from the small glossy square and back to me, his expression unreadable. "okay?" I whispered. He pressed his lips tight together, eyes serious, and nodded silently. I plucked the slippery ring out of the package and skinned him in latex as deftly as I could, straddling him cautiously as I finished unrolling. I paused for a minute, unable to suppress a grin and warned; "You're not even going to believe how good this feels." and for a second he smiled too before closing his eyes and turning his face into the soft folds of his pillow as I lowered myself down and around him, having to nudge things a bit because he was so pleasingly big.

And something happened to me in that moment as I was still, feeling his heart beat both deep inside me and against my palms which were flat on his chest to anchor me. There he was, stretched out beneath me in the flesh like so many times in my mind. My eyes stung and my head swam and my heart felt about to break with the perfection of it all. I want you forever, I wanted to say. You're the one. And I was scared for a minute because I never felt anything so all-at-once like that. I caught my breath instead and began to move, hoping that I could somehow transmit how deeply grateful I was for this; his trust, his decision to share himself with me, of all people.

I rode him until I was exhausted, awash in pleasure, fast and teasing with short, quick jabs and slowly and deeply, grinding myself against him until I came in long, undulating waves. When my legs became too shaky, I folded myself down on him, resting my head on his chest, and within seconds I was asleep. Apparently my breathing gave me away because he laughed and tenderly touched my head and I sprang awake and said; "Oh! I'm so sorry! I've just never felt so...comfortable before." and then I dozed again for a few minutes, still with him hard and deep inside me.

This, in and of itself, was an event. I rarely, if ever, spend the night with a lover, and when I do, it's murder trying to get to sleep. If I do manage to catch a few winks, I wake up constantly, longing for my own bed, a bed all to myself, until I can politely slink away and take my sleep deficit back to my familiar sanctuary. I preferred to sleep alone. Nothing personal, I just always have, and sharing a bed is difficult for me. But in LushBoy's bed, I felt like I was home. His sheets were soft and sweet and more importantly, he was in them. I never wanted to leave. And instead of fighting to maintain a little space of my own in his bed, I wanted to sleep with every possible limb wrapped around him, with my nose in his spicy, shampooed hair, with his skin all enfolding me, with his chest against my cheek, with his lips at my forehead, with his cock for a pacifier, anything, everything, I wanted to walk hand-in-hand with him in his dreams. To pull him along in mine.

When I woke from my doze, I began to move again. Fluid, dreamlike motions that merged us at the pelvis until we no longer knew whose was what. I continued for as long as I could until I confessed I was just too tired to go on. He hadn't come yet, and admitted to feeling overstimulated to the point of numbness. We smiled and kissed, fell asleep naked and entangled his hardness a constant presence against the small of my back.

I awoke the next morning still in his arms, with his fingers laced in mine and locked over my heart as if to keep each other tethered to the earth, to this warm, welcoming bed. I felt alive and safe, I felt strong and reborn.

...I felt that maddeningly yummy length of flesh still hard and ready between my thighs and smiled.

I rolled over and kissed his forehead, rolled him gently on top of me and grabbed another condom off his nightstand. He was inside me minutes after we awakened which is my favorite because it's then that my pussy feels like a soft, tingling hothouse flower blooming still inside some languid dream, even more receptive somehow. I liked the newness of his weight on me, the way he fit so nicely and pressed against me so perfectly. It felt like I was engulfing all of him, and I was so caught off guard by the ease and depth of the sensation that I found myself coming before I even realized it was starting. His eyes widened a little and he whispered; "I can feel that!" as I rippled and clutched around him. And as perfectly as mine ended, his began and he pressed into me, gripping my shoulders, and pounding me against him with surprising ferocity and letting out a long, satisfied animal sigh.

We rested in each other's arms a moment, and rose shaky and ravenous, dying of thirst. We had breakfast and spent the day lounging on the couch, sliding against each other giddily in the shower, falling back into bed when we had regained enough strength and then waking from a doze to find it was dusk and then calling for takeout. We ate and watched movies and fucked again, falling asleep tangled and sweaty once more, waking the next morning to find that same heartbreaking puzzle of arms and legs locked together as if we had been doing this for a hundred years.

It was the single greatest, most complete encounter I had ever had, and it continues still. We fall into bed with the same passion and hunger and newness every time, somehow. The gods sent me a lover who has not only learned my body and mind and soul so completely, but also seemed to know me intuitively from the start. I can only hope I have given him as much in return. Every day we discover each other. Every day we amaze each other. Every day we are grateful to be in each other's company.

My name is LushGirl, and this is my story. I have a million great stories, but this is the only one that means anything. This is merely the beginning of the story of LushGirl & LushBoy, also known as LushUs, yet somehow this is the whole story. For all of the details I have left out, all of the adventures we have had together since, and all of the adventures yet to come, this story as is complete (and as long!) as it will ever get. I have no need of gestures anymore, of artifice, of an escape hatch, of a clever and amusing ending. For every time I've fallen in love with a whole roomful of people at first sight this is the first love, the only love, the one thing you need to know.

So thank you to the Indecent Blogging community for giving me a place to tell this story, and thank you to LushBoy for giving me such a miraculous story to tell. I am unspeakably grateful to both. And thanks for spending your time with me.

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