Elle

She laughs uproariously. When she stops laughing, we go back inside and go to bed, leaving the dirty dishes on the balcony.

I sleep the sleep of the dead and there are no more incidents that night. But there is still tomorrow and we don't know how many tomorrows are yet to come.

* * * * *

I wake to a bright and hot morning—one of those days when you pray for an occasional breeze or the chance of rain. Anything to upset the status quo.

I slip into a pair of shorts and a T-shirt and walk into the kitchen barefoot. There, I brew coffee and then gather up all our dirty dishes from the balcony and wash them. As I'm putting them away in the cabinet, Elle enters the kitchen, shrugging into her robe.

"Good morning," she says over a yawn.

"Morning," I say. "I slept like a log. How about you?"

A slow smile parts her lips. "Me too."

The coffee has finished perking, so I pour us two cups and we sit at the table, drinking it after it cools down enough.

"What's the plan today," I ask, carefully avoiding our conversation from last night. I've decided to let that one go, because there's nothing to be gained by pursuing it.

"I don't know. Mom's supposed to meet us here at ten this morning. What time is it?"

I stand to look at the clock on the range. "Eight-fifteen."

"Oh, plenty of time. You're already dressed," she says, blushing lightly, "but I need to be dressed when she comes."

I look away from her. I'm uncomfortable with her embarrassment this morning. I'm often ill at ease in situations like this.

"This is just something I put on when I get up. I have to get cleaned up," I say, finishing my coffee. "I'll jump in the shower." As I'm crossing to go into the bathroom, I wonder if I should have let her go first.

A half-hour later, I'm out of the bathroom and getting dressed in another pair of shorts and another T-shirt—cleaner ones—in the bedroom when I hear the shower go on and know Elle's in there now.

I finish dressing and sit on the side of the bed where she'd slept. The aroma of sweat—I'm sorry, perspiration—rose to my nostrils . . . and something else. A faint woman's smell unlike any I'd smelled before. There's something different about it. Sweet—but that wasn't it. I'd never realized that one woman might smell unlike any other woman. What is it? An aroma of vanilla? Maybe. Whatever it is, it's tantalizing to my senses.

At ten minutes after ten, Mother Dearest arrives just slightly late, but with an entourage of men behind her, lugging—from the looks of it—a bulky and heavy box. She kisses me on my cheek as she always does and then ignoring me, she directs the laborers to do her will.

Elle comes out of the bedroom dressed in a pair of slacks and an almost too-tight silk shirt and watches with confusion as her mother dominates the apartment. When the men are through taking directions from her, they leave and an air conditioner is installed in my one window in the living room. I stare at it in total disbelief. Mother Dearest walks over to it, flips on the switch, and the apartment slowly fills with cool air.

* * * * *

We have been living with air conditioning now for two days and I have to admit that it's wonderful, but I see a problem ahead. When the time comes for Elle to move back with her lover, is she going to be able to lug the air conditioner with her? And once used to it, am I going to be able to give it up?

I'm working evenings at the New Yorker now, so Elle and her mother go out to dinner every night alone. After her mother leaves each evening, Elle complains to me, but her mother is unstoppable.

Elle's wardrobe keeps swelling and she's slowly pushing my stuff out of the closet. At least it's only stuff relating to my boyhood—which I can neither wear nor find any practical use for—that's getting displaced. But Mother cannot see her daughter in this wretched city without the proper wardrobe.

One day, I come home and there's a brand new sofa and chairs in my living room and a brand new outdoors set on my balcony. It's days before I find out what happened to my old and well-worn furniture. It never sees my apartment again.

Elle has taken to sleeping on the couch again. I'm both relieved and hurt by that, but I never say a word to Elle. Just as I say nothing about her mother throwing away my stuff.

But it finally comes time to talk to Elle. We have to put a stop to my growing fear that once Elle's free to leave, all the furniture in the apartment will go too and I'll be left with nothing—seeing as her mother had seen fit to throw all my stuff away.

Elle snickers when I bring up my fears, but I quickly learn she's snickering at her mother—not me. But of course, Mother isn't here.

"Don't worry, Jules. You can have all of it when I leave. Sam has all the niceties we need. We don't need my mother's charity."

"Neither did I—before," I told her.

"Yeah, I know that, Jules. You're a prince for putting up with all this. I've been wondering how much you were going to take—when you were going to give me up to my mother. I don't know how I'll ever thank you for this." She crosses to me and gives me a warm, gentle kiss. Then she crosses back toward her chair, but before she gets there she turns and she says with a smile, "But I've been thinking of a way."

There is something about her—something erotic. No, something . . . I can't put my finger on it, but it makes my heart leap and I find myself getting light-headed.

I try to smile, but I'm not sure I pull it off. "And what are you thinking of doing?"

"We'll discuss that tonight. You have to go to work, don't you?"

I look at my watch and stand. "Christ, I'm late," I say and rush out.

* * * * *

Elle's curious statement leaves my mind completely a few minutes after I arrive at The New Yorker. I hadn't known anything about it since I'd been out of sorts and not watching the television or reading the news. A flu epidemic had hit the city and lots of people hadn't come into work. I'm one of the few who had come in and they hadn't really expected me. But now that I'm here, they make good use of me. I become a runner and I'm running from one department to another, doing anything I can to fill in—get coffee, get donuts, get lunch, and—as it turns out—write my very first column for a legitimate magazine.

By the end of the day, thoughts of greatness are swirling in my mind, so Elle's words upon my entering the apartment completely floor me. They probably would've floored me anyway.

"Jules, I've decided to take you up on it," she says in a matter of fact manner—as if she were discussing some other subject altogether. But still, there's a rosy glow suffusing her cheeks that could blind a weaker-eyed person.

I simply stare at her—thoughts of my imminent success flying from my mind. Stunned, I know I must have my mouth hanging open and a goo-goo eyed dreamy look on my face.

"You what?" I manage to get out, my pulse pounding in my ears.

She reddens anew. "I want to—as you put it—use you as a dildo. I just can't take it anymore." She stomps her feet on the resilient wood floor. "I'm so horny I'm climbing walls." Her blush deepens. "When you and Mother aren't here, of course."

Walking closer to her, my sense of responsibility kicks in. "Are you sure? Have you thought this through?"

Looking down at the floor, she nods. Then she looks up at me and says, "I've thought it through."

I take her in my arms then and hold her. My eyes are actually welling with tears of joy.

"Why did you decide this? And don't give me that climbing-the-walls bit." I push her away, so I can see her eyes, afraid of what I'm going to see, but needing to be sure. "I don't want you to do this for me—not me alone, Elle. I love you—you know that—but if I can't have you, I'll live. I don't want you to do something you're going to regret."

She smiles for the first time and her eyes fill with tears. "It isn't just for you, Jules. I've become curious, too."

She leads me to the couch and we sit there while she continues, "You know I've never been with a man, but I don't have a hymen anymore for you to break. So that's not a problem—or an obstacle I guess is a better way of saying it. You know that part of my . . . fear of men has to do with hairy men, but you don't have a lot of hair."

I nod, not sure if that's a compliment or not.

She smiles. "Enough, but not too much anyway. Well, then I also have to admit I'm very horny. I haven't had sex for several weeks now and Sam and I . . . well, we did it every night. So when I took that into consideration too, it was enough for me to want to try it. I need to try it."

I look at her dumbfounded, almost sorry our relationship is about to change so drastically. That she'll never be just my friend—she'll be my lover, too.

"And," she adds, "I want to try it with you."

I nod again, still unsure if I know what she's saying.

"Now," she urges me.

I stand, reach for her hand, and pull her up to a standing position. I kiss her on the lips and then lead her into the bedroom. She's out of her clothing in a flash and helps me get undressed, because of my natural slowness—or reticence.

Calling on every lovemaking experience I've ever had, I then take charge completely, determined to make this the cornerstone of her heterosexual sex life—one she'll remember no matter where her choices take her after this.

I kiss her again and her mouth opens for me, surrendering the one physical act she's never given me. We kiss for a long time, exploring, playing. That familiar scent of vanilla charges my senses. Getting very hard, I angle my pelvis towards her and move closer to her, so she can feel what's going to happen.

I end the kiss. She probably could have gone on for awhile, but I couldn't wait to taste her. I urge her to lay on the bed on her back and spread her legs apart, so I can see her vagina and the nub—her clit—above it.

Leaning over her, I kiss her again, then I move down her body, kissing as I go. When I get to her small, but erect, nipples, I kiss them and take them into my mouth, using my tongue to stimulate them. She arches her back in response and I move on, over her chest to her stomach where I pay a little attention to her navel. Then I work down to her neatly trimmed bush and stop.

She groans when I change course and start sucking her toes into my mouth, then wash her feet, her ankles, and her calves with my tongue as I work my way up. I begin licking her inner thighs and I feel her moving her legs further and further apart as I work my way up to her vulva.

I sense more than see her rise up on her elbows to look down at me. "Oh, God, Jules. You're driving me crazy. Where did you learn this?"

I look up and smile. "On the streets, Elle. Just for you."

I lick a path to her lips and separate them with my tongue, inserting it just a little ways into her vulva and the canal beyond. Removing my tongue, I lick up her slit and nuzzle her clitoris, making it hard and red.

I leave her lying there quivering with anticipation and travel back north to work on her nipples again. I take each in my mouth and I maul them with my tongue, suckling one while I roll the other between my fingers. I can't believe how lustily she behaves when I continue my ministrations for a few minutes. She squirms around, moaning, and kissing me wherever she can reach.

I move down her body again for the final journey to her vagina. She gasps when I probe her sensitive flesh with my tongue. For a few minutes, I fuck her with my tongue, then pay special attention to her erect nub, sucking it as if it were a cock, tickling it with my tongue—feeling her accelerating toward her first climax of the night. I continue holding her clit between my lips as her orgasm crests and she comes down the other side of the wave of pleasure. She's such a wonderful sexual partner—so responsive. I keep pleasuring her pussy until she has two more orgasms and I feel she's as wet as she can get.

Leaning over her, I let her watch with sleepy, but lustful, eyes as I rub the head of my penis in her juices and begin slipping him inside her.

"Dildo," I hear her murmur and look up to see her smiling at me.

I enter her smoothly an inch at a time. She grimaces once, but that facial contortion eases quickly and she begins to fuck me back—slowly at first. Once I have half my penis in her, I push the rest in by pulling him out, and then pushing him back in again, over and over again, letting the motion take him the rest of the way until I'm sunk to the hilt inside her. Each time I pull out, the tissues of her vagina cling to my cock and slightly move out with him. No fucking dildo can do this. I begin pushing in and pulling out faster and soon we achieve a rhythm only we understand—only we can sustain—riding the roller coaster of life.

We go on this way for some minutes until her energy comes back completely. Showing me how much she's into our fucking, her eyes closed, her breaths increasing, her mouth opens, gasping for air, as she humps back at me. I pull out of her until only the very tip remains inside her, then plunge deeply into her again . . . and again . . . and again.

Intense pleasure growing inside the deepest parts of me, Elle climaxes once again beneath me and I pull out just in time to ejaculate on her belly, coming more than I ever have before. I lay down on her abdomen, trying to avoid the mess I've made—and of course, failing to do so. Finally, I roll in it, smearing it around on her belly, then I lay still—just breathing and feeling her breathe beneath me.

After a time, I pull myself up and away from her, feeling my penis flop against my leg. I stand there and look at her. Her eyes are closed and, like me, she's breathing normally again. She opens her eyes and looks at me.

"You're beautiful Elle." Smiling, I add, "And you're a wonderful fuck, too."

She smiles. "You're also beautiful—and a wonderful dildo, too."

Then she closes her eyes and goes to sleep.

* * * * *

Mother Dearest definitely notices a difference in Elle when we go to brunch the next morning. I do, too. There is something sleepy, yet alert, about her. Her eyes aren't entirely open and she keeps touching me reassuringly as we eat. Her smiles are somehow mellow—almost languid—and her responses are minimal. She keeps smiling and her eyes are focused on some distant horizon where, seemingly, happiness resides.

"Jules," her mother says to me with a knowing smile, "you have to let Elle get some sleep, dear boy."

A smug smile is my only answer.

* * * * *

Over the next eleven days in which her mother remains in the city with us, Elle and I make love every day—sometimes three or four times a day. But she never again looks like she did that first morning after at brunch. She never again touches me in public. She never again looks at that distant horizon. At least, she doesn't with me.

She enjoys the sex—there's no question about it. At times, she even gets pushy about it. Sometimes, she uses me as if I am, in fact, her dildo and doesn't care if I climax or about my feelings. Sometimes, she lets me take charge and control the issue, but as the days continue rolling smoothly by, she seems to be lost in herself and controls me more and more.

I don't really know how I felt about it. I just go on, day to day. Work, eat, fuck, sleep. While it's never again like the first time, it's still good. It's fine.

On the fifth day of November, Elle's mother leaves New York City and goes back to her Maine home. I'm at work when she leaves, so I don't see her go. But she leaves me a note about being good to Elle.

Elle's not there when I get home from work—just the note from her mother. I look for her, long for her, wait for her . . . but she doesn't come back and pretty quickly, it dawns on me—she's not ever coming back. Elle's back with her lover. Our interlude is over.

We never make love again.

For many years later, I would occasionally see Elle and her lover—another, I'm afraid. But haven't we all taken others. But I must say, as much as we shared, it seems I don't know her and never really did. It's strange what life can sometimes do to two lovers in the stream of time, isn't it?

FINIS

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