Hot Night in Brooklyn

Hot. Hot and sticky. And hot. Brooklyn, mid-July, the end of a humid day and a thunderstorm getting ready to rock and roll. After a day spent working to a deadline, Maggie wants nothing more than to quit, switch off the lights (the storm has robbed her of a good hour of daylight), cover the table and go drink something very cold, very fast. And find a cool spot. She wants to quit, but she wants to finish...but she wants to quit. As she's deciding if she's at a good spot to stop, one where she can go on, she hears a key in the lock downstairs. Well, that's one decision out of her hands, and in no time, she's standing in the lower hallway of the brownstone, waiting for Dave to walk through the door.

"I wasn't really expecting you," she tells him, then sees that he's carrying a shopping bag. "Ooh, good boyfriend! What did you bring?"

"I brought sustenance," he tells her, savoring every syllable. "I knew you wouldn't have done anything, and I wanted to eat, so I brought it to you."

"Well, come on," she says, and goes down the hall to the big kitchen in the back of the house.

It's marginally better in here, a little below street level, in the back away from the worst of the day's sun, and the tile floor is cool on her bare feet, but it's still oppressively hot. The first hints of thunder can be heard, still at the point where the question is, is it just a plane, or is it really thunder?

Dave thumps the bag down on the table, and together they unpack it. Ciabatta, tomatoes, fresh mozzarella, salami, strawberries. "You are the best," she tells him, and suddenly hungry as well as thirsty, quickly has one end of the long table set for two. The finishing touch is a shallow bowl of herbed olive oil, to dip the bread into. Dave is opening two bottles of beer--"Use glasses," she reminds him--and then she lights some candles and switches out the light. "I thought it might seem cooler this way," she says.

"We need the storm to break it," he says, and for a short while, they're silent, eating. It's one of those times when hunger truly is the best sauce. After the first pangs are assuaged, and they're down to picking, Maggie asks Dave how his day was. "Fine," he answers. "Rehearsal was good....look at that," he says, changing the subject suddenly. "Nothing is moving, look at the flames, they're not even flickering."

It's true, the air is still and heavy. There seem to be more horns blowing than usual--the weather making tempers even shorter than normal.

Maggie is wearing a black, v-necked t-shirt, and it's so humid that it looks nearly painted on her. Her generous cleavage glistens with sweat, and her hair has turned into a cloud around her head. She reaches up to lift it off her neck, the v of her decolletage deepening as she does, then lets it drop again. She does this a few times, and Dave begins to feel a heat that has nothing to do with the weather.

A true rumble of thunder now, no question of what it is.

Dave feels the sweat running down the middle of his back and decides to take off his shirt.

"I'm not sure if that raised or lowered the temperature," Maggie observes, in the dry voice she keeps almost solely for the moments when she's feeling the least dry, then rests her wrists against the cool of her glass of beer.

"I could go either way," he says.

Lightening flashes, further out in Brooklyn.

Maggie moves her chair closer to his. She looks completely deadpan, but he can see her breath is coming a little faster than before. A slight breeze is starting, the precursor of the storm, and the flames begin to flicker ever so slightly. She runs her left hand idly across her chest, and Dave is mesmerized. Finally, she says, "There's something I want to try...I want to play with food a little, okay?"

"Okay," slowly, not knowing what's going to happen next.

She takes the red bowl of olive oil off the table, and sits holding it for a moment in her palm. "A new twist on an old favorite...."

She leans forward, and dipping a finger into the oil, rubs it on first one of his nipples, then the other. The slick coolness (even in the heat) is unexpected and exciting. "Nice?"

"Uh-huh."

"Uh-huh..." Then she leans forward, and sucks it thoroughly off first one, then the other, in the same order as she applied it. His breath is a glottal stop of an exhalation, a soundless punctuation of passion. As she's finishing, he leans closer in to her, and catches her wrists in his hands and pulls her to him. His kiss is almost rough, and she answers him in kind. Not a pretty movie kiss, this one is urgent, hungry, flavored with beer and garlic and sweat and and the soundtrack is not swelling music, but the occasional suctiony slurp, which bothers them not at all.

The thunder sounds closer now, and there's a flash of lightning behind the Williamsburg Bank building.

He lets go of her wrists, and puts his hands on either side of her breasts. He enjoys the familiar feel of the fullness of them, and then his face is in her cleavage. Summer sweat and her perfume, even muskier than normal, fill his senses and he licks his way through the salt and sweetness. Then, through the shirt and her bra, he takes her nipple in his teeth and tugs. It's her turn to make a noise, but hers is an intake of breath, sharp with the surprise of it. He tugs again, a bit harder, and she throws back her head, and her legs begin to part, slowly. Then her hands are on his slick, naked back, and she murmurs, "Come on, oh, please, here, on the table, oh, please..."

They're both on their feet, this is the best idea anyone has ever had, since the beginning of time, "the candles," she giggles, "I don't want to go up in flames."

He blows out two and moves one further away on the floor. Only shadows and one candle and the two of them.

His hands go up under her skirt (she favors skirts) and finds to his pleasure, that she's naked under it. Quite naked, he finds. "I shaved for you."

His voice thick, he says, "You know I how I like that," and small talk is done. She sits on the table, it's the perfect height, her skirt is pushed up and he's undone his jeans and her legs are wrapped around him. He pushes himself into her, hard, and the noise she makes is both pleasure and relief. She's leaning back, supporting herself on her hands, and he's thrusting so hard that the dishes on the other end of the table are jumping. He slows for a moment and reaches down to finger her clit, at which point there's no stopping her, her orgasm starts and he feels the familiar convulsive waves. He tries to prolong the moment, but before long, he's cumming too, hard, a jaw-dropping pleasure. His arms are braced against the table, he leans toward her and knows that when he kisses her, her lips will be icy cold....they always are afterwards...

And the heavens open and the storm is overhead, thunder and lightening, as though jealousy has caused the weather to compete with them.

Later, a floor above, in her big sleigh bed, naked on the sheets, they listen to the rain that has slowed to a steady rhythm, and finally, sleep.